Project Hail Mary presents quite the paradox. There’s so much going on with it that I felt like it could sustain not only one long podcast episode but several1 – not that I’m in the mood to return to Rancho Notorious just yet – but that all the rich pickings for conversation never quite added up to a film that could love.
The editor-in-chief and I were texting backwards and forwards all day Friday with thoughts, ideas and observations and I can’t say that has happened too often recently after a night at the cinema, but I wasn’t emotionally moved by it the way I was by the films that inspired it.
Douglas Trumbull’s Silent Running is a foundation text for me and I’m still destroyed whenever I see the three little robots, Huey, Dewey and Louie, going about their lonely conservation business as their ship disappears off into outer space. The character of the alien Rocky in Project Hail Mary serves a similar purpose – selfless cuteness – but I never got the sense that he was really in mortal2 danger or that his desperate sacrifices might be permanent. It’s not that kind of film. It has themes of loneliness, alienation3 and self-discovery, but an uplifting ending is never really in doubt.
Even the existential elemental crisis facing humanity isn’t caused by anything we’ve done down here on Earth. A species of tiny organisms feeding off – and therefore depriving the galaxy of – starlight is just rotten luck and the global conglomerate of space agencies tasked with finding the solution appears – despite boss Sandra Hüller’s lack of faith in humanity’s ability to cooperate – to be coming together productively.
Ryan Gosling is a ‘seat of the pants’ microbiologist, hounded out of respectable science for having the temerity to posit that life does not require hydrogen and oxygen, now teaching at a middle school and attempting to sugar coat the bad news about sunlight to impressionable youngsters. Turns out the box is thing we need to be thinking outside of and he is drafted in to help work out what these little critters are and how they can be stopped before the lights go out all over the galaxy.
The film takes a little while to get to that, however, as it follows the structure of Andy Weir’s novel by backwardsing and forwardsing as Gosling’s character recovers from space-induced amnesia. When we meet him, he’s waking up from cryosleep to discover that he’s the only survivor of an 11-light-year journey to a star that appears to hold the key to our fate. We – like he – are dropped right in it.
Before he can get his bearings, he sees another vessel out of his porthole and comes to discover that his experience is mirrored by an alien – also on the same mission and also alone due to the death of his crew members – and the two of them have to learn how to work together if their mission is to be successful. An interstellar bromance ensues – charming and funny thanks to a typically goofy performance from Gosling and some outstanding puppet character work from the gifted James Ortiz.
A crowd-pleasing, inspiring, smart and deliciously detailed film, Project Hail Mary deserves to make a ton of money – mainly because when the final pieces drop into place at the end you’ll want to go back and buy a second ticket straight away to enjoy how writer Drew Goddard and directors Lord & Miller put it all together..
No Tears on the Field is a local documentary about the world of provincial women’s rugby – a topic already rendered into drama by David Geary’s Pack of Girls in 1991. The novelty is therefore long gone and the successes of our elite players mean the profile of the sport is as high as it has ever been.
Where Lisa Burd’s film shines is in the casting. Focusing on Taranaki club rugby she has found some brilliant characters even if a lot of the drama in their lives has already happened by the time she arrives with her camera. I’m not convinced that the final product justifies the price of a movie ticket but I’m glad that these women are having their stories told.
Further listening (and watching)
I barely scratched the surface of Project Hail Mary with Emile Donovan on RNZ Nights on Friday and we also spoke about Star Wars Skeleton Crew (Disney+) and this delightful YouTube video which was made by combining hundreds of high resolution photos taken by astronaut Loral O’Hara from the International Space Station turned into a slow and meditative journey across North America.
It was also my rostered appearance on RNZ’s Culture 101 on Sunday afternoon and I reviewed No Tears on the Field as well as I Swear and Hoppers, which I will write up here next week when they get their proper cinema release.
- I’d love to talk to somebody for an hour or more about the genius of casting Sandra Hüller and how she isn’t ((just) there because she’s an Oscar-nominated actress lending gravitas to a blockbuster. She brings something uniquely Hüller to the character of Stratt, making someone that doesn’t have much to say on the page as rich and complex as any of her most famous roles. I literally can’t imagine anyone else in the part. ↩︎
- I know, I know – “mortal danger”. ↩︎
- I know, I know – “alienation”. ↩︎
