Interstellar
Starring Matthew McConaughey, Anne Hathaway, Jessica Chastain
Directed by Christopher Nolan
Rightfully recognizing that there's no escaping the Gravity comparisons, Christopher Nolan raises the ante with his sci-fi odyssey. Here, it's not just a lone astronaut's survival that's at stake but rather all of humanity's. Furthermore, the cosmic perils encountered don't represent a particularly bad day at the office but rather the hurdles that must be overcome if we're to fulfil our destinies as explorers and pioneers. Consequently, there's a sense of exhilaration that fuels these interstellar exploits, even if Nolan's debt to Kubrick's 2001 – even before we're vaulted somewhere beyond the Stargate – ensures that it's of the grim-faced variety.
With the business of this near-future's backstory tended to in a parent-teacher meeting, Cooper (Matthew McConaughey) – a devoted patriarch but reluctant farmer on a failing Earth – turns space cowboy and accepts a commission to discover an inhabitable planet where humanity can start over. While this doomsday scenario instills much urgency, the “running clock” more closely resembles the timepiece in a Dali painting once Cooper and his weepy sidekick (Anne Hathaway) pass through a wormhole.
Unsurprisingly, warping reality comes more naturally to Nolan than conveying basic human emotions. Despite the torrents of tears, the attempts at sentiment are steamrolled by the sheer spectacle. Having abandoned the rigorous construction of Memento or The Prestige in favour of more rickety narratives that threaten to collapse under the weight of their considerable ambition, Nolan is one of the few blockbuster directors willing (and permitted) to venture into the unknown. Understandably, he loses his way on occasion, but he atones for those missteps by arriving at a bravura climax that leaves you questioning when the multiplex last inspired legitimate awe.
