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CaptainJackSparrow

AD Astra | Sep 20 2019 | Sci Fi | Best movie of the year with a B- cinemascore? | Brad Pitt

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Yeah, go see this, people! It can't be bad!

 

And yeah, I would never expect the brilliance of Sunshine and Gravity - because such movies come once in a decade. AND because - whatever some misguided people here seem to think - James Gray is a nobody. Yes, I saw Z in cinemas, also We Own the Night  - he is a nobody. While Cuaron and especially Danny Boyle are both Top 5 directors in the world EVER, maybe even Top 3!!

 

BUT - this is real space sci-fi, this looks good, this has a chance of being thoughtful or emotional - how many of those do we really get?!! In a DECADE?!!

 

IMAX for the Shay, at least two or three times! Bringing my girlfriend too. Let's see how she handles good sci-fi.

 

P.S.: Bonus points!! @Plain Old Tele says he hates it!

Edited by shayhiri
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Absolutely beautiful film. Maybe not the best film I've seen today (I'm sorry but that goes to the Steven Universe movie) but I love how the film gets more and more personal as Roy gets further and further away from Earth. Also happy that the ending didn't go into "Contact" level melodrama. Ended on a much more nuanced note and thank god for that. Probably my favourite Gray film after Two Lovers (might be a bit below Lost City in terms of ranking but that's a maybe).

 

Also, I'm glad the ex-wife wasn't added here just to make the character more relatable. I didn't know why she was there in the movie while watching it but it all makes sense in the end. 

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Very curious to know what the 9/10-year-olds in my screening made of their (probable) first experience of a James Gray film.

I really liked this overall but can't see general audiences taking to it unfortunately. I found it to be a lot more emotionally engaging than The Lost City of Z and ranks just above Two Lovers as my favorite Gray film. I'm still waiting to fully adore one of his works but he's clearly a very gifted filmmaker.

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5 minutes ago, lorddemaxus said:

Saw a lot of kids in my screening too. Kind of funny though. Most of them probably came in expecting something like The Martian.

Funny you say that, because my dad saw it too and afterwards he told me that it wasn't as enjoyable as The Martian. I was like: "Well....yeah, but it wasn't designed to be as entertaining as The Martian".

This is where the initial marketing may have hurt its potential general audience reception. I remember being underwhelmed by the first trailer because it gave me Gravity/ The Martian vibes, which were not what I was expecting from Gray. However, it was edited in a way that contained a broader audience appeal, something the movie itself doesn't carry imo.

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Given the current status of space exploration and vehicle development pretty much all of the space vehicles in the movie are ridiculous. It’s like the script and vehicle design was done in the 70’s and no one ever bothered to update it except to slap on a few Virgin Galactic stickers. 

 

If there was an interesting emotional core to the movie this could have been overlooked but the main character is an emotionless robot and you’re not given much reason to care about him. 

 

The movie played things very straight but randomly jumped between trippy sequences. It felt like Gray was looking for his inner Terry Gilliam but was nowhere near finding it. 

 

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7 minutes ago, DeeCee said:

It’s like the script and vehicle design was done in the 70’s and no one ever bothered to update it except to slap on a few Virgin Galactic stickers.

 

Just this description makes it sound great i'm sorry.  that doesn't mean an inherent disinterest in actual space stuff. but those kinda retro ideas of what space travel coulda been like are fun. 

 

as for Bradley Pitt being an emotionless robot i know that's not gonna work for a lot of people but for me how errr... empty he is is why his arc plays so well for me emotionally.

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5 minutes ago, CoolioD1 said:

Just this description makes it sound great i'm sorry.  that doesn't mean an inherent disinterest in actual space stuff. but those kinda retro ideas of what space travel coulda been like are fun. 

 

as for Bradley Pitt being an emotionless robot i know that's not gonna work for a lot of people but for me how errr... empty he is is why his arc plays so well for me emotionally.

 

I suppose you could say he's an empty vessel into which you can pour whatever you want. But without going into spoilers, the keys to how it wraps up needed to be more established (or even set up) early on, and I didn't think they were.

 

The vehicle design didn't bug me as much as it did for @DeeCee (I think), but there were certain... choices made in the third act that effectively throw away any effort they made at depicting any sort of "realistic space travel". Movies like GRAVITY and THE MARTIAN (or even INTERSTELLAR) have done a pretty good job at trying to be "realistic" (while fudging things here and there) but it's like AD ASTRA just gives up in that regard.

 

edit: LOL at my post directly following Tree's. :rofl: 

Edited by Plain Old Tele
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The problem is it’s not set up as being some kind retro alternative universe. 

 

That works if it’s something like the Battlestar Galactica reboot or what looks to be happening with For All Mankind on Apple. 

 

The orbital mechanics in Gravity are ridiculous but you don’t care because you’re engaged with the main character and her journey. 

 

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