AD ASTRA
Starring Brad Pitt, Tommy Lee Jones, Ruth Negga, Liv Tyler and Donald Sutherland
Written by James Gray and Ethan Gross
Directed by James Gray
Out of Four
Director James Gray (The Lost City of Z) has been very upfront about the influence of Joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness on his film, Ad Astra, a space drama set in the not too distant future. But he seems so intent on creating his own Apocalypse Now that he should have gone ahead and just calyoled this movie Apocalypse Later.
Image Courtesy 20th Century Fox |
Could Clifford still be alive? And if so, what is going on out there? Roy is tasked with sending a message to his father, with the hope that the old man will respond.
Ad Astra presents an intriguing premise, well acted and directed with a keen eye and strong sense of (no pun intended) atmosphere. It also features some nicely staged action/suspense sequences, though it's certainly not an action movie. But from Pitt's sullen voice over narration to steady stream of picturesque images, it's impossible for a true cinephile not to be distracted by how preoccupied Gray is with his love for Coppola's experimental masterpiece. And that really leads to the movie's downfall, because taken on its own merits, it's a solid if uninspired sci-fi adventure drama. But the director clearly wants to be a lot more, and frankly, it just isn't.
The number of standout films set in space in recent memory gives us further reason to focus on what this movie isn't rather than what it is, and it's not as exciting Gravity, as mesmerizing as Interstellar and certainly not as funny or life affirming as The Martian. And we won't even get started on how it plaes in comparsion to last year's most underrated classic, First Man.
Image Courtesy 20th Century Fox |
It's not that Ad Astra is a bad movie, it's just not nearly as good as it wants to be. But it's stilll ambitious and visually pleasing, and if don't mind slow, deliberate pacing and have a passion for the space program, that's enough to make it worth seeing in IMAX. Just don't expect it to stay with you for long after the credits are over.
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