Interstellar 9/10
Buh bah, buh bah, boh bah, boh bah bo bo bah, buh bah, buh bah, boh bah bo bo bah...
Hours later and the theme song is still in my head.
If you haven't seen this movie, go see it...it's great. That said....
LESSTHANSTELLAR (so clever) OR WHY I HATE LOVE THIS MOVIE.
This movie is good. It's original, it's beautiful, it delves into subjects that I find fascinating, but it's not without its problems. And some of those problems are pretty major. But despite those problems, I still got goosebumps from some scenes, and I walked out of the movie theater glad that I sat through this experience.
But that's also one of the major problems. It's long. It's really long. That would be okay, if it wasn't unnecessarily long. There were so many scenes and plot points that actually didn't serve the plot. They were completely trivial and it dragged down what could have been a laconic film. For example, there was no reason for Matt Damon's character and planet other than for Nolan to preach through film. It didn't serve the plot at all, and in general, the entire scene was badly written. It could have been something worth filming if the character wasn't so obvious. There was ample room for suspense, but even a novice could see the twist coming. And other than Cooper being the "ghost", this was the only point in the film thus far that we knew exactly what was about to happen. And the lack of surprise completely killed the scene. That said, Cooper docking into the station was thrilling. I loved every second of it, but Damon being "the best of the best" surely wouldn't have made such a mistake no matter how severe his psychotic breakdown, and it all came off very forced in retrospect. Nolan should have realized that leaving this scene in the movie was a mistake. There was no need to force a problem through "Man" when space is already extremely dangerous. If after guessing wrong on the first planet, the astronauts spent most of their fuel and had to slingshot around the black hole in order to reach the hopefully habitable planet, with Cooper sacrificing himself, the movie would have benefited.
Still, as an adventurous person, I was excited that we were travelling to three planets instead of two (or even one). Space is the biggest dick tease. You can quote me on that. And our generation was born too late to explore Earth and too early to explore the Cosmos, so it comes down to movies like this to satisfy my thirst for adventure. But what do we get? A water planet, an ice planet, and a desert planet. How incredibly boring. Nolan had free range to create any world he wanted with a multitude of reasons why it is or isn't habitable, yet he showed us nothing creative in the slightest. And it was so bland, so insipid that it made me question the science of the film, which immediately drew me out of the picture. If we, today, can find "Goldilocks" planets by the hundreds, then how did these future astronauts not make better guesses? And next to a black hole? Really? I was willing to let the black hole slide because it was serving the plot beautifully, but after the dud of water world, and the unimaginative ice world, I began to hate this movie.
But then the black hole drew me in and creativity was finally shown to me. Despite the many problems I have with this, which mainly focus on the fifth dimensional beings, I really loved the scene of Cooper in the tesseract. The only thing working in this film was Cooper and Murphy, and they were on display on a stage I have wanted to see visualized for a long time now. Seeing time laid out in front of you is incredibly compelling, and with the two best written characters, it was mesmerizing. There were few scenes already that were incredible, but this made the movie. Even though I knew Cooper was the "ghost", seeing how he was the ghost was the best thing this movie had to offer.
And then the movie continues, and at first I was genuinely excited to see it play out. But it just became worse and worse. The only reason you would ever write an ending where Cooper and Murphy meet is because they finally meet. All of their actions and regrets has been leading to this point, and though you could have ended the movie already and really struck a chord about those actions and regrets, you continued on so that they could meet and embrace each other and what happens? A 30 second conversation. A 30 second conversation that doesn't even end abruptly because of someone dying. Is that really it? Is that what you wanted us to see? Cooper should have gotten on the bed and cradled Murphy as if she was young again and the movie should have ended. That would have been powerful, that would have been meaningful, but instead you try to wrap everything in a nice bow, insuring all your characters who survived are accounted for and it comes off confusing and completely backwards to your characters motivations. Either have Cooper floating through space and die or have him coddle his now older than him daughter. Those are the only two ways to end the film...well.
But despite all those problems and several more (why did the fifth dimensional beings make it so damn hard for us humans? There are more coincidences in this movie than an M. Night film), I like it. I really liked it. Every time I got flustered with the plot or tired of the length, Nolan would punch me in the gut with raw dramatic energy. Every time there was too much explanation or the surprise wasn't well concealed, Nolan would punch me in the gut with a thrilling set piece. And every time I began to get bored with the monologues and speeches, my jaw would drop from the magnificent backdrops (I seriously could watch a .gif loop of some of those for hours, hypnotoad be damned).
So watch this movie. Buy it if need be. And shut your brain off and be spoon fed explanation while you lovingly watch two great characters act out their drama on the greatest of stages.
EDIT: One last thing. I do not hate Matt Damon's character. Far from it actually. He's one of the most intriguing and easily one of the most believable, but he's ultimately unnecessary.
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