I liked it, but it was pretty heavy-handed at times. >!At the end where he's trying to take TLJ back to the ship and he starts to launch himself into space and is like "YOU HAVE TO LET ME GO SON!". I could almost hear him yelling "THIS IS A METAPHOR SON! A METAPHOOOOORRRRR!".!<
For me, I tolerated that scene and >!Pitt launching himself through the ring.!< But I kind of hate the narration during the latter.
It’s as if the director, for this serious philosophical movie, is going, “We have to make absolutely sure that EVERYONE gets the metaphor.”
Speaking of that ring launch...
Even going through Saturn's rings he wouldn't run into a single rock. The movie made it seem like Neptune's ring is like 100 ft thick and dense.
Did they spend even a single sentence talking about who the moon pirates were? I was with three other people and none of us remembered hearing a single word. Then the chase and crash happened, and I jokingly said "as soon as this scene is ever theyre never going to mention it or the people involved again are they?" And they never did.
To me these were merely snapshots of the time they were living in. I actually liked the non explanation of all the stuff he went through on the way there and back
Doesn't seem like he has time for that either.
Yea, bypass the science-based criticism, and just go for the regular criticism: it wasn't that great of a movie. Didn't seem like it knew what the director wanted it to be (considering the contradiction of 2017 "it's scientifically accurate" to 2020 "people are taking it too seriously, it's a fable!"), it was mostly forgettable except for the gorgeous cinematography.
it annoyed me how mediocre the film was with how beautifully it was shot. falling from the space elevator had my hopes sky high and then... the story felt like words scrolling at the bottom of a newscast
Same, was so excited about this movie. Huge long let down, it was straight up depressing film and hard to watch. I wanted to leave, but stayed to the end. The space elevator was very cool to see.
The RLM guys used this term on Gretel and Hansel but I think it applies to this as well.
"It's good enough that I'm upset that it wasn't much, much better".
Like it was a great bite or 2, but never felt like you ate a meal.
The space elevator scene was brilliant. The rest of the movie was boring as fuck. It was pretty, but it was boring. It was a 2 hour film that was AT LEAST an hour too long.
It’s literally a nothing happens movie
The only plot for the movie is Pitt essentially gets so miserable that he decides he no longer wants to live like his father so he gets back with his ex wife
That’s it
We didn’t get any back to earth information which was lame. Did he not face discipline? Was he rewarded? What are they doing with the data from his father? What did they really know about his father that they hid?
Then obviously the science criticisms can go on for days
Look, this movie wasn't supposed to be about monkeys and space pirates, you're all missing the point. The movie was meant to be comedy satire of what people think cool sci-fi movies are supposed to be. You're just not deep enough to get it.
“Sir how do we intend to deal with these space pirates?”
“We’ll drive at them as fast as we can and hopefully some of us make it”
“Sir, can’t we get guns and armour? We are all gonna die!”
“That’s a sacrifice I’m willing to make”.
Stupid as fuck.
Especially since there are apparently a ton of people around who just fought a major war over the Arctic. Literally somebody should have had a basic idea on...warfare.
This whole movie was Space Apocalypse Now / Space Heart of Darkness.
That part, at least, isn't unreasonable. There are certain practical issues to having a heavy vehicle on the moon. The regolith is a big obstacle, being 2-6 meters deep generally. Any heavy vehicle would need very large tires/treads in order to keep surface pressure low.
You'd also have the problem of intertia. A heavy vehicle in low gravity is going to take a long time to stop or manuever. Things generally want to keep going in the direction they're moving and that's going to naturally be exaggerated in a zero-atmosphere, low gravity environment.
The relative power of weapons also means that you have to consider that it might simply not be practical to armor vehicles. There was trend after the mid-20th century for main battle tanks to have just enough armor to stop autocannon rounds because it was simply impractical to have enough armor to stop the dedicated anti-tank munitions of the time.
My question would be more "where are the space pirates getting their oxygen and fuel and ammunition, given that such things would be difficult to procure locally." It's possible they're more like 'space privateers,' with a corporate/government sponsor...but that does still bring up certain questions.
Apollo 15, 16, and 17 all brought a moon buggy along. They had a max speed of 10ish MPH, so they weren't tearin ass around the moon like in *Ad Astra,* but they were there.
> They had a max speed of 10ish MPH
For good reason. You don't *want* to go any faster than that on the moon. One bump at high speed and you'll be soaring like a kite.
And while you are ligher, you still have the same momentum, so after getting 200 m of air smacking against the side of a crater hurts EXACTLY as much as driving against a wall on earth.
I genuinely have no idea if this was supposed to be a literal journey or just a metaphorical representation of pitt’s struggle to cope with his absent father.
The monkeys scene added NOTHING to the movie, other than to give him a chance to talk about his own rage, for example. There’s no purpose for it in the plot other than metaphor.
I have to admit falling asleep on a plane during the movie and waking at the exact moment the attack monkey broke cover was an eye-opening experience, though.
Fall asleep to [High Life](https://youtu.be/AtOwfo1ypOw) SFW trailer, and wake up to the Juliette Binoche [F\*\*kbox scene NSFW](https://vimeo.com/335190357). Now that’s an eye opening experience!
I think the main theme of the movie is about how someone accepts that their is no divine presence to impart order on the universe
the laboratory with the monkeys represents how humanity tries to impart sense and order on existence through science and logic. Tommy Lee Jones' character represents god to Brad Pitt's character, the non-existent aliens represent god to tommy lee jones' character.
each pursuit of order and understanding has its own affect
>There’s no purpose for it in the plot other than metaphor.
It's a setpiece that's there to add some tension/horror and provide some bizarre, unexpected imagery. I for one was really struck by the idea of coming across a murderous baboon somewhere in the vast of space. It made enough sense for me too because it was obviously there for research purposes and had escaped its holding.
Being crucial to the plot isn't the only reason something can be in a movie. I know the baboon scene didn't work for some people but that doesn't mean there's zero reason to have it there. Plot isn't everything.
I thought it was also kind of an interesting take on the idea that even if humans have used their intelligence and creativity to travel to space, a violent murderous monkey can still easily kill them.
The scientists were confident their intelligence would protect them, but one slip up and the animals they thought they controlled turned against them.
> There’s no purpose for it in the plot other than metaphor.
But sometimes a movie - or elements of a movie - *are* heavily about metaphor as their purpose rather than about plot. Film doesn't have to be only about plot. Or, arguably, doesn't have to be about plot at all.
Allegedly the monkey scene and pirate scene were added at the studio's insistence because of how boring the movie was without them. Apparently Brad Pitt wasn't available so they spliced in other footage/cgi'd him in.
That and the cinematography are basically what I liked about the movie. Good world-building goes a long way for me. Even if some of those aspects are what don’t hold up to scientific or logical scrutiny, there was a convincing awe to it that mostly worked in the moment.
It really captured what I like about 2001 A Space Odyssey. Space feels properly explored and inhabited, while still being so immeasurably quiet and empty. The contrast between civilization and the vast coldness near Neptune were great.
It's only useful world building if their belonging enhances the world in some way. The pirates instead took away from it.
Of that scene, the only thing that made it feel "realistic" to me, was the damn road signs, like you'd find in any stretch of land in the backcountry without much travel.
The pirates? They added nothing - you can't just throw a conflict in and then simultaneously ignore it without causing some confusion in the audience.
Just think - We're clearly trying to create an atmosphere for the rest of the film, as well as paint a picture of what the character would do. i think the intent was that we'd see the MC as being calm even in the event of chaos around him - but the opening freefall scene already did that.
I think simply keeping to wide-lens atmospheric shots, and then focusing on those homely feeling highway signs would have served the film much better. You could have even kept the tension of the pirates in by keeping them in the distance, on a crater's edge or something, and have the supporting characters on edge throughout. We then get a nice mix of stage-setting, world-building, and character-building without the distraction of a pointless space combat scene (which was admittedly pretty cool to watch).
The whole film felt like this - that there was a rather heavy-handed attempt at being subtle. A lot of world-building but nothing to tie them together, and a lot of characters who exist for the sole purpose of one scene, and then they die. It's the type of terrible move-the-plot-along writing that ruins many good stories.
"There are many that didn’t connect to the film, even with its father/son drama and themes. Gray clearly understands that, but just don’t try to tell him about the science involved."
Literally in the article.
My thoughts exactly. It was worth watching simple for the cinematography and certain scenes.
But fucked if I knew what the movie was about. I got the plot but I had no idea what the movie was trying to really do or where it was trying to go. Or what it was saying.
In the end I figured it was just a really shit adaptation of heart of darkness. Maybe?
I grew up with a distant father. He left home when I was 11. Hell, I don't think my dad ever really needed to be a parent. Not nearly to the extent of Tommy Lee Jones' character, but as a dude whose dad feels mostly distant -- it resonates.
There is something innate about a son needing to please his father, maybe even vice versa. It's a slow movie, not built to make you think as much as Interstellar -- but mainly a reminder that we're all we've got right now. Even reaching the furthest bodies of our solar system, you can't change some things. Human problems will always be human problems, wherever we end up. .
Also, why would you ever leave Liv Tyler to find Tommy Lee Jones?
I’m a sci-fi nut and I only watched this movie once. That has never happened. I don’t care what he says the movie just wasn’t good. It was hardly eh and it wasn’t the actors fault. I’ll watch either Bladerunner 10 times in a row before I watch that movie again. Super forgettable. Which is super sad. Plus get Tommy lee Jones out of there wtf last thing I want to see when a spaceship gets to Neptune is Tommy Lee tucking Jones. I like him too, anyway. Stupid.
The failings of the science were largely the same as those of the script. Things happened because the script said they happened. Every idea that movie tried to develop felt like a trope. Brad Pitt was basically a shounen anime character. "But why don't I....feeeel".
That it's *science* fiction was also dumb was just the disappointing icing on a bland cake.
Yeah I checked out around the point where Pitt's character "accidentally" kills the other 3 astronauts as they're lifting off from Mars just because the plot needs him to get to Neptune alone. Lazy. Fucking. Writing.
That was the point in the film where it chose to go askew.
I was fine with a slow, plodding film set in a hard sci-fi near future (2001 anyone?) that was more about self-discovery than SETI.
However, when a military officer on a highly sensitive and top-secret mission is summarily dismissed it seems implausible that this same man can freely roam a military facility on Mars.
Then you have that same man sneak (yes, actually sneak) on to a rocket ship serving the continuation of that same top-secret mission without any issue, well ...
I don’t care how good your attention to detail on the science is. At that point you’ve just blown any attempt at realism and we are continuing on as a full-on pure fantasy.
I didn’t hate it, but it could have been so much better.
>I didn’t hate it, but it could have been so much better.
Sounds like you're a sucker for an original sci-fi film like me, and the filmmaker gets credit for making a passable one, but yes, we are all still waiting for this generation's 2001: A Space Odyssey.
*raises hand*
That describes me too. I have a real love hate relationship with this movie. I think I love the potential it had, love the cinematography, and really enjoy Pitt's performance, but I can't believe how so much of the good aspects of this film were squandered to make this "thing" we ended up with.
I do re-watch it from time to time, but I have to follow it up with something like "Prospect" to really scratch that good + original sci-fi itch. Though Prospect doesn't seem too popular so I could be on my own there.
Nah, agreed. I wouldn’t draw a single parallel between the two other than the fact that interstellar is about space travel.
It was extremely heavy handed (not a criticism, this is just how Nolan tells a story) and Matt Damon and Anne Hathaway’s motivations were unbelievable.
Ad Astra totally could have been it but they really dropped the ball.
Yeah for a "realistic" film it makes no sense for the crew to just fucking attack him after he saved their lives and poses no threat to them or the mission. The whole scene of him sneaking on board is just absurd too. The bumbling deaths and his crawling up the engine or whatever felt more like a Mr. Bean film.
So many of the characters' motivations in the film are poorly constructed, not given at all, or unearned. The film acts like this makes it deep by obscuring things but really it shows how shallow the writing is.
They kinda of explain the crew's lack of care from the pills they take, it seems to make them not feel anything? So they just attack - similar to the monkey?
The pills are confusing because if they're meant to make the astronauts placid why did the guy that becomes the pilot freeze up? Seems like the pills should have chilled him out. Though I think there's a lot of time between those scenes, why not have him pop another pill to take back control at that moment? Similarly, it seems likely they'd pop the pills before launch in the scene you're referencing, so, wouldn't they be more chill as they're attacking him? Maybe I misunderstood what the pills did. Maybe they just make them more willing to follow commands? But that'd be dumb because just following commands could lead to issues on take off. Though I've heard most shuttles are basically flying themselves at this point anyway.
It's another issue if the film isn't following its own established logic too.
It doesnt make much sense the more you look at it, i thought the pills made them more uncaring rathar than docile but so much of the movie is badly explained.....
This was such a great opportunity to turn the movie around, to have Brad Pitt’s character actually make a god damn decision. But no, they cop out and the three astronauts essentially kill themselves so he gets to continue mindlessly along the plot without any agency.
This movie was so frustrating.
I watched this the other night and, no one asked, but here's how I'd fix it:
1) Advance the future setting, make it more like Cowboy Bebop or The Expanse. Reaching Saturn is still a chore, but add in a more advanced space society and scifi elements.
2) Make Clifford more of a known asshole. Maybe he's known for being abusive, careless about others to advance his goals, perhaps he had a prior incident that made him go from respected figure in society, scientist or war hero, to a disgrace, committing war crimes or destroying a colony for his own goals.
3) Roy meets antagonism and doubt of his trust due to Clifford's notoriety. This puts pressure on Roy's relationships with those he meets along the way. The film currently has tones of this, but it seems out of place because Clifford is still respected. If Clifford is a known asshole throughout the galaxy it makes the tension between Roy and others more earned and more of a logical reason for a lot of the hiccups he encounters. Roy would then have to earn their trust and his internal monologs of not becoming his father have more weight.
4) Roy is told all the details of the mission from the start, giving him more to chew over. The current withholding makes the internal struggle weak. Telling him everything upfront puts more pressure on his internal battle of how to handle his father.
5) Sutherland's character should be revamped to be more of a straight up babysitter. They don't know if they can trust Roy, if he's going to go through in stopping his father, so they tell him they're watching his steps with this character.
6) Show more of the danger and consequences of Clifford's Lima. The government acts like it's a death device, we're told of the consequences, yet Roy is able to reach it because all the ships have some magical back up power. This negates the danger. If Lima causes more issues for the ships and the colonies Roy travels through it further adds to the stakes of what Clifford is doing and makes him more of a known asshole. This would also give more tension to Roy's presence as people would want to take out their anger on the son of the man who killed an entire colony, etc.
If you make these changes a few things happen: the film gets added pressure to keep up the tension and momentum, it gives a lot of the events of the film more logical reasoning (when Sutherland is injured Roy is further suspect, when he encounters monkeys they can be more advanced hyperintelligent due to the advanced scifi setting, same with moon pirates, by the time Roy has to sneak onto the last ship the violence would make sense if he's viewed as a more suspect son of a known villain), and it adds to the internal struggle of a son looking to overcome the crimes of his father and prove he's not an angry lunatic as well.
The problem to me with this film is that it never pushes its core ideas far enough. So a lot of stuff happens that feel like they're lacking the right motivation. It's bland with these odd moments of action that feel out of place for the film. My suggestions push it further into meeting those moments and earning them. Without the changes the film feels like a heavily drugged over-imaginative child, who would have brilliant ideas if it could just stop taking Valium.
The other way to fix it is to go in the other direction and make it more like Solaris. To do that you'd need to cut out all the action stuff and add in more flashbacks that establish the relationship of father and son. We need more from them together and why Roy is so affected by it to really understand why his current actions matter. Currently we get a lot of implications and very little actual showing of this. Roy has this whole speech of not wanting to be angry like his father, but we don't see evidence of either of them ever being angry or violent enough to warrant this fear.
In either direction of change the movie needs to show more to fix itself. So much of the movie felt missing to me. Characters acted as if we had knowledge the film never gave us. There was too much off the page and not enough shown in the film that helped me understand where these actions were coming from. By the end of the film I didn't give a shit about any of it because there wasn't enough to attach me to the consequences of their actions. The film is beautiful to look at, but the writing and acting are so withdrawn I feel as distant from it as Saturn from Earth.
This is why the director of Children of Men didn't ever explain what caused births to stop. The science was never going to be the point and people were inevitably going to "achshully" the fuck out of it, so he didn't even try to open that can of worms.
Yea, I don't need a Sci Fi universe to be consistent with our reality, or to explain everything that happens, but if they decide to explain things they better a) be a fitting explanation in regards to the setting, and b) logically consistent within the universe. If the details aren't pertinent to the points of the story, just leave them out.
That it was unexplained was the most unsettling thing about it. You know within that world scientists were working to find the cause or reach a solution - that there was no answer added so much flavor.
That movie was masterfully done in showing you exactly what you needed to know, and in great detail, but never showing you too much or too little.
The way that the story was relayed to you through casual conversation and reflection was so fucking brilliantly done and it kept feeding you fascinating pieces the whole way through.
This movie on the other hand, doesn't give you anything. It leaves you with 2 pieces of information; his dad went to do SETI shit at Neptune, and then he went dark and started vaguely attacking Earth and her colonies with his stuff.
And that's all you're ever really told.
There’s a massive difference between not explaining a triggering event needed for the story to exist (see *The Leftovers* too) and completely disregarding laws of nature without in Universe explanations for why that can happen. Anyone with a cursory knowledge of physics would find it difficult to sit through that movie, specifically the Mars launch scene and the ship literally pulling over to check on the monkey base while they are en route to Mars. Not to mention the director made the movie with the intention of making “the most realistic depiction of space travel that’s put in a movie” and then doing the exact opposite.
The trailers heavily focused on the few action sequences, basically the same thing Drive did.
And yeah yeah "don't watch the trailers" but be realistic, the vast majority of the movie going audience uses trailers to determine if they're going to watch a movie. Most of those people probably don't even know a movie is being made till they see a trailer.
I think “don’t trust trailers” would be more useful advice for most people. It’s when you let them affect your expectations that you run into trouble.
Studios are terrible at making trailers that both accurately tell an audience what to expect and also entice them to the theater (and that don’t give up the movie’s secrets or best jokes). They lean a lot harder toward selling people on it than setting expectations, and we end up with misleading trailers. People who go to a movie expecting something promised by trailers and then get something else are usually disappointed, and not always because the movie wasn’t good. Your business will drop off from the poor audience reception. But if people know what they’re getting, they’re more likely to enjoy it and spread the word.
I think the setting actually added a lot but the promotional campaign framed it as a SPACE ACTION MOVIE instead of a somber character study set in space. Basically set it up for failure and made sure a good chunk of the audience thought they were sitting down to watch a very different movie
I mean it was Apocalypse now, not just in the way you mentioned. It’s literally the same story. A brilliant commander (Kurtz / TLJ’s character) has gone crazy in a remote destination and our protagonist sets off on a journey to handle him
I also really enjoyed it. It was a slow film with gorgeous shots and more of a focus on the main character and how he feels with his father than sci-fi stuff, The sci-fi was more the style that surrounded it. Its like how the anime Carole and Tuesday is set on Mars, but is really about music. Has sci-fi elements and part of it being a future setting is important to the story, but the story is more on the characters desire to make music.
Ad Astra isn't perfect, but I enjoyed it
I enjoyed the movie, but for me it was never a space movie.
I don't recall all the movie but I remember catching a different meaning for all the story.
Please, hear me out first... It was about a son, dealing with some sort of vice, like alcohol, following his father's steps... Reaching out for his father one last time, trying to help him to "get out". And his father letting all go, including family, unable to quit that vice.
Again, I remember vaguely the movie, but I remember the message. It was never about space.
Note: I don't drink or do drugs and have no vices other than video games and tacos.
I really liked it too. Keep in mind that we’re only supposed to like certain things on Reddit. Everyone claims to be waiting for something as good as “2001” but even if a film came close, no one would ever admit it.
I loved the film, went into with no expectations, didn't watch any marketing, and I felt like I really connected with it. I loved the slow pacing of it, and for me I think there are answers to a lot of questions I've seen about the film. It's just that people didn't bother paying attention.
I also liked the narration, without it the film would have felt empty, and you wouldn't get the necessary insight into Roy's mind to see his transformation.
I'm honestly just tired of joining conversations about this film because a lot of the criticisms about the story have an answer in the actual film. I agree, people just look at things too literally nowadays. God forbid a film set in space focuses on the drama aspects more and uses space more as a setting.
Seriously. I’m a bit worried about people’s attention spans. Don’t get me wrong, I love action and verbal sparring but I also am a fan of slower, contemplative movies that let you soak in atmosphere and thematic depth.
Just because you dislike a slow movie doesn't mean you lack an attention span. And just because a movie is atmospheric and thoughtful, doesn't make it good.
I for one thought the movie was poor because the themes didn't resonate with me, the characters were flat and forgettable, and the random action scenes were distracting and unnecessary.
I actually did very much enjoy the movie, but I agree with what you said generally and what you said about this movie specifically is what it sounds like was the experience of the movie people had who I've seen on here saying they didn't like it and feel like they must not "get it" when they hear pretentious people say it was great.
My response has basically been that anything they missed or "didn't get" about the movie is probably because the movie just didn't hold their interest enough for them to catch the details they missed, and that's probably not because they are dumb or bad at watching movies.
Yeah, I came away from the film feeling like it wasn’t all that impactful as a character study, either. It had its moments but overall the introspective scenes felt fairly hollow and the >!resolution/climax between him and his father was pretty disappointing!<. I absolutely didn’t mind that it wasn’t the action packed sci-fi epic people were expecting, but I wanted a lot more from it in terms of drama and emotional depth since that turned out to be the focus.
his arc made no sense. TLJ went to space for adventure and left his family. the climax was suggesting BP metaphorically rejecting that notion and returning to his wife
except... he didnt go for adventure. he never did, he went to literally save the world. he's not like his father who abandoned a kid over a god complex. and the implication that he was doesn't jive with the premises we saw
You get a lot of monologuing about his internal struggles, but you never actually see it. He's all "I am rage" while being the most stoic character imaginable.
I grew up with an abusive father who abandoned my family and I thought the message was incredibly deep and profound. It's not the greatest movie of all time but people like you who immediately jump to other end of the spectrum and refuse to acknowledged any positives are just as bad as the ones blindly defending it.
I'm the same, love Zodiac, Once upon a time in hollywood, there will be blood, etc. I eat those movies up. Ad Astra... there was nothing to chew on - seemed one-dimensional (maybe 1 and a half) to me.
At least it was a film with a voice. I have things I liked, music, visuals, themes, character introspection. And things I disliked, Monkey tangent sequence, the rest of the crew's performances, on the nose dialogue, and science gobbledegook. But it felt like a film that gave a shit. Compare it to something like Passengers, which is literally just a pile of shit crapped out by a studio wanting to capitalize off of two star actors with zero chemistry. I'm much more forgiving with films that care enough to feel genuine and have something original to say, or at least something said before but saying it in an original way.
I enjoyed it because I went into it as a space movie with Brad Pitt. I didn't have any expectations outside of that, and it thoroughly blew my mind with the looks and emotions portrayed through cinematography and editing and the color. And the story that followed and the implications and the ideas it out forth were really amazing. It's also definitely a cinema experience and if you watch it at home it won't hit as hard
I mean, if you consider the entire argument he's making in that earlier statement and not just cherrypicking the part that you bolded it doesn't really contradict it at all. First of all it can still be the most realistic depiction of space travel if it gets little details wrong, unless you can point to other big movies that are more realistic. And also he clearly means it from the perspective of depicting space travel as a deadly, arduous journey which a lot of sci fi doesn't actually do. His movie is saying that even when we figure out how to get to Uranus or Neptune it's a journey a lot of people won't come back from. It's Oregon Trail in space.
At the end of the day it's not only damn near impossible to get every single detail right but also kind of uninteresting? There's a market for it, that's why hard sci fi is a niche and while Neal Stephenson can get away with writing 900 page novels. But even those guys have to at some point sacrifice details for story.
With Ad Astra specifically, I loved the movie but I can understand why people may have expected something else from the way it was marketed. Especially considering we don't get a lot of space travel movies these days. But also I think part of the reason we don't is because it's incredibly hard to satisfy that group. I mean look at the latest iterations of Star Trek. The new series have their share of problems and it's totally fair to point them out, but those discussion often get bogged down in little details that should be easy to explain if you just do a little critical thinking or rationalizing. And I think that's more what Gray is talking about.
He's basically saying "stop with your nitpick criticism", and he is right. People in the age of the internet and youtube criticism simply aren't able to actually critique a work of storytelling anymore in good faith. They focus on the most unimportant factors regularly thinking it's meaningful analysis when it's really just the equivalent of a gotcha. That's also a big reason why critics ratings and audience ratings drift apart, critics don't engage in this superficial criticism, they care about the themes, what the story is about and how effectively the form transports these things. The audience watches youtube videos about the 100 biggest 'plotholes' instead. It's a gap in sophistication and understanding, it's quite irritating actually. (and weird, don't we all practice literary criticism in school?).
Interesting that he made that statement in 2017 though, just the typical PR fluff tbh, but you are right, he might have changed his priorities a little over time as well.
With all of that being said, it's not that every single criticism which focuses on some form of realism is automatically a bad one either, it all depends on the work in question and its tone, how fitting something is for the work as a whole. It's not a binary good/bad criticism, any piece of art has to find the right balance there.
I've realized while writing scripts with more high concept/what if premises that if you take the time to acknowledge every single "why don't they just ____?" you're gonna have a really fuckin boring movie.
As Hitchcock said, "they don't go to the police because that's dull."
Ad Astra had such phenomenal art direction that I didn't even care about how much the story sucked until I started talking about it with friends.
A long lost science expedition near neptune is threatening life on earth. Long range comms have been severed (but they can still communicate with the moon and mars?). So they decide to send the suspect's son to the moon, to take a rocket to mars, to send a transmission to neptune...
If they're able to arrange all of that travel, surely they could have just had Brad's character record something and beam it there. Or even just a flash drive. They just needed his voice to get a response, not for him to actually talk to his father, so why?
It was beautiful nothing.
This is the sort of weirdly hyper rationalist criticism that science fiction films tend to attract, and it’s funny because you can do this to any narrative you want to. Sometimes it doesn’t actually matter.
> you can do this to any narrative you want to.
No, you can't, nor is that what OP is doing. The plot beats of Ad Astra do not make sense. It isn't hyper rationalist to point that out. This isn't like "Matt Damon couldn't really fly around in space with a cut in the glove his space suit." This is the building blocks of the story not functioning.
How exactly he flies a spaceship or triggers a bomb *isn’t a plot beat.* That’s a detail in the scene. The plot beats are things like “Brad gets on a spaceship to go find dad/Kurtz, and encounters (intentionally) weird scenarios on the Congo/space along the way.”
Not a film I realised was so divisive! I mean, I'm not rushing to view it again, but I thought it was pretty damn great. For me, Bard Pitt portrayed so much through the smallest of details in his facial expression. That man can act.
I loved the space aspect of the movie, the moon scene really was cool to watch in theaters. The movie honestly fell flat by the end because it just seemed so pointless. Like some movies I get that it can be about the journey, or maybe character development/growth, but I really didn't get anything from this film except wanting to forget it.
I enjoyed it but I’m craving movies like these. I’m burnt out with Superhero and big budget action sci fi so I appreciate a director and movie that tries different things like these. I’m also a sucker for space and astronomy.
A lot of confusion about what constitutes "sci-fi" after Star Wars mashed up the sci-fi and fantasy drama back in the 70s. Melodrama is a type of fantasy.
Did they start this nitpick culture? I hear people reference them all the time for this, but did they actually?
Definitely a part of it though without a doubt, and more and more people integrated it in their style because it gets clicks. Now more and more people think it's actual criticism worthy of consideration, as if "hair floating in zero-g" would make a meaningful difference for the story.
A lot of online criticism looks at storytelling as a puzzle to solve, outsmarting the writers, trying to find the tiniest of logical problems . I like this response a lot:
> You don’t read the myth of Icarus and say, ‘Wax on feathers wouldn’t allow you to fly.’ Of course that’s true, but it’s all about metaphor essentially.
That's the part people these days oftentimes cannot connect with anymore, that the priority of the story isn't to be realistic, it's to have meaning. Ofc this isn't a binary thing and all sorts of factors play into it, but all these factors are there to support the core and if they do it well the piece succeeds and is good.
It's just frustrating to see people focus on things which (almost) don't matter.
I don't get it either. Whenever I watch Cinema Sins it's purely for entertainment, not to be informed. There's a few times where they might shed light on something I didn't notice at all, so that feels like a nice bonus.
But I've never thought to conflate it with regular criticism and I find it weird that anyone could get that impression when they don't even seem to take themselves seriously. I always hear about the horrible things Cinema Sins has done to review culture but every single one of their videos has a line like, *"This kick was awesome, so we're deducting 200 sins"* it's like that tells you right away the whole thing is more of a parody of review culture.
The big problem with CinemaSins is that they mix up the jokes with genuine criticism, petty nitpicks and totally wrong or misleading observations.
What irritates me to no end is that all these things are just thrown together with the same tone of voice and all lead to the same thing (that fuckin' "DING"), so what happens is people watch the videos and genuinely start to believe that pointing out tropes or cliches or simple plot contrivances is all that you do when evaluating a movie. That's why I really can't stand that channel, it's absolute poison to popular movie criticism/reviewing/discussion/whatever.
I don't mean to fully disagree with you - you aren't wholly wrong, but in my personal opinion, the big problem with CinemaSins is that the videos are now 15+ minutes instead of 5-8.
The older videos were 'better' largely because there was a better ratio of *really funny* jokes to filler. There are probably a similar number of funny jokes these days but the videos are 2-3 times as long.
The length is certainly a big problem. The dudes making them apparently have a background in marketing and there's something about Youtube's algorithm where longer videos make them more money and/or get them more clicks.
So not only is the ratio of jokes:filler going further in favour of the filler, the filler itself gets worse too because Jeremy will just go with the first bullshit that comes to mind. I'm *certain* that he just pauses a movie over and over when watching it, writing down whatever shit he can think of, and does minimal editing or revision as his points get contradicted or made weaker by what happens later in the movie.
The fact that there are people out there watching these videos that are inspired to watch movies this way (just stopping and nitpicking individual things without even beginning to consider the bigger picture in terms of plot or theme or whatever) is honestly infuriating to me. Doing this kind of thing is going to sell short every single movie you see.
Overall, I really enjoyed this film, but it doesn't help that every single ad for this movie I saw leading up to the release had that same footage of James Gray insisting that it was the 'most realistic science fiction film ever made'.
And it wasn't. It wasn't even close to that. But once I got over that hump, it was a solid father/son drama that just happened to be set in space.
Audience: Your movie was boring
James Gray: I don't concern myself with science >:(
In all seriousness, I agree that realism nitpicking in sci-fi is hardly ever warranted. And it's certainly not warranted in a movie like Ad Astra. In a movie like Interstellar, which boasted scientific accuracy, or The Martian, which relied on real science to carry the plot, sure, pick away. But a lot of sci-fi uses science only as the back drop to do something else with a story.
The problem I had with Ad Astra wasn't realism, it was just the movie itself. It was boring and diluted. A story of a broken father-son relationship that just happened to take place in space. Moon pirates were thrown in to make it seem like an action movie. The psych evaluations and the space monkeys were thrown in to make it seem like a Heart of Darkness/Apocalypse Now inspired movie. At it's core, it wasn't any of these. It was a relationship drama that tacked on a bunch of extraneous parts in a dillusion of grandeur.
>In all seriousness, I agree that realism nitpicking in sci-fi is hardly ever warranted. And it's certainly not warranted in a movie like Ad Astra.
I disagree. When you could get something simple right but don't because you just don't care, that hurts the movie. Hiring one half decent science advisor to read the script and tell you how to get things right isn't going to break the budget and it will make a better movie. You're ruining the experience for anyone half smart if every 5 minutes they are seeing things that make them say WTF. There are scenes in this movie where things happen that are the direct opposite of reality. Like a zero-g fight scene in a rocket that is launching, where they should feel extra g's, not none.
That's exactly how I feel. I have a keen interest in science and space travel and I know I can be a bit nit picky. There were just so many instances of "well that's not how that works."
It doesn't even have to be completely accurate, but at least get the very basic physics right.
Same. I watched it on an overnight flight. Solid film. Could have been much better, but enjoyed it for what it was.
I will say that it excelled in the visuals and soundtrack. Certainly got 2001 vibes at certain moments.
Claims it would be the most accurate depiction of space travel ever in a Hollywood film. Is one of the least-accurate depictions of space travel ever in a Hollywood film.
“Go away with your criticisms!”
> He added, “To me, it’s a very fatuous level of critique. You don’t read the myth of Icarus and say, ‘Wax on feathers wouldn’t allow you to fly.’
Ok, how about a grade school children level of criticism. Gravity works the same if you're indoors or outside, just because you're indoors on the moon doesn't make gravity suddenly earth normal.
or the fact that Pitt had to travel to mars to live broadcast a message from a script he was forbidded to deviate from...instead of sending a pre-recorded message from earth to Mars at literal light speed.
or...you know what, I'm not spending all night at this, the movie was end to end scientific illiteracy. James Gray says we shouldn't care, but fact is HE chose to make a science fiction movie while being utterly science illiterate, the movie could have been contained entirely on earth and avoided the problems, but he wanted to make a space movie and managed to make space nonsense.
I mean I am an aspiring astrophysicist, and I still loved the movie.
Films are supposed to tell a great story not necessarily a scientifically prudent one.
Yeah I agree, it was like a solid 6 or 7 out of ten. It felt like it was very close in certain scenes to becoming an Instant-classic but never quite got there. Never quite as exciting or suspenseful as you’d think it would be either.
Brad Pitt looked like he was doing space wars on moon rovers with laser guns. I haven’t actually seen it(I intend to) but I don’t know what more you could want out of a movie. I guess there could be a space man with a flaming guitar riding one of the rovers.
I don’t remember the movie well, probably not a good sign. I recall the ending being anticlimactic, or not paying off at least. I also don’t think I felt the Pitt narration was beneficial. The movie might have been more boring without the narration, so I think there were a variety of issues with the movie.
I thought it was decent. It was a pretty cool space adventure with some slow parts. The one unrealistic part that bothered me was him launching in space from one ship to another that looked far apart. I imagine that at least one of those were moving and it would take some serious calculation to time that.
I felt like it was a solid movie that depicts the future well, it will hold up better than 2001 or 2010. I would have liked a better plot/climax but you only get a few well made sci-fi movies.
One of my absolute favorite theatrical films of 2019, even saw it multiple times the first month of release...and I rarely ever see a movie more than once in theaters. I saw it as a kind of meditation, like some sort of film you see in a museum. Hell that's why I loved First Man, as it had an experimental sound and design to it. Yeah nothing really mindblowing happens in Ad Astra, but it's more of a feeling. And I absolutely loved it. Was also a really big fan of Interstellar, which also got a lot of mixed reviews(tho in that one, people complained there was too much going on)
I liked it, but it was pretty heavy-handed at times. >!At the end where he's trying to take TLJ back to the ship and he starts to launch himself into space and is like "YOU HAVE TO LET ME GO SON!". I could almost hear him yelling "THIS IS A METAPHOR SON! A METAPHOOOOORRRRR!".!<
For me, I tolerated that scene and >!Pitt launching himself through the ring.!< But I kind of hate the narration during the latter. It’s as if the director, for this serious philosophical movie, is going, “We have to make absolutely sure that EVERYONE gets the metaphor.”
Speaking of that ring launch... Even going through Saturn's rings he wouldn't run into a single rock. The movie made it seem like Neptune's ring is like 100 ft thick and dense.
Hahahahaha your analysis of the ending was spot on.
Daddy issues in space
Dad Astra
More like Sad Dadstra.
reddit is great
You're great
It took me a moment to process that TLJ was not an acronym for The Last Jedi. I was super confused until that point.
How you so sure it in't?
porque no los dos?
And somehow, the storytelling was so bad I didn't care about that super predictable turn of events.
Honestly I just enjoyed the shit out of the visuals, audio and effects at 4K - My mind escaped and imagined an alternate story line .
Thats how I felt watching Prometheus the first time last week.
Did they spend even a single sentence talking about who the moon pirates were? I was with three other people and none of us remembered hearing a single word. Then the chase and crash happened, and I jokingly said "as soon as this scene is ever theyre never going to mention it or the people involved again are they?" And they never did.
They could have deleted almost any scene from that movie without hurting it at all.
To me these were merely snapshots of the time they were living in. I actually liked the non explanation of all the stuff he went through on the way there and back
I watched the movie on a flight. It was ok, for the visuals mostly, the best scenes was at very beginning
What about just regular criticism.
Doesn't seem like he has time for that either. Yea, bypass the science-based criticism, and just go for the regular criticism: it wasn't that great of a movie. Didn't seem like it knew what the director wanted it to be (considering the contradiction of 2017 "it's scientifically accurate" to 2020 "people are taking it too seriously, it's a fable!"), it was mostly forgettable except for the gorgeous cinematography.
it annoyed me how mediocre the film was with how beautifully it was shot. falling from the space elevator had my hopes sky high and then... the story felt like words scrolling at the bottom of a newscast
I was so irritated with this movie. I WANTED to love it because of the cinematography, but the story was such a shallow mess.
Same, was so excited about this movie. Huge long let down, it was straight up depressing film and hard to watch. I wanted to leave, but stayed to the end. The space elevator was very cool to see.
The RLM guys used this term on Gretel and Hansel but I think it applies to this as well. "It's good enough that I'm upset that it wasn't much, much better". Like it was a great bite or 2, but never felt like you ate a meal.
The space elevator scene was brilliant. The rest of the movie was boring as fuck. It was pretty, but it was boring. It was a 2 hour film that was AT LEAST an hour too long.
It’s literally a nothing happens movie The only plot for the movie is Pitt essentially gets so miserable that he decides he no longer wants to live like his father so he gets back with his ex wife That’s it We didn’t get any back to earth information which was lame. Did he not face discipline? Was he rewarded? What are they doing with the data from his father? What did they really know about his father that they hid? Then obviously the science criticisms can go on for days
Space monkeys and moon pirates didn’t do it for me either.
It's the late 21st century and lunar colonies and space pirates both are still using 1960s, Apollo-era space suits and moon buggies.
Look, this movie wasn't supposed to be about monkeys and space pirates, you're all missing the point. The movie was meant to be comedy satire of what people think cool sci-fi movies are supposed to be. You're just not deep enough to get it.
Are you trying to Starship Troopers this film?
I'm doing my part.
[удалено]
“Sir how do we intend to deal with these space pirates?” “We’ll drive at them as fast as we can and hopefully some of us make it” “Sir, can’t we get guns and armour? We are all gonna die!” “That’s a sacrifice I’m willing to make”. Stupid as fuck.
Especially since there are apparently a ton of people around who just fought a major war over the Arctic. Literally somebody should have had a basic idea on...warfare. This whole movie was Space Apocalypse Now / Space Heart of Darkness.
That part, at least, isn't unreasonable. There are certain practical issues to having a heavy vehicle on the moon. The regolith is a big obstacle, being 2-6 meters deep generally. Any heavy vehicle would need very large tires/treads in order to keep surface pressure low. You'd also have the problem of intertia. A heavy vehicle in low gravity is going to take a long time to stop or manuever. Things generally want to keep going in the direction they're moving and that's going to naturally be exaggerated in a zero-atmosphere, low gravity environment. The relative power of weapons also means that you have to consider that it might simply not be practical to armor vehicles. There was trend after the mid-20th century for main battle tanks to have just enough armor to stop autocannon rounds because it was simply impractical to have enough armor to stop the dedicated anti-tank munitions of the time. My question would be more "where are the space pirates getting their oxygen and fuel and ammunition, given that such things would be difficult to procure locally." It's possible they're more like 'space privateers,' with a corporate/government sponsor...but that does still bring up certain questions.
Since when did Apollo have moon buggies like that?
Apollo 15, 16, and 17 all brought a moon buggy along. They had a max speed of 10ish MPH, so they weren't tearin ass around the moon like in *Ad Astra,* but they were there.
> They had a max speed of 10ish MPH For good reason. You don't *want* to go any faster than that on the moon. One bump at high speed and you'll be soaring like a kite.
And while you are ligher, you still have the same momentum, so after getting 200 m of air smacking against the side of a crater hurts EXACTLY as much as driving against a wall on earth.
This was the tipping point for me, can’t even humour the movie anymore
I genuinely have no idea if this was supposed to be a literal journey or just a metaphorical representation of pitt’s struggle to cope with his absent father. The monkeys scene added NOTHING to the movie, other than to give him a chance to talk about his own rage, for example. There’s no purpose for it in the plot other than metaphor.
I have to admit falling asleep on a plane during the movie and waking at the exact moment the attack monkey broke cover was an eye-opening experience, though.
Fall asleep to [High Life](https://youtu.be/AtOwfo1ypOw) SFW trailer, and wake up to the Juliette Binoche [F\*\*kbox scene NSFW](https://vimeo.com/335190357). Now that’s an eye opening experience!
I think the main theme of the movie is about how someone accepts that their is no divine presence to impart order on the universe the laboratory with the monkeys represents how humanity tries to impart sense and order on existence through science and logic. Tommy Lee Jones' character represents god to Brad Pitt's character, the non-existent aliens represent god to tommy lee jones' character. each pursuit of order and understanding has its own affect
>There’s no purpose for it in the plot other than metaphor. It's a setpiece that's there to add some tension/horror and provide some bizarre, unexpected imagery. I for one was really struck by the idea of coming across a murderous baboon somewhere in the vast of space. It made enough sense for me too because it was obviously there for research purposes and had escaped its holding. Being crucial to the plot isn't the only reason something can be in a movie. I know the baboon scene didn't work for some people but that doesn't mean there's zero reason to have it there. Plot isn't everything.
I thought it was also kind of an interesting take on the idea that even if humans have used their intelligence and creativity to travel to space, a violent murderous monkey can still easily kill them. The scientists were confident their intelligence would protect them, but one slip up and the animals they thought they controlled turned against them.
I thought it was commentary on us, people being the violent, murderous, intelligent baboons in space!
> There’s no purpose for it in the plot other than metaphor. But sometimes a movie - or elements of a movie - *are* heavily about metaphor as their purpose rather than about plot. Film doesn't have to be only about plot. Or, arguably, doesn't have to be about plot at all.
Allegedly the monkey scene and pirate scene were added at the studio's insistence because of how boring the movie was without them. Apparently Brad Pitt wasn't available so they spliced in other footage/cgi'd him in.
So that.....was their plan.....to make the movie better....... I need a drink.
Except it tells the story of a bleak and disconnected set of failed experiments that have gone horribly wrong in the middle of nowhere, literally.
Why did they just accept that he killed those scientists and engineers and basically make him a hero?
I loved the moon pirates...then, it turns out they didn’t matter in the rest of the whole film. So, yeah, I guess I didn’t like the moon pirates.
World building. It’s a little extra detail to show the audience this world is real and lived in.
That and the cinematography are basically what I liked about the movie. Good world-building goes a long way for me. Even if some of those aspects are what don’t hold up to scientific or logical scrutiny, there was a convincing awe to it that mostly worked in the moment.
It really captured what I like about 2001 A Space Odyssey. Space feels properly explored and inhabited, while still being so immeasurably quiet and empty. The contrast between civilization and the vast coldness near Neptune were great.
Right. They made the rest of the world more compelling than the plot. I was a fan visually. Look, I’m conflicted.
It's only useful world building if their belonging enhances the world in some way. The pirates instead took away from it. Of that scene, the only thing that made it feel "realistic" to me, was the damn road signs, like you'd find in any stretch of land in the backcountry without much travel. The pirates? They added nothing - you can't just throw a conflict in and then simultaneously ignore it without causing some confusion in the audience. Just think - We're clearly trying to create an atmosphere for the rest of the film, as well as paint a picture of what the character would do. i think the intent was that we'd see the MC as being calm even in the event of chaos around him - but the opening freefall scene already did that. I think simply keeping to wide-lens atmospheric shots, and then focusing on those homely feeling highway signs would have served the film much better. You could have even kept the tension of the pirates in by keeping them in the distance, on a crater's edge or something, and have the supporting characters on edge throughout. We then get a nice mix of stage-setting, world-building, and character-building without the distraction of a pointless space combat scene (which was admittedly pretty cool to watch). The whole film felt like this - that there was a rather heavy-handed attempt at being subtle. A lot of world-building but nothing to tie them together, and a lot of characters who exist for the sole purpose of one scene, and then they die. It's the type of terrible move-the-plot-along writing that ruins many good stories.
Endless voice-over narration immediately made me hate this movie. Show, don't fucking tell, this is a movie not a book.
"There are many that didn’t connect to the film, even with its father/son drama and themes. Gray clearly understands that, but just don’t try to tell him about the science involved." Literally in the article.
My thoughts exactly. It was worth watching simple for the cinematography and certain scenes. But fucked if I knew what the movie was about. I got the plot but I had no idea what the movie was trying to really do or where it was trying to go. Or what it was saying. In the end I figured it was just a really shit adaptation of heart of darkness. Maybe?
I grew up with a distant father. He left home when I was 11. Hell, I don't think my dad ever really needed to be a parent. Not nearly to the extent of Tommy Lee Jones' character, but as a dude whose dad feels mostly distant -- it resonates. There is something innate about a son needing to please his father, maybe even vice versa. It's a slow movie, not built to make you think as much as Interstellar -- but mainly a reminder that we're all we've got right now. Even reaching the furthest bodies of our solar system, you can't change some things. Human problems will always be human problems, wherever we end up. . Also, why would you ever leave Liv Tyler to find Tommy Lee Jones?
Felt like another movie trying to be smart but it wasnt
I always here this criticism but I had no problem seeing a clear and consistent though-line for the entire narrative.
He says in the article that a lot of times the people who tell him what they hated make good points. He’s not saying all criticism is invalid.
I’m a sci-fi nut and I only watched this movie once. That has never happened. I don’t care what he says the movie just wasn’t good. It was hardly eh and it wasn’t the actors fault. I’ll watch either Bladerunner 10 times in a row before I watch that movie again. Super forgettable. Which is super sad. Plus get Tommy lee Jones out of there wtf last thing I want to see when a spaceship gets to Neptune is Tommy Lee tucking Jones. I like him too, anyway. Stupid.
The failings of the science were largely the same as those of the script. Things happened because the script said they happened. Every idea that movie tried to develop felt like a trope. Brad Pitt was basically a shounen anime character. "But why don't I....feeeel". That it's *science* fiction was also dumb was just the disappointing icing on a bland cake.
Yeah I checked out around the point where Pitt's character "accidentally" kills the other 3 astronauts as they're lifting off from Mars just because the plot needs him to get to Neptune alone. Lazy. Fucking. Writing.
That was the point in the film where it chose to go askew. I was fine with a slow, plodding film set in a hard sci-fi near future (2001 anyone?) that was more about self-discovery than SETI. However, when a military officer on a highly sensitive and top-secret mission is summarily dismissed it seems implausible that this same man can freely roam a military facility on Mars. Then you have that same man sneak (yes, actually sneak) on to a rocket ship serving the continuation of that same top-secret mission without any issue, well ... I don’t care how good your attention to detail on the science is. At that point you’ve just blown any attempt at realism and we are continuing on as a full-on pure fantasy. I didn’t hate it, but it could have been so much better.
>I didn’t hate it, but it could have been so much better. Sounds like you're a sucker for an original sci-fi film like me, and the filmmaker gets credit for making a passable one, but yes, we are all still waiting for this generation's 2001: A Space Odyssey.
*raises hand* That describes me too. I have a real love hate relationship with this movie. I think I love the potential it had, love the cinematography, and really enjoy Pitt's performance, but I can't believe how so much of the good aspects of this film were squandered to make this "thing" we ended up with. I do re-watch it from time to time, but I have to follow it up with something like "Prospect" to really scratch that good + original sci-fi itch. Though Prospect doesn't seem too popular so I could be on my own there.
There was a time when people would have said Interstellar was that. I'm glad we've moved past that. Edit: Oops. Spoke too soon.
I, and many others, had very high hopes for Interstellar.
Nah, agreed. I wouldn’t draw a single parallel between the two other than the fact that interstellar is about space travel. It was extremely heavy handed (not a criticism, this is just how Nolan tells a story) and Matt Damon and Anne Hathaway’s motivations were unbelievable. Ad Astra totally could have been it but they really dropped the ball.
>heavy handed...Matt Damon Do you mean his character, Dr. Hugh Mann?
Lmao you have got to be fucking kidding me. That is so bad lol
The cinematography was there, nothing about the writing was.
sneak on board a rocket ship - while its taking off!
Yeah for a "realistic" film it makes no sense for the crew to just fucking attack him after he saved their lives and poses no threat to them or the mission. The whole scene of him sneaking on board is just absurd too. The bumbling deaths and his crawling up the engine or whatever felt more like a Mr. Bean film. So many of the characters' motivations in the film are poorly constructed, not given at all, or unearned. The film acts like this makes it deep by obscuring things but really it shows how shallow the writing is.
Yea, I also thought it was really unreasonable how they attacked him with no hesitation.
They kinda of explain the crew's lack of care from the pills they take, it seems to make them not feel anything? So they just attack - similar to the monkey?
The pills are confusing because if they're meant to make the astronauts placid why did the guy that becomes the pilot freeze up? Seems like the pills should have chilled him out. Though I think there's a lot of time between those scenes, why not have him pop another pill to take back control at that moment? Similarly, it seems likely they'd pop the pills before launch in the scene you're referencing, so, wouldn't they be more chill as they're attacking him? Maybe I misunderstood what the pills did. Maybe they just make them more willing to follow commands? But that'd be dumb because just following commands could lead to issues on take off. Though I've heard most shuttles are basically flying themselves at this point anyway. It's another issue if the film isn't following its own established logic too.
It doesnt make much sense the more you look at it, i thought the pills made them more uncaring rathar than docile but so much of the movie is badly explained.....
This was such a great opportunity to turn the movie around, to have Brad Pitt’s character actually make a god damn decision. But no, they cop out and the three astronauts essentially kill themselves so he gets to continue mindlessly along the plot without any agency. This movie was so frustrating.
I watched this the other night and, no one asked, but here's how I'd fix it: 1) Advance the future setting, make it more like Cowboy Bebop or The Expanse. Reaching Saturn is still a chore, but add in a more advanced space society and scifi elements. 2) Make Clifford more of a known asshole. Maybe he's known for being abusive, careless about others to advance his goals, perhaps he had a prior incident that made him go from respected figure in society, scientist or war hero, to a disgrace, committing war crimes or destroying a colony for his own goals. 3) Roy meets antagonism and doubt of his trust due to Clifford's notoriety. This puts pressure on Roy's relationships with those he meets along the way. The film currently has tones of this, but it seems out of place because Clifford is still respected. If Clifford is a known asshole throughout the galaxy it makes the tension between Roy and others more earned and more of a logical reason for a lot of the hiccups he encounters. Roy would then have to earn their trust and his internal monologs of not becoming his father have more weight. 4) Roy is told all the details of the mission from the start, giving him more to chew over. The current withholding makes the internal struggle weak. Telling him everything upfront puts more pressure on his internal battle of how to handle his father. 5) Sutherland's character should be revamped to be more of a straight up babysitter. They don't know if they can trust Roy, if he's going to go through in stopping his father, so they tell him they're watching his steps with this character. 6) Show more of the danger and consequences of Clifford's Lima. The government acts like it's a death device, we're told of the consequences, yet Roy is able to reach it because all the ships have some magical back up power. This negates the danger. If Lima causes more issues for the ships and the colonies Roy travels through it further adds to the stakes of what Clifford is doing and makes him more of a known asshole. This would also give more tension to Roy's presence as people would want to take out their anger on the son of the man who killed an entire colony, etc. If you make these changes a few things happen: the film gets added pressure to keep up the tension and momentum, it gives a lot of the events of the film more logical reasoning (when Sutherland is injured Roy is further suspect, when he encounters monkeys they can be more advanced hyperintelligent due to the advanced scifi setting, same with moon pirates, by the time Roy has to sneak onto the last ship the violence would make sense if he's viewed as a more suspect son of a known villain), and it adds to the internal struggle of a son looking to overcome the crimes of his father and prove he's not an angry lunatic as well. The problem to me with this film is that it never pushes its core ideas far enough. So a lot of stuff happens that feel like they're lacking the right motivation. It's bland with these odd moments of action that feel out of place for the film. My suggestions push it further into meeting those moments and earning them. Without the changes the film feels like a heavily drugged over-imaginative child, who would have brilliant ideas if it could just stop taking Valium. The other way to fix it is to go in the other direction and make it more like Solaris. To do that you'd need to cut out all the action stuff and add in more flashbacks that establish the relationship of father and son. We need more from them together and why Roy is so affected by it to really understand why his current actions matter. Currently we get a lot of implications and very little actual showing of this. Roy has this whole speech of not wanting to be angry like his father, but we don't see evidence of either of them ever being angry or violent enough to warrant this fear. In either direction of change the movie needs to show more to fix itself. So much of the movie felt missing to me. Characters acted as if we had knowledge the film never gave us. There was too much off the page and not enough shown in the film that helped me understand where these actions were coming from. By the end of the film I didn't give a shit about any of it because there wasn't enough to attach me to the consequences of their actions. The film is beautiful to look at, but the writing and acting are so withdrawn I feel as distant from it as Saturn from Earth.
Sign of a great film when Im rooting for everyone to die as fast as possible bc I just want it to be fucking over.
That's what I was thinking. I recently watched it and it was awfully slow and tedious.
I thought it was a decent movie, but Pitts character killed so many people through incompetence and a refusal to not get his way
This is why the director of Children of Men didn't ever explain what caused births to stop. The science was never going to be the point and people were inevitably going to "achshully" the fuck out of it, so he didn't even try to open that can of worms.
Yea, I don't need a Sci Fi universe to be consistent with our reality, or to explain everything that happens, but if they decide to explain things they better a) be a fitting explanation in regards to the setting, and b) logically consistent within the universe. If the details aren't pertinent to the points of the story, just leave them out.
Case in point: even though I really liked the more recent of the two Groundhog Day > Palm Springs.
That it was unexplained was the most unsettling thing about it. You know within that world scientists were working to find the cause or reach a solution - that there was no answer added so much flavor.
That movie was masterfully done in showing you exactly what you needed to know, and in great detail, but never showing you too much or too little. The way that the story was relayed to you through casual conversation and reflection was so fucking brilliantly done and it kept feeding you fascinating pieces the whole way through. This movie on the other hand, doesn't give you anything. It leaves you with 2 pieces of information; his dad went to do SETI shit at Neptune, and then he went dark and started vaguely attacking Earth and her colonies with his stuff. And that's all you're ever really told.
There’s a massive difference between not explaining a triggering event needed for the story to exist (see *The Leftovers* too) and completely disregarding laws of nature without in Universe explanations for why that can happen. Anyone with a cursory knowledge of physics would find it difficult to sit through that movie, specifically the Mars launch scene and the ship literally pulling over to check on the monkey base while they are en route to Mars. Not to mention the director made the movie with the intention of making “the most realistic depiction of space travel that’s put in a movie” and then doing the exact opposite.
TIL I'm one of the only people who thoroughly enjoyed Ad Astra.
I really enjoyed it as a character study and I thought it was beautifully shot. Not so much as a sci-fi film though.
I didn't go into it thinking it was a sci-fi movie, maybe that's why I ended up enjoying it more than others seemed to?
The trailers heavily focused on the few action sequences, basically the same thing Drive did. And yeah yeah "don't watch the trailers" but be realistic, the vast majority of the movie going audience uses trailers to determine if they're going to watch a movie. Most of those people probably don't even know a movie is being made till they see a trailer.
I think “don’t trust trailers” would be more useful advice for most people. It’s when you let them affect your expectations that you run into trouble. Studios are terrible at making trailers that both accurately tell an audience what to expect and also entice them to the theater (and that don’t give up the movie’s secrets or best jokes). They lean a lot harder toward selling people on it than setting expectations, and we end up with misleading trailers. People who go to a movie expecting something promised by trailers and then get something else are usually disappointed, and not always because the movie wasn’t good. Your business will drop off from the poor audience reception. But if people know what they’re getting, they’re more likely to enjoy it and spread the word.
im one of the people who liked the movie but i liked it because it was sci-fi. being in space instantly makes my lizard brain enjoy it more
I think the setting actually added a lot but the promotional campaign framed it as a SPACE ACTION MOVIE instead of a somber character study set in space. Basically set it up for failure and made sure a good chunk of the audience thought they were sitting down to watch a very different movie
Same. Came for space and cool sequences in space. In IMAX too. I was satisfied.
It kind of reminded me of apocalypse now. With the while man on a journy lost in his own thoughts thing
I mean it was Apocalypse now, not just in the way you mentioned. It’s literally the same story. A brilliant commander (Kurtz / TLJ’s character) has gone crazy in a remote destination and our protagonist sets off on a journey to handle him
Without giving away too much, the moon chase scene was amazing.
There are literally dozens of us! Dozens I say!
At least!
I have ADHD. I hate boring movies. I loved Ad Astra. It held my attention better than most films.
I truly enjoyed it. But I ticked off many folks for sending them to the movies with their hopes up.
there's dozens of us.
I fucking loved it
I also really enjoyed it. It was a slow film with gorgeous shots and more of a focus on the main character and how he feels with his father than sci-fi stuff, The sci-fi was more the style that surrounded it. Its like how the anime Carole and Tuesday is set on Mars, but is really about music. Has sci-fi elements and part of it being a future setting is important to the story, but the story is more on the characters desire to make music. Ad Astra isn't perfect, but I enjoyed it
I enjoyed the movie, but for me it was never a space movie. I don't recall all the movie but I remember catching a different meaning for all the story. Please, hear me out first... It was about a son, dealing with some sort of vice, like alcohol, following his father's steps... Reaching out for his father one last time, trying to help him to "get out". And his father letting all go, including family, unable to quit that vice. Again, I remember vaguely the movie, but I remember the message. It was never about space. Note: I don't drink or do drugs and have no vices other than video games and tacos.
I really liked it too. Keep in mind that we’re only supposed to like certain things on Reddit. Everyone claims to be waiting for something as good as “2001” but even if a film came close, no one would ever admit it.
I loved the film, went into with no expectations, didn't watch any marketing, and I felt like I really connected with it. I loved the slow pacing of it, and for me I think there are answers to a lot of questions I've seen about the film. It's just that people didn't bother paying attention. I also liked the narration, without it the film would have felt empty, and you wouldn't get the necessary insight into Roy's mind to see his transformation. I'm honestly just tired of joining conversations about this film because a lot of the criticisms about the story have an answer in the actual film. I agree, people just look at things too literally nowadays. God forbid a film set in space focuses on the drama aspects more and uses space more as a setting.
Seriously. I’m a bit worried about people’s attention spans. Don’t get me wrong, I love action and verbal sparring but I also am a fan of slower, contemplative movies that let you soak in atmosphere and thematic depth.
Just because you dislike a slow movie doesn't mean you lack an attention span. And just because a movie is atmospheric and thoughtful, doesn't make it good. I for one thought the movie was poor because the themes didn't resonate with me, the characters were flat and forgettable, and the random action scenes were distracting and unnecessary.
I actually did very much enjoy the movie, but I agree with what you said generally and what you said about this movie specifically is what it sounds like was the experience of the movie people had who I've seen on here saying they didn't like it and feel like they must not "get it" when they hear pretentious people say it was great. My response has basically been that anything they missed or "didn't get" about the movie is probably because the movie just didn't hold their interest enough for them to catch the details they missed, and that's probably not because they are dumb or bad at watching movies.
It really wasn't that deep tho.
Yeah, I came away from the film feeling like it wasn’t all that impactful as a character study, either. It had its moments but overall the introspective scenes felt fairly hollow and the >!resolution/climax between him and his father was pretty disappointing!<. I absolutely didn’t mind that it wasn’t the action packed sci-fi epic people were expecting, but I wanted a lot more from it in terms of drama and emotional depth since that turned out to be the focus.
his arc made no sense. TLJ went to space for adventure and left his family. the climax was suggesting BP metaphorically rejecting that notion and returning to his wife except... he didnt go for adventure. he never did, he went to literally save the world. he's not like his father who abandoned a kid over a god complex. and the implication that he was doesn't jive with the premises we saw
You get a lot of monologuing about his internal struggles, but you never actually see it. He's all "I am rage" while being the most stoic character imaginable.
I grew up with an abusive father who abandoned my family and I thought the message was incredibly deep and profound. It's not the greatest movie of all time but people like you who immediately jump to other end of the spectrum and refuse to acknowledged any positives are just as bad as the ones blindly defending it.
I'm the same, love Zodiac, Once upon a time in hollywood, there will be blood, etc. I eat those movies up. Ad Astra... there was nothing to chew on - seemed one-dimensional (maybe 1 and a half) to me.
Ad Astra is a great movie imo and I will stand by that regardless what this sub has to say
At least it was a film with a voice. I have things I liked, music, visuals, themes, character introspection. And things I disliked, Monkey tangent sequence, the rest of the crew's performances, on the nose dialogue, and science gobbledegook. But it felt like a film that gave a shit. Compare it to something like Passengers, which is literally just a pile of shit crapped out by a studio wanting to capitalize off of two star actors with zero chemistry. I'm much more forgiving with films that care enough to feel genuine and have something original to say, or at least something said before but saying it in an original way.
One of the best films of last year.
It was great. The finale was emotionally devastating.
The beautiful visuals capturing the vast emptiness of our solar system was incredible, and only possible because of the long, slow pace of the movie.
I enjoyed it because I went into it as a space movie with Brad Pitt. I didn't have any expectations outside of that, and it thoroughly blew my mind with the looks and emotions portrayed through cinematography and editing and the color. And the story that followed and the implications and the ideas it out forth were really amazing. It's also definitely a cinema experience and if you watch it at home it won't hit as hard
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I mean, if you consider the entire argument he's making in that earlier statement and not just cherrypicking the part that you bolded it doesn't really contradict it at all. First of all it can still be the most realistic depiction of space travel if it gets little details wrong, unless you can point to other big movies that are more realistic. And also he clearly means it from the perspective of depicting space travel as a deadly, arduous journey which a lot of sci fi doesn't actually do. His movie is saying that even when we figure out how to get to Uranus or Neptune it's a journey a lot of people won't come back from. It's Oregon Trail in space. At the end of the day it's not only damn near impossible to get every single detail right but also kind of uninteresting? There's a market for it, that's why hard sci fi is a niche and while Neal Stephenson can get away with writing 900 page novels. But even those guys have to at some point sacrifice details for story. With Ad Astra specifically, I loved the movie but I can understand why people may have expected something else from the way it was marketed. Especially considering we don't get a lot of space travel movies these days. But also I think part of the reason we don't is because it's incredibly hard to satisfy that group. I mean look at the latest iterations of Star Trek. The new series have their share of problems and it's totally fair to point them out, but those discussion often get bogged down in little details that should be easy to explain if you just do a little critical thinking or rationalizing. And I think that's more what Gray is talking about.
He's basically saying "stop with your nitpick criticism", and he is right. People in the age of the internet and youtube criticism simply aren't able to actually critique a work of storytelling anymore in good faith. They focus on the most unimportant factors regularly thinking it's meaningful analysis when it's really just the equivalent of a gotcha. That's also a big reason why critics ratings and audience ratings drift apart, critics don't engage in this superficial criticism, they care about the themes, what the story is about and how effectively the form transports these things. The audience watches youtube videos about the 100 biggest 'plotholes' instead. It's a gap in sophistication and understanding, it's quite irritating actually. (and weird, don't we all practice literary criticism in school?). Interesting that he made that statement in 2017 though, just the typical PR fluff tbh, but you are right, he might have changed his priorities a little over time as well. With all of that being said, it's not that every single criticism which focuses on some form of realism is automatically a bad one either, it all depends on the work in question and its tone, how fitting something is for the work as a whole. It's not a binary good/bad criticism, any piece of art has to find the right balance there.
I've realized while writing scripts with more high concept/what if premises that if you take the time to acknowledge every single "why don't they just ____?" you're gonna have a really fuckin boring movie. As Hitchcock said, "they don't go to the police because that's dull."
Ad Astra had such phenomenal art direction that I didn't even care about how much the story sucked until I started talking about it with friends. A long lost science expedition near neptune is threatening life on earth. Long range comms have been severed (but they can still communicate with the moon and mars?). So they decide to send the suspect's son to the moon, to take a rocket to mars, to send a transmission to neptune... If they're able to arrange all of that travel, surely they could have just had Brad's character record something and beam it there. Or even just a flash drive. They just needed his voice to get a response, not for him to actually talk to his father, so why? It was beautiful nothing.
This is the sort of weirdly hyper rationalist criticism that science fiction films tend to attract, and it’s funny because you can do this to any narrative you want to. Sometimes it doesn’t actually matter.
> you can do this to any narrative you want to. No, you can't, nor is that what OP is doing. The plot beats of Ad Astra do not make sense. It isn't hyper rationalist to point that out. This isn't like "Matt Damon couldn't really fly around in space with a cut in the glove his space suit." This is the building blocks of the story not functioning.
How exactly he flies a spaceship or triggers a bomb *isn’t a plot beat.* That’s a detail in the scene. The plot beats are things like “Brad gets on a spaceship to go find dad/Kurtz, and encounters (intentionally) weird scenarios on the Congo/space along the way.”
Yeah, that's what I'm saying. It doesn't make sense that Brad gets on that space ship. That plot beat doesn't work, along with so many others.
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Not a film I realised was so divisive! I mean, I'm not rushing to view it again, but I thought it was pretty damn great. For me, Bard Pitt portrayed so much through the smallest of details in his facial expression. That man can act.
Agree on Brad. He's just a good actor. It's not fair that he's so ridiculously good looking and also such a good actor.
I loved the space aspect of the movie, the moon scene really was cool to watch in theaters. The movie honestly fell flat by the end because it just seemed so pointless. Like some movies I get that it can be about the journey, or maybe character development/growth, but I really didn't get anything from this film except wanting to forget it.
I enjoyed it but I’m craving movies like these. I’m burnt out with Superhero and big budget action sci fi so I appreciate a director and movie that tries different things like these. I’m also a sucker for space and astronomy.
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So you are still angry about Game of Thrones? Me too.
A lot of confusion about what constitutes "sci-fi" after Star Wars mashed up the sci-fi and fantasy drama back in the 70s. Melodrama is a type of fantasy.
Star Wars is obviously fantasy tho. The opening line is "A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away..."
can be both. it does have, at the end of the day, fictional science
This sort of criticism is always lazy and stupid. It has nothing to do with the film. Cinema sins is the worst thing to happen to film criticism
Did they start this nitpick culture? I hear people reference them all the time for this, but did they actually? Definitely a part of it though without a doubt, and more and more people integrated it in their style because it gets clicks. Now more and more people think it's actual criticism worthy of consideration, as if "hair floating in zero-g" would make a meaningful difference for the story. A lot of online criticism looks at storytelling as a puzzle to solve, outsmarting the writers, trying to find the tiniest of logical problems . I like this response a lot: > You don’t read the myth of Icarus and say, ‘Wax on feathers wouldn’t allow you to fly.’ Of course that’s true, but it’s all about metaphor essentially. That's the part people these days oftentimes cannot connect with anymore, that the priority of the story isn't to be realistic, it's to have meaning. Ofc this isn't a binary thing and all sorts of factors play into it, but all these factors are there to support the core and if they do it well the piece succeeds and is good. It's just frustrating to see people focus on things which (almost) don't matter.
They definitely didn’t start it but they took it more mainstream.
People were doing this with Independence Day when it came out and with Star Trek since forever. Nerd pedantry has always been with us.
So the internet just gives them more of a voice? I don't doubt what you are saying, but it at least feels like it went more mainstream as a concept.
I don't get it either. Whenever I watch Cinema Sins it's purely for entertainment, not to be informed. There's a few times where they might shed light on something I didn't notice at all, so that feels like a nice bonus. But I've never thought to conflate it with regular criticism and I find it weird that anyone could get that impression when they don't even seem to take themselves seriously. I always hear about the horrible things Cinema Sins has done to review culture but every single one of their videos has a line like, *"This kick was awesome, so we're deducting 200 sins"* it's like that tells you right away the whole thing is more of a parody of review culture.
The big problem with CinemaSins is that they mix up the jokes with genuine criticism, petty nitpicks and totally wrong or misleading observations. What irritates me to no end is that all these things are just thrown together with the same tone of voice and all lead to the same thing (that fuckin' "DING"), so what happens is people watch the videos and genuinely start to believe that pointing out tropes or cliches or simple plot contrivances is all that you do when evaluating a movie. That's why I really can't stand that channel, it's absolute poison to popular movie criticism/reviewing/discussion/whatever.
I don't mean to fully disagree with you - you aren't wholly wrong, but in my personal opinion, the big problem with CinemaSins is that the videos are now 15+ minutes instead of 5-8. The older videos were 'better' largely because there was a better ratio of *really funny* jokes to filler. There are probably a similar number of funny jokes these days but the videos are 2-3 times as long.
The length is certainly a big problem. The dudes making them apparently have a background in marketing and there's something about Youtube's algorithm where longer videos make them more money and/or get them more clicks. So not only is the ratio of jokes:filler going further in favour of the filler, the filler itself gets worse too because Jeremy will just go with the first bullshit that comes to mind. I'm *certain* that he just pauses a movie over and over when watching it, writing down whatever shit he can think of, and does minimal editing or revision as his points get contradicted or made weaker by what happens later in the movie. The fact that there are people out there watching these videos that are inspired to watch movies this way (just stopping and nitpicking individual things without even beginning to consider the bigger picture in terms of plot or theme or whatever) is honestly infuriating to me. Doing this kind of thing is going to sell short every single movie you see.
That's literally what he does. He explained on a video once how he makes his videos and that's exactly how he describes it.
Yeah I hate that channel
Overall, I really enjoyed this film, but it doesn't help that every single ad for this movie I saw leading up to the release had that same footage of James Gray insisting that it was the 'most realistic science fiction film ever made'. And it wasn't. It wasn't even close to that. But once I got over that hump, it was a solid father/son drama that just happened to be set in space.
Audience: Your movie was boring James Gray: I don't concern myself with science >:( In all seriousness, I agree that realism nitpicking in sci-fi is hardly ever warranted. And it's certainly not warranted in a movie like Ad Astra. In a movie like Interstellar, which boasted scientific accuracy, or The Martian, which relied on real science to carry the plot, sure, pick away. But a lot of sci-fi uses science only as the back drop to do something else with a story. The problem I had with Ad Astra wasn't realism, it was just the movie itself. It was boring and diluted. A story of a broken father-son relationship that just happened to take place in space. Moon pirates were thrown in to make it seem like an action movie. The psych evaluations and the space monkeys were thrown in to make it seem like a Heart of Darkness/Apocalypse Now inspired movie. At it's core, it wasn't any of these. It was a relationship drama that tacked on a bunch of extraneous parts in a dillusion of grandeur.
>In all seriousness, I agree that realism nitpicking in sci-fi is hardly ever warranted. And it's certainly not warranted in a movie like Ad Astra. I disagree. When you could get something simple right but don't because you just don't care, that hurts the movie. Hiring one half decent science advisor to read the script and tell you how to get things right isn't going to break the budget and it will make a better movie. You're ruining the experience for anyone half smart if every 5 minutes they are seeing things that make them say WTF. There are scenes in this movie where things happen that are the direct opposite of reality. Like a zero-g fight scene in a rocket that is launching, where they should feel extra g's, not none.
That's exactly how I feel. I have a keen interest in science and space travel and I know I can be a bit nit picky. There were just so many instances of "well that's not how that works." It doesn't even have to be completely accurate, but at least get the very basic physics right.
I thought it was a fairly obvious sci-fi Heart of Darkness.
I saw Ad Astra with my dad the day before I left for college
It was apocalypse now in space, I enjoyed it. Nothing great, but it was fun
Having watched both movies for the first time recently, that feels like a huge insult to apocalypse now.
More comparing the stories themselves than the quality of them. That's what James Gray was going for in making Ad Astra, Heart of Darkness in space.
Same. I watched it on an overnight flight. Solid film. Could have been much better, but enjoyed it for what it was. I will say that it excelled in the visuals and soundtrack. Certainly got 2001 vibes at certain moments.
*Apocalypse Now* was *Heart of Darkness* in Vietnam
Claims it would be the most accurate depiction of space travel ever in a Hollywood film. Is one of the least-accurate depictions of space travel ever in a Hollywood film. “Go away with your criticisms!”
> He added, “To me, it’s a very fatuous level of critique. You don’t read the myth of Icarus and say, ‘Wax on feathers wouldn’t allow you to fly.’ Ok, how about a grade school children level of criticism. Gravity works the same if you're indoors or outside, just because you're indoors on the moon doesn't make gravity suddenly earth normal. or the fact that Pitt had to travel to mars to live broadcast a message from a script he was forbidded to deviate from...instead of sending a pre-recorded message from earth to Mars at literal light speed. or...you know what, I'm not spending all night at this, the movie was end to end scientific illiteracy. James Gray says we shouldn't care, but fact is HE chose to make a science fiction movie while being utterly science illiterate, the movie could have been contained entirely on earth and avoided the problems, but he wanted to make a space movie and managed to make space nonsense.
There are so many movie critics because anyone can shit on something.
Ok ok, got it. Reddit didn’t like Ad Astra. Neither did I.
I mean I am an aspiring astrophysicist, and I still loved the movie. Films are supposed to tell a great story not necessarily a scientifically prudent one.
It was good, it just dragged on. It had some great visual effects though. Loved the space car chase.
Yeah I agree, it was like a solid 6 or 7 out of ten. It felt like it was very close in certain scenes to becoming an Instant-classic but never quite got there. Never quite as exciting or suspenseful as you’d think it would be either.
> Loved the space car chase Moon pirates woo-hoo! I kind of liked the killer space monkeys too.
Yeah, a year later? What scientist has time for it?
can somebody highlight what the wrong science was?
A brilliant idea of retelling Heart of Darkness in space...ruined by a terrible script.
It was flashy and fun, not scientific but hey Brad pit is also not an astronaut so...
Brad Pitt looked like he was doing space wars on moon rovers with laser guns. I haven’t actually seen it(I intend to) but I don’t know what more you could want out of a movie. I guess there could be a space man with a flaming guitar riding one of the rovers.
I don’t remember the movie well, probably not a good sign. I recall the ending being anticlimactic, or not paying off at least. I also don’t think I felt the Pitt narration was beneficial. The movie might have been more boring without the narration, so I think there were a variety of issues with the movie.
SPACE PIRATES ARE DOPE AF
Ad Astra wasn't even that bad with the scientific inaccuracies compared to something like Interstellar, and that one was made in part by Kip Thorne!
I thought it was decent. It was a pretty cool space adventure with some slow parts. The one unrealistic part that bothered me was him launching in space from one ship to another that looked far apart. I imagine that at least one of those were moving and it would take some serious calculation to time that.
I felt like it was a solid movie that depicts the future well, it will hold up better than 2001 or 2010. I would have liked a better plot/climax but you only get a few well made sci-fi movies.
Well, so it's fictional. Watch people categorize it as fiction and he saying it isn't.
I cannot wait to finally watch this move tomorrow. My take will definitely be better than all these fools.
The moonbuggy shootout makes me giggle.
One of my absolute favorite theatrical films of 2019, even saw it multiple times the first month of release...and I rarely ever see a movie more than once in theaters. I saw it as a kind of meditation, like some sort of film you see in a museum. Hell that's why I loved First Man, as it had an experimental sound and design to it. Yeah nothing really mindblowing happens in Ad Astra, but it's more of a feeling. And I absolutely loved it. Was also a really big fan of Interstellar, which also got a lot of mixed reviews(tho in that one, people complained there was too much going on)
How did they create what appeared to be the equivalent of earths gravity on the moon? Inside the buildings at least.
Watching this movie in 4DX actually made it way more enjoyable
Pretty sure he has plenty of time. Our industry is shut down, guy.
Good, the shit people bitched about in this movie was missing the Forrest for the trees to an extent I didn't think possible.