The earth is getting dusty,
And our crops are less than trusty,
And our history is rusty,
And all life is soon to end.
Farmer Coop is in frustration
Till suspicious gravitation
Sends him to a NASA station
To encounter an old friend.
Dr. Brand suggests spacefaring
On a certain wormhole bearing
Will reward the pilots’ daring
With a new potential Earth.
Leaving son and loving daughter,
Coop departs to be the spotter
On new worlds of ice and water,
Where time carries greater worth.
Though he carries on with yearning,
Many dangers are concerning.
Complex choices stem from learning
He may not end up returning.
______________
I was impressed by the Dark Knight trilogy, thoroughly impressed by The Prestige, and blown away by Inception, so I had high hopes for director Christopher Nolan’s latest creative extravaganza Interstellar. While it was praised for its scientific accuracy, creative innovation, and Oscar-winning visuals, it obviously draws from several other precedents of science fiction cinema, such as Contact (a mysterious “them” sends messages to Earth, which prompt a wormhole-related mission with Matthew McConaughey involved), Sunshine (a mission to save Earth runs into an ill-fated earlier mission), and of course 2001: A Space Odyssey, from which Interstellar derives those long, slightly boring scenes of space and space docking and a not-quite-as-confusing journey into transcendence. Plus, those walking wall AIs resemble (perhaps intentionally) the monolith from 2001.
As the film sets up a believably down-to-earth apocalypse and a touching father-daughter dynamic between former astronaut-turned-farmer Cooper (Matthew McConaughey) and his brainy daughter Murph (Mackenzie Foy), it lays a compelling groundwork. Then when it leaves the devastated planet behind to travel through a wormhole near Saturn, it rises in its sci-fi virtuosity, even if certain scenes are a bit drawn out. It really hits its stride when the crew (McConaughey, Anne Hathaway, Wes Bentley, and David Gyasi) explore stunning new worlds with heartbreaking costs. All this adds up to a plausible visionary experience that was more or less what I was expecting, and then….
[Spoiler alert for the next paragraph] I’d like to add one more cinematic comparison: Disney’s 1979 let-down The Black Hole, another film with a compelling storyline, a likable robot, innovative special effects, and a climactic journey into a black hole. As in that film, all of the plausibility is lost once the black hole is entered, and the unlikeliness of subsequent events is written away with the weak argument that no one knows what would happen in a black hole, so artistic license is free to do any old thing. In the case of Interstellar, I can swallow what Coop finds and even his shaky assumptions about who brought him there, but the film’s most glaring hole is how grown-up Murph (Jessica Chastain) inexplicably figures out the meager messages given her to save mankind. The truth apparently just dawns on her, and the day is saved thanks to Coop ex machina. While the emotional climax that follows is fittingly poignant, it is cut too short (Coop doesn’t even try to meet his grandchildren) and also calls into question the necessity of finding a replacement world in the first place.
Okay, spoilers done. I was really expecting to love this movie, and in some ways, I do. It has the Nolan touch that combines well-drawn characters with difficult dramatic situations, inspiring themes of love and pioneering, and a moving, if repetitive, Hans Zimmer score. It even gets the science right in the space sequences, which are true to life in not relaying any sound, even explosions. I do wish that the monolith robots TARS and CASE had had more screen time since they offered the only comic relief and were the most unique special effect.
Yet for all its visual wonder and strong characters, the implausibility of the climax saps some of the emotion that it attempts to convey. It simply bends the mind a bit too far. I can still admire the film, but my VC was entirely turned off by the fantastical lurch toward a not-quite-satisfying-enough conclusion, though she’s not a Nolan fan anyway. While the care and craftsmanship behind the production are obvious, Interstellar is not Nolan’s best. It deserves a place of honor among his middle efforts, but Inception is still tops for me.
Oh, and here’s an Honest Trailer from Youtube that had my VC howling with agreement (and laughter): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lZMzf-SDWP8
Best line: (Coop, calibrating the settings on TARS) “Humour — 75%.” (TARS) “75%. Self-destruct sequence in T minus 10, 9, 8…” (Coop) “Let’s make it 65%.” (TARS) “Knock, knock.” (Coop) “Want me to make it 55?” Rank: List Runner-Up© 2015 S. G. Liput
307 Followers and Counting
A lonely hotel is a dangerous thing,
At least in the works of an author named King,
For no one can know what occurs in the mind
When volatile men are annoyed and confined.
They say, like Jack Torrance, the winter caretaker,
That past tragedies are no sign or deal breaker.
He’s simply too sane for such things to occur;
His wife is the same, and he’d never hurt her.
But get them alone in a desolate maze
And watch them get worse with the passing of days
And cringe as the dread and the wickedness weave,
For those at the Overlook may never leave.
__________________
With S.H.I.E.L.D. out of service,
At least on the surface,
Six awesome Avengers defend the world still.
Since HYDRA arose,
They’ve empowered new foes,
Quicksilver and Scarlet Witch, twins with ill will.
Once Tony Stark’s had
An epiphany bad,
He then starts preparing for “peace in our time,”
But Ultron’s created
And quickly upgraded,
Equating true peace with a murderous crime.
Against these new threats
And alarming skill sets,
Our heroes must deal with their goals and their fear,
And when all agree
To save Earth mightily,
The smackdown is epic and worth a good cheer.
____________________
Surgeries happen every day,
Routine and clean, so doctors say.
You simply go to sleep and then
They ought to wake you up again.
What’s that? You’ve heard, through some mistake,
That sometimes people never wake?
That’s possible, but don’t dismay;
It’s very rare, so doctors say.
You need not worry of a coma;
Trust the doc and his diploma.
Never fear about foul play
That can’t occur, so doctors say.
Statistics prove how safe you are;
The surgeon’s been ideal so far.
He’ll deftly take the pain away,
And you’ll be fine, so doctors say.
________________
In District 13, Katniss Everdeen waits,
Unsettled by District 12 citizens’ fates.
Deep under the ground with her saved family,
She worries for Peeta interminably.
Both Plutarch and resolute President Coin
Are eager for her to recover and join.
Insisting that Peeta be rescued someday,
Poor Katniss agrees to be their Mockingjay,
The hero for all districts, sure to inspire
The masses and light an unquenchable fire.
Since staged propaganda does not work as well,
She heads to the war zones to get mad as hell.
Her anger at Snow for the cruel devastation
Extends to the people who rise from privation.
Yet who should appear on the Capitol screens
But Peeta, denouncing the riotous scenes?
The boy’s brain seems washed, but he still tries to warn
The rebels of sudden barrages that morn.
When Capitol power is violently cut,
The rebels move in ere the window is shut.
The three captive tributes that Snow has been holding
Are surely a part of his scheme still unfolding.
Though Katniss is eager for Peeta’s return,
She’s shocked at the lesson Snow wants her to learn.
_________________
The author Jane Austen
Refused to get lost in
Romance of her own,
Though for that she’s well-known.
__________________
I am the fire that burns out of sight,
Starting my rampage as merely a wisp.
Celebrate victory into the night;
I will burn you and your spire to a crisp.
Why do they build these skyscrapers so high,
Making it simpler with every floor
For me to cut off and trap in the sky
Everyone over my fiery roar?
Look at the people who panic and flee,
Visitors boasting illustrious names.
Look at the firemen battling me,
Feeble to fight in the face of my flames.
I am inferno, the new height of heat,
No other bastion of bragging is hotter.
Top of the world, Ma! None can defeat
Me or my mayhem, except—oh no—water!
________________
Rhyme and Reason 