Inverarity (inverarity) wrote,
Inverarity
inverarity

Movie Review: Interstellar

Interstellar

At some point the near future, a "blight" is destroying all crops on Earth. The human race is facing slow extinction. A former astronaut-turned-farmer stumbles upon a secret NASA project to send explorers to other planets, thanks to a wormhole to another galaxy discovered near the orbit of Saturn. They believe they have received messages from an advanced alien race steering them towards this wormhole. So he is corralled into piloting the ship that will chose humanity's new home.

Oh. My. God.

This movie is an actual Science Fiction movie.

I wouldn't quite call it "hard SF" - I'm sure physicists more educated than I were probably wincing at the math and the relativity and the wormholes, and I definitely spotted some dubious science concerning the black holes, travel times between planets, a lot of hand-waved technology, and some suspensions of disbelief in the plot.

Nonetheless, this is probably the best true science fiction (as opposed to science fantasy) movie I have ever seen.

There is social commentary, like the bright-eyed teacher insisting that the moon landings were a hoax, and the (quite legitimate) debate over spending enormous resources for an extra-solar mission when people are starving at home. There is touching family drama and heroism and sacrifice. There are some awfully cool alien landscapes, and friendly AIs who do not go all HAL 1000 on the crew.

It's like The Black Hole minus the Disney silliness. It's like Contact but not boring. It's like 2001: A Space Odyssey but not boring. It's like Gravity without relying on George Clooney. It's all the best parts of those movies wrapped into one.

5 stars, see it in theaters, boo and hiss when it fails to win an Oscar.
Tags: movies, reviews, science fiction
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