"PROJECT HAIL MARY" - NONSPOILER EARLY REVIEW
Directors Phil Lord and Christopher Miller step up their game from their previous directorial efforts, which include CLOUDY WITH A CHANCE OF MEATBALLS, 21 JUMP STREET and its sequel, and THE LEGO MOVIE. Their influence was also strong over the LEGO and SPIDERVERSE franchises (they were also famously fired off of SOLO: A STAR WARS STORY, but that didn’t stop them from returning to space).
Lord and Miller have always been astute cinematic magpies who tend to gravitate toward stories of unlikely heroes, and here they team up with Ryan Gosling (also a producer), who gets to have a larger range than he’s been allowed after a decade of doing mostly comedies himself (THE NICE GUYS, BARBIE, and THE FALL GUY—all excellent, and he’s undeniable in them, but the new film is a refreshing extension and reminder of his other gifts).
What I can tell you about PROJECT HAIL MARY (assuming you haven’t read it) is it’s about Ryland Grace, an astronaut who awakes from hyper sleep as the only human alive on his mission in deep space. It’s also about that same Ryland Grace as a “cool nerd” high school science teacher who wrote an obscure paper years ago, which attracts the attention of a federal government agency (led by Sandra Hüller, ANATOMY OF A FALL) who have discovered a mysterious substance that is slowly eating the sun. The film unfolds in a unique structure of parallel narratives, shifting back and forth between what takes him out of the classroom into space and how to combat this frightening new inevitability, and what happens when he’s the only one there… but is he alone?
The film they made, adapted from the beloved sci-fi novel by Andy Weir, may remind you a bit of all—yes, ALL—of the crop of similar save-the-future-of-humanity/space-mission films of the recent past, like Alfonso Cuarón’s GRAVITY, Christopher Nolan’s INTERSTELLAR, Ridley Scott’s THE MARTIAN (also adapted by screenwriter Drew Goddard from a novel by Weir), Denis Villeneuve’s ARRIVAL, maybe a little bit of DUNE (also shot by the great Greig Fraser), and, because of the Gosling connection, maybe a little bit of Damien Chazelle’s underrated FIRST MAN (which isn’t technically sci-fi).
I’m not sure if PROJECT HAIL MARY overall is “better” than any of those movies (it’s oddly paced and structured, much of the humor surprisingly didn’t land with me), but I don’t want to yuck anyone’s yum here: what it may lack in not getting there first, it more than makes up for it with a buoyant spirit and a light touch, which very few of the aforementioned films possess. It boasts a fine supporting cast, stunning visuals (using NO GREEN SCREEN!), and a playful, mesmerising score by Daniel Pemberton (MATERIALISTS, the SPIDER-VERSE movies). It uses the tools and techniques discovered and developed by those films and filmmakers to get to something that matters, something real. And it’s a great science movie, in that it’s a movie about perpetual failure, and having the courage and the heart to persevere when the odds feel insurmountable. And unlike THE MARTIAN, Grace is not alone, and I’m being purposefully vague because, having not read the book or even watched a trailer myself, I was surprised by the unique friend Grace meets, and the unique friendship at the film’s center which, on more than one occasion, moved me to tears.
In short, PROJECT HAIL MARY is joyous, humane, and hopeful. Cinematically speaking, it may not be a giant leap for mankind, but it is a small step for man, and now more than ever, boy, do we need that. I can’t wait to experience it again.
PROJECT HAIL MARY opens nationwide on Friday, March 20 in theaters.
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Zach is a proud member of the Minnesota Film Critics Association (MNFCA). For more info about Zach, the organization, or to read other great reviews from other great Minnesota-based film critics, click here: www.mnfca.com