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movie: Interstellar
2014-Nov-15, Saturday 11:13 pmI liked the movie, in spite of the mixed reviews.
I saw it on opening night and enjoyed it a lot. On the ride back home from the theater, I listened to National Public Radio where a man and woman were discussing several movies. The man thoroughly disliked Interstellar and wanted to walk out several times. He never explained why, exactly, he disliked it so strongly. And now I can't find that radio clip. It was Friday, November 7th, soon after 6pm Central, if any readers here know where to find it.
Interstellar is a good story, though. The film is nice to watch on a big screen, sure, but the visuals are not the point of this movie. It actually has a story... with characters... and adventure... and it asks us what humanity considers its own purpose to be in this universe. It doesn't get much farther than pointing out that nature is harsh and our existence here is provisional, but it's still a fun ride. It dares us to wonder what's "out there" in our future. As a reflection of the main character himself, the story as a whole makes the point that we perform much better as explorers than caretakers.
I wanted to see it a 2nd time after reading some of the (vague) criticism of the movie, to see if I still actually liked it. First, I watched "2001: A Space Odyssey" on television, then I walked out the door to the theater to watch "Interstellar" again. I still liked the movie. I saw three similarities between the two films. First, they both use orchestral music to good effect. Second, they both tried to accurately depict life in space (both zero gravity and the lack of sound in a vacuum). Third, at the end of each movie, they had to rely on visual metaphor to convey peculiarities of math and physics to a general audience. On this last point, Interstellar did a far better job than 2001.
So, I recommend the film. Be warned though that it's 3 hours long. Don't buy any soft drinks unless you're prepared to miss a few minutes of the story for a restroom break. A minute or two out of 3 hours, though, isn't much of an omission.
I saw it on opening night and enjoyed it a lot. On the ride back home from the theater, I listened to National Public Radio where a man and woman were discussing several movies. The man thoroughly disliked Interstellar and wanted to walk out several times. He never explained why, exactly, he disliked it so strongly. And now I can't find that radio clip. It was Friday, November 7th, soon after 6pm Central, if any readers here know where to find it.
Interstellar is a good story, though. The film is nice to watch on a big screen, sure, but the visuals are not the point of this movie. It actually has a story... with characters... and adventure... and it asks us what humanity considers its own purpose to be in this universe. It doesn't get much farther than pointing out that nature is harsh and our existence here is provisional, but it's still a fun ride. It dares us to wonder what's "out there" in our future. As a reflection of the main character himself, the story as a whole makes the point that we perform much better as explorers than caretakers.
I wanted to see it a 2nd time after reading some of the (vague) criticism of the movie, to see if I still actually liked it. First, I watched "2001: A Space Odyssey" on television, then I walked out the door to the theater to watch "Interstellar" again. I still liked the movie. I saw three similarities between the two films. First, they both use orchestral music to good effect. Second, they both tried to accurately depict life in space (both zero gravity and the lack of sound in a vacuum). Third, at the end of each movie, they had to rely on visual metaphor to convey peculiarities of math and physics to a general audience. On this last point, Interstellar did a far better job than 2001.
So, I recommend the film. Be warned though that it's 3 hours long. Don't buy any soft drinks unless you're prepared to miss a few minutes of the story for a restroom break. A minute or two out of 3 hours, though, isn't much of an omission.