Dr. Mann Deserves Some Grace
If you have seen Interstellar, you are familiar with Matt Damon’s character, Dr. Mann, the unlikely villain who betrays Cooper (Matthew McConaughey) and Brand (Anne Hathaway). He dupes our heroes by relaying faulty data about the planet he was sent to so that they would rescue him.
You probably remember hating him just as I did. It is easy to criticize Dr. Mann and cast him aside as a man trying to save his own skin. While I am not denying this, I argue that given the circumstances, any of us would have done the exact same thing. Dr. Mann deserves a little empathy. Here’s why:
If you haven’t seen Christopher Nolan’s Interstellar in a while (it came out 6 years ago! What?), here’s a refresher: It follows the journey of a group of scientists in the not too distant future on their search for a new planet to call home after famine has rendered Earth uninhabitable. On their journey, complications arise from the first planet they visit and they waste an unexpected amount of time and fuel. In order to make the journey home, the astronauts only have enough fuel to visit one of the two planets left to see if it could sustain human life. The astronauts decide to journey to the one with promising data: Dr. Mann’s.
Upon arrival to the icy wasteland that is Mann’s Planet, they wake up the doctor from hypersleep, who immediately grabs Cooper and starts weeping, relieved. He tells Cooper that he hopes he never gets to a point where he doesn’t think he will ever see another human face again.
Suspicions arise when Dr. Mann and Cooper head out to establish different sites for the colony. The shots get quicker, the music gets tenser (thanks Hans Zimmer), and Dr. Mann begins to ramble — he can’t seem to stop talking about the isolation he felt, which Cooper doesn’t think twice about. I mean, why would he? This guy just woke up from hypersleep after years of believing he would ever see another human being again. Cooper follows him, mind preoccupied with making haste so he can get back to his family as soon as possible.
Dr. Mann’s façade is made known after he pushes Cooper to his death down an icy slope. “Don’t judge me Cooper,” he says, “you were never tested like I was.” He had been on this world for years with no hope of rescue, which he initially thought he could live with. But, complete isolation revealed he was missing the component which makes us human — connection. He was completely alone on a planet that he knew could never be inhabited. But, escape was simple: all he had to do was forge the data, and salvation would follow.
Any of us would have done the same thing if we were in Dr. Mann’s shoes. You could argue he never should have signed up for the Lazarus Mission if he was unable to endure the potential of perpetual isolation. But, often in life, it seems the idea of something is quite different than the actuality of it. “I never thought my planet wouldn’t be the one,” he tells Cooper as he leaves him gasping for air on the side of the slope.
“I never thought my planet wouldn’t be the one.”
Years of complete solitude with no hope of rescue, starved of the very nature which makes us human, and tormented with the deliverance from it all by the simple act of forging some numbers, of course, he sent the fabricated data. I would have, too.
Coming to terms with devising a lie that would alter the future of humanity, Dr. Mann sought self-justification. So, he put all his efforts into Plan B: to continue the survival of the human race through establishing a colony from the embryos aboard Cooper’s ship on a survivable planet. Dr. Mann’s plan was to get the astronauts to rescue him and then establish the colony on the other planet. That’ll redeem him, right?
The case for Dr. Mann gets sticky in his attempted murder of Cooper, easily the scene where the traitor is despised the most. In his defense, he had to kill Cooper to escape the planet because he knew Dr. Mann’s data was faked. “I’m sorry, I can’t watch you go through this,” he says as he leaves Cooper to suffocate, “I thought I could, but I can’t.” He convinces himself that the murder of another human being is justified for the sake of humanity. “Do you see the children? It’s okay, they are right there with you,” he tells Cooper, referring to the embryos intended for the colony that would ensure the survival of the human race. Dr. Mann, driven to madness from being denied basic human contact, convinced himself he could lie and murder for the sake of the survival of the human species.
“Do not go gentle into that good night. Rage, rage against the dying of the light,” Dr. Mann repeats Dylan Thomas’ poem as he continues back to the ship. To Dr. Mann, he is raging against the dying of the light. He took measures to escape death, as evil as they were, and he shows that same tenacity to save humanity. What Dr. Mann doesn’t realize is that this raging against the dying of the light is his own madness and human nature finding an excuse to commit immoral crimes in an effort to save his own skin.
The extent of this madness is exposed when Dr. Mann attempts to dock his ship to the mothership after escaping his planet. With autodocking disabled, he has to dock manually, which will result in an explosion. As a scientist and astronaut, Dr. Mann is aware of this risk, yet still cuts the radio connection between him and Cooper, who’s ship can dock safely. Instead of allowing them to dock and then helping him on board, he attempts to dock himself, ultimately ending in his own demise. So why didn’t he just let Cooper’s ship board?
Cooper knew his lie. He knew the truth about him, and Dr. Mann, still trying to find self-justification for his actions and escape his own guilt, had to escape Cooper as well. Cooper was a blaring reminder of the immoral crimes he had committed, and Dr. Mann could not live with that. So, driven by madness and the lie that he was doing this to save the human race, he ignored reason and died.
It’s easy to criticize Dr. Mann, especially with the events following his death as the mothership is destroyed, causing Cooper and Brand to separate. But, can you really blame him? The first time I watched Interstellar, I hated him for his lies and selfishness. But coming back around again and watching it as a twenty-something, I empathize with Dr. Mann. I don’t even think he was evil. He was a product of his circumstances, pushed by his own human instinct to survive. Isolation from human contact led to madness which led to him committing these crimes, which he convinced himself were necessary to save the human race.
Humanity has proven to be adept at this, in convincing itself great evils are necessary at times in order for the greater good. Haven’t we all convinced ourselves that our immoral actions were necessary for a greater good at one point or another, just like Dr. Mann?
