Sean’s Scene: Ad Astra
Perhaps the Most Cynical Movie Ever Made
Have you ever seen a movie that you recognized was good, but you somehow can’t decide if you actually like the movie? That’s the dilemma with Ad Astra. It’s a thematically ambitious, beautiful, technical marvel, with some heavy emotions, but it’s also a drag, and deliberately cynical. Not that the movie being cynical is necessarily a bad thing, but it doesn’t make it an easy movie recommend.
Brad Pitt plays Roy McBride. He is the son of a famous astronaut H. Clifford McBride (Tommy Lee Jones). Years ago, Clifford went on a mission to Neptune, and never returned. After a power surge from Neptune hits a space station that Roy works on, he is given top secret information, and learns his father may be alive. Space Command needs Roy to go to Mars, and send a message to Neptune to see if they can reach Clifford, and put a stop to those power surges. Failure to do so may result in the end of the human race. Roy, who hasn’t quite gotten over the fact that his father left, agrees to do the mission.
Of course, not everything works out as planned. It turns out that the inner workings of the universe in Ad Astra are quite hostile. And Roy must also contend that he doesn’t actually really know the truth of his father’s mission, passion or even much about who he is. There are harsh truths to uncover in this science fiction thriller.
From the outset the movie seems really interesting. Not only does the film have a stellar cast, it’s beautifully shot, and has some brilliant set design. From a technical standpoint everything about Ad Astra is quite magical. Everything has been done to make this universe feel real and engrossing.
While Ad Astra may be beautiful, it’s also a movie that has a tendency to drag. You get many moments of silence where all you can do is take in the deep emptiness of space, or be surprised at the technology on display. This means that at times you’ll get long drawn out shots of say… Brad Pitt staring out the window on a space craft. Or big long moments where something like a rocket landing feels like an eternity. It’s difficult to tell if the movie is being indulgent or just trying it’s beast to suggest that the wonders of space and science fiction technology needs to be taken in. I’m going with the ladder, but after a while it gets rather dull. There are plenty of moments where you simply want the movie to just get going with the story, but instead it takes another two or three minutes to gasp in awe of space and life beyond the stars, while striving to look and feel as realistic as possible.
True enough, some of these visual and technical moments are impressive, but this also means that the story is also held up by these moments of marvel as well. And that’s sad because Ad Astra has a pretty encompassing story. You will be drawn into the mystery going on, and you will desire to dig deeper, provided you can also deal with the slow, methodical pace the film moves at. The story absolutely takes itself very seriously. It isn’t interested in a lot of humor. This, in and of itself isn’t bad, but it also means that Ad Astra is unapologetically cynical and depressing.
Part of the themes of the story concern itself with loneliness, abandonment and unresolved conflicts between a parent and son. The movie sets the tone really early on for what you can expect, but it won’t stop the movie from disappointing those expecting a big payoff. And that payoff is going to hurt. The two hour extravaganza has a HUGE message, but one that is not likely to leave you feeling good.
Certainly it is not the job of a movie like Ad Astra to make us feel good. Likewise, in order to really consume the movie you may have to think about it for a moment. As I said at the beginning this is what makes discussing Ad Astra difficult. It’s a glorious movie that’s well put together, well written, marvelously acted, superb technical mastery, and thematically ambitious… but it deliberately goes out of its way NOT to make you feel good, hopeful or anything like that. Very few movies (particularly US films) are so ambitious as to attempt deliberate disappointment.
I wish that Ad Astra could pull that trick off with gusto. It mostly succeeds, but only to the point that it works thematically. Where it doesn’t work is that there is so much build up to the conclusion that some audience members are going to feel cheated, as though there should be more to the story than what you ultimately get. I can appreciate the thematic ambitions of the movie, even if the end result was something I didn’t particularly like. You can accuse Ad Astra of many things, but being poorly done isn’t one of them. It’s just going to end up leaving a void in the pit of your stomach.
So is Ad Astra a good movie? Absolutely, but it requires you to be in a particular mindset to enjoy. You may have to step out of the theater to get there. It’s easy to hate the movie when you walk out, but after digesting it… you might still not grow to love it, but you will appreciate what it does.
It’s particularly difficult to reconcile how good the movie is with how horrible it made me feel after it was over. Ad Astra is a movie worth seeing, but only if you keep in mind that Ad Astra is a thematically ambitious movie, but not one that’s here to make you feel good. It’s a visual and technical masterpiece, but may not be the type of movie you want to watch over and over again.