Joining the immortalized successes of space adventure drama genre films like “Interstellar,” “2001: A Space Odyssey” and the entire “Star Wars” franchise, is finally an optimistic film cinephiles and science buffs can rejoice under: “Project Hail Mary.”
The film, based on the novel of the same name by Andy Weir, is the return of practical effects, slow-burn storytelling and excellent acting that has been a seldom met-standard in blockbuster cinema since “Dune.”
Despite all the comparison, don’t assume you’re in for anything you expect from sci-fi. “Project Hail Mary” is a singular unique experience, even compared to Weir’s other screen-adapted work “The Martian.”
The film follows our unwilling hero, Ryland Grace, played by Ryan Gosling. Maybe it’s the similarities in name that drew Gosling to the project, which has been in production for six years under his guidance and care. And it’s exactly that dedicated energy and intentionality that made Ken come to life in “The Barbie Movie,” Sebastian Wilder relatable in “La La Land” and Ryland so captivating in this film.
For a character suffering from amnesia due to his 11-year-long medically-induced coma, he is still fully realized from the moment he awakes to his final appearance on screen. Even when he can’t remember his own name, Gosling plays Ryland to his fullest internalized core. He is frantically concerned for his crewmates, innately funny and emotionally expressive.
As Ryland slowly remembers his past, he taps into a familiar nostalgia for your favorite teacher in middle school, with drooping glasses and a knack for making school magical. His eccentricities against Sandra Huller’s portrayal of Eva Stratt as he is roped into the titular “Project Hail Mary” is the best foil of the film. Huller’s cold, inexpressive style of empathy makes Gosling’s comedic performance and warmth shine.
In a film bolstering such a small cast, you get to truly experience the science of this world as its own character to conquer. Ryland is grappling with the microscopic sun-eating cells, or “Astrophage,” on a level that feels so grandiose, and he is doing it with a pack of Skittles and rolls of duct tape. Experiments and montages that are bursting with plot also beat with the heart of Gosling’s lovable and easy-to-root-for demeanor. Nothing is too scientific that viewers get left behind in incomprehensible waters, but nothing is entirely dumbed down either. The science is made out to be fun and interesting and logical, a line that other sci-fi films have failed to walk in the past.
It was no surprise to audiences that there was an alien encounter in the film, since it was plastered in every advertisement. This only made the anticipation in the theater so palpable and exciting. The “reveal” of Rocky, an engineer from the planet Erid, puppeteered and voiced by James Ortiz, is the moment where the movie gets to soar.
If you were delighted that Gosling could have chemistry with a stoic Stratt, you will be ecstatic to hear that he has even more of a spark with an arachnid-esque rock.
The spark in question is so earned by the thoughtful pacing of the film. A run time pushing near three hours is forgivable when the padded minutes allow for a slow, realistic and deserved friendship to blossom. Ryland fails repeatedly to understand Rocky. He has to infer and recontextualize their communication method, while not being able to even be in each other’s air.
It’s the kind of time and care we don’t take outside of fiction. Learning a new language, and inviting new creatures and ideas into your orbit was refreshing. The film’s true emotional ethos reared itself when the two went from understanding each other fundamentally to understanding the other emotionally; the act of welcoming the unknown is a burden in modern reality. On the Hail Mary ship by the immune Tal Ceti star, connection becomes the crucial antidote to loneliness.
Rocky is the cure to Ryland’s loneliness, and the necessary final piece to his discovery of the earth-saving remedy Talmoeba. The relationship between the two allows Ryland to recontextualize his past. Ryland’s memories do not hold him up on a pedestal. He doesn’t remember himself as anything resembling a science-slinging, earth-saving hero the audience sees, but Rocky reasserts his current self that has risen to the task, regardless of how he views himself.
For a film centered around aliens and intergalactic troubles, it remains intrinsically human. What makes Ryland and Rocky so endearing to see on screen is how relatable they are. Ryland complains about Rocky as a roommate, and Rocky rallies against Ryland’s ex-girlfriend’s new boyfriend. They’re learning about each other, all in tandem with humor and despair. It’s hard to not fall in love with these characters, but downright impossible when they are sharing scenes.
The gripping performance we get from Ortiz as Rocky is also a testament to the practical effects, puppeteering and lifesize sets that made the movie feel so grounded in, well, space. Gosling never performed to a tennis ball, and it shows through comedic timing and genuine reactions. His wire work that has been part of the film’s promotion online is a feat on the same level as method acting. The commitment to making a film without the crutches of CGI is a creative choice that should be praised, and should be the standard.
The full blockbuster treatment the film has gotten from theaters has been a return to form for the lacking category of “must see in theater” films. A release in both IMAX, 70mm and showings at the Mugar Omni Theater at The Museum of Science is a cinematic hail mary that you should not ignore. The film is edited with aspect ratios and audio signatures to signal the past and present, which on the big screen is the best kind of dramatic. And if you were wondering, select theaters do have collectors popcorn buckets, so you can retire your “Dune” sandworm.
In the plainest terms, Gosling and Ortiz save blockbuster cinema. Statement.
