‘Interstellar’ is one of the most teased and anticipated films of the year, and it delivers... if you have masters in quantum physics and space exploration - ah, who am I kidding, writer/director Christopher Nolan is a master filmmaker who can make the phonebook watchable. Nolan has continually created the best of the best in cinema for the past 15 years, and now he's taking audiences into the bleak, desolate future and saving us all by going out of this world - literally.
Not too many years from now, Earth’s population has plummeted and the planet has become an increasingly barren land as humanity struggles to survive. When a child’s brightest hope after graduation is to become a farmer instead of going to collage, you know there’s something seriously wrong. As one character explains, “The world didn’t run out of television sets and screens, it ran out of food.” Former NASA pilot and engineer turned farmer Cooper (Matthew McConaughey) is raising his son and daughter with his father-in-law as they fight dying crops, severe dust storms and a future they have no choice but to take one day at a time. When Cooper and his daughter stumble across a gravitational anomaly in their own home, it leads them to a secret NASA headquarters where its inhabitants are working on a covert mission to travel out of our galaxy in the slim hope of finding new worlds to inhabit and save the human race.
SWITCH: 'INTERSTELLAR' TRAILER 3
Using a scope beyond anyone’s wildest imaginations, Nolan has once again done what he does best - stretching the human mind and its comprehension, while at the same time delivering a subtle and heart-wrenching tale of humanity and revealing frightening truths about ourselves. Occasionally hitting a few potholes caused by the weight of its own exposition and general ambition, the film powers through these issues, leaving little in its wake.
Where ‘Gravity’ faltered under its poor script and unbelievable casting, Nolan and his co-writer brother Jonathan have put together a highly comprehensive story that makes even McConaughey appear legit as a space traveller - no easy feat. Combined with stunning visuals (the biggest sequences are shot for IMAX) and a terrific cast including Anne Hathaway, Casey Affleck, Jessica Chastain and Nolan regular Michael Caine, this film is so complex yet at the same time so gripping that, by the end, all the parts seem to magically falls into place.
Nolan is taking audiences into the bleak, desolate future.
Despite all the pomp and circumstance of an intergalactic futuristic space adventure, the heart of this film is a father/daughter relationship that catches you by surprise, even erring on the side of saccharine at times.
‘Interstellar’ is a film where you can sit back and be taken on a journey by a master as you watch on in wonderment. It probably won’t be the journey you expected, but it's one worth taking nonetheless.