It's interesting that mainstream media fear talk of systemic collapse but movies lap it up.
Of course films are all about drama and conflict and newspapers rely on sound-bite headlines, so they are always going to pick up on different topics. A three hour film has plenty of time to explore complex and ambiguous issues (though many don't) while the news focuses on simpler (over simplified?) discussions. The media bang on about immigration and EU membership while films like Interstellar look at the end of the world.
As big-budget films go, Interstellar is a good one. The cast are well chosen and play it perfectly, Matthew McConaughey being worthy of special mention, and the visuals are stunning. Director Christopher Nolan brings his usually gritty and cerebral approach with the science fiction elements all having a feel of realism (even with wormholes and time distortions).
As big-budget films go, Interstellar is a good one. The cast are well chosen and play it perfectly, Matthew McConaughey being worthy of special mention, and the visuals are stunning. Director Christopher Nolan brings his usually gritty and cerebral approach with the science fiction elements all having a feel of realism (even with wormholes and time distortions).
But what is really interesting is the narrative. Science fiction films are rarely about the future. They are metaphors for the present, the world today as seen by the USA - because Hollywood is always about the US. This is a film with a familiar theme: the end of the world and setting up new colonies. This has evolved from the 1960s expansionist Star Trek model (a parallel of US global expansion) through the Alien series (giving a post-Vietnam pessimistic view of the unknown) to the recent Avatar (where the humans - Americans - are the evil aliens). Science-fiction has had its ups and downs, fading as the space-race died out and now almost eclipsed by its cousin the Superhero film, but there are still a steady trickle of films, helped by the rebooting of Star Trek and the visual appeal of the genre in 3D format.
Interstellar picks up on features of the recent blockbusters being lengthy and beautifully filmed (though refuting 3D and CGI excesses) and, for a post-apoclytic film, it has a degree of optimism. Despite all the gadgets this is a simple story. The old world is dying and humanity needs a new one. The exploration element gives it a retro feel, almost like an Asimov or Arthur C. Clarke story. But binding it all are the tropes from Westerns. This is all about riding out into unchartered territory, the frontier of the 'Wild West' set in space. It is a place for rugged individuals and non-nonsense men of action.
McConaughey's character encapsulates this perfectly. He is caught between the love for his family (a compact nuclear family but with grandpa substituted for McConaughey's wife, stressing that apocalypse is a man's world) and his wish to get back into space (the cowboy's hate of domestication). This is reinforced by his frequent mention of how much he hates farming, a job he was forced into by society's collapse. Cowboys need to be on a horse not stuck in the ranch.
This active adventurer he is blasted into space, by NASA, of course, with a macho and intellectual Anne Hathaway and two sidekicks (following cowboy and sic-fi tradition). Instead of a faithful horse there's also a non-humanoid computer. There is a lot of scientific mumbo-jumbo but the messages are quite simple - (good old American) teamwork and humanity win the day. On the way they face hostile environmental conditions and have to deal with a rough frontiersman but their perseverance and ingenuity pull them through.
The film fails to fails to asks some deeper questions, like why can't resources be put into fixing Earth rather than blasting into space, but this isn't that kind of film. This is about the American Dream rewritten. It's a pastiche of Westerns and sci-fi films framed for the current world.
But above all, it's a really good film.
The film fails to fails to asks some deeper questions, like why can't resources be put into fixing Earth rather than blasting into space, but this isn't that kind of film. This is about the American Dream rewritten. It's a pastiche of Westerns and sci-fi films framed for the current world.
But above all, it's a really good film.