GRAVITY (2013 - SCI-FI / ACTION / THRILLER) ***1/2 out of *****
(I'm thinking explosive upchucking in a zero-gravity environment is probably not a good thing...)
CAST: Sandra Bullock, George Clooney.
DIRECTOR: Alfonso Cuaron
WARNING: Some SPOILERS and some compelling reasons to remain Earthbound - straight ahead...
IT'S LIKE THIS: I bet if you polled the most popular jobs for young kids to aspire to when they grow up, "astronaut" is close to the top - if not actually at # 1. However, dear parents, if there is a movie that is very helpful in giving your little tykes a nice reality check about a career in space, our next review is it. GRAVITY explores what happens when a U.S. shuttle mission in Earth's orbit goes south (literally and figuratively) big-time when debris from a Russian satellite explosion turns there spacecraft into high-altitude Swiss cheese. Trust me: after your kids see this flick, they will be ready to explore careers in retail, law, fast food, go-go dancing, or any other kind of profession that doesn't require you to be more than five feet off the ground.
Before the shit hits the fan (or, rather, the debris hits the ship), our heroes are busy bantering and fucking around as they repair some communications device on the exterior of the shuttle. They are: (1) Dr. Ryan Stone (Sandra Bullock), cerebral and tentative medical engineer who is making her maiden voyage into orbit; and (2) Matt Kowalski (George Clooney), veteran astronaut who has led a shitload of missions before and is getting ready to retire when they return to Earth. In other words, this is Matt's last mission. Anyone thinking it will be in more ways than one, please join us at the Tequila table. You are obviously special. I should add that there are a few other crew members but we only hear and not actually see them (unless you count their corpses later on), so for all intents and purposes, Ryan and Matt are our only real characters.
Anyhow, just when you think you can't take anymore of this "water-cooler-talk-masquerading-as-repairing-the-comm-link-on-the-shuttle-talk", all that aforementioned debris from the Russian satellite finally hits. Of course, mission control down in Houston basically gives our intrepid heroes, oh, about 30 seconds of warning. In other words, "Houston, we have a problem - and YOU are the fucking problem." In other other words, thanks for nothing, assholes. And just like that, Ryan and Matt are cast adrift in space. After what seems like a goddamned eternity, Matt manages to lasso and corral a free-floating and free-spinning Ryan before she gets too close to Mars.
Thank goodness, too, because I can't imagine a fate worse than loop-de-looping your ass all the way across the universe. I can just imagine some Martian family having a nice picnic on a red dune, then the kids suddenly asking the parents: "Mom, Dad - what is THAT?!?" Cue the Martian parents looking up to see Ryan doing the ass-over-teakettle routine over and over again across the sky, all the while screaming her lungs out. Tragic, scary, but also somehow deeply, deeply hilarious.
But I digress. Anyhow, Matt - being the experienced vet that he is - tells Ryan that they have one chance: get to the Chinese space station over yonder and use its escape pod (or something) to re-enter Earth's atmosphere. However, to do that they must first get to the International space station that's a little closer to them and use that station's damaged escape pod to get to the Chinese one. Got all that? Good. I don't know about you folks, but I had no idea how crowded things were up in Earth's orbit. Hell, if Matt and Ryan just keep cruising a little bite more past the Chinese space station, they may find an orbiting Olive Garden or Arby's to grab a quick bite before returning to Earth.
So... will Matt and Ryan's plan work? Will they be able to reach the International station and use its damaged pod to reach the Chinese one beyond it? And even if they do make it to the Chinese space station, who's to say its pod isn't damaged, too? And what about their air? How long can it last, especially with them panting like a bunch of oversexed horndogs? Will Ryan live to see her boring-ass Illinois hometown again? Will Matt be able to tell more wacky stories to his mission control homies in Houston? Speaking of those useless bastards, what can they do to help our Dynamic Duo?
Well, considering Houston's version of an Early-Warning System consisted of twenty-five whole seconds, I'm thinking not much. Jack-asses.
BUT, SERIOUSLY: Some films are so technically-accomplished and dazzlingly shot and presented, that its easy to be overwhelmed by the sheer virtuosity of the special effects - and overlook that the human element of the plot is relatively mundane and formulaic. Such is the case with GRAVITY - which arrives with such tremendous hype and buzz that you would think it was the movie event of the decade. It is not. While the film is certainly a solid action/thriller with nice grounding in human emotion, it is most definitely not all that and a bag of chips. Bottom line: GRAVITY is overrated.
We have what we like to call the "Special vs. Standard" test in movies. That is, if you can watch a film in "standard version" and still be dazzled by it, then it's a winner. It's kind of like what a friend of mine likes to say: "There's no use in dating a woman who looks good in make-up, but actually resembles a saggy-faced basset hound underneath." Amen, brother. Basically, some films seem "terrific" when seen in "special" mode, i.e., IMAX, 3-D, or both. However, when you watch them in regular format, their "magic" fades - a little for some, considerably for others. AVATAR was one film that survived the transition from 3-D to standard, remaining a riveting, engrossing action/thriller (albeit with some hackneyed elements). INCEPTION was another film that played well both in IMAX and regular versions, with Christopher Nolan's pretzel-like plot still managing to confound and entrance. MISSION IMPOSSIBLE 4 is another example of an IMAX film that still holds its own even when brought "down to Earth" - primarily due to the best story in the MI series, as well as the best ensemble cast headed by a stronger-than-usual Tom Cruise. The latest Bond film, SKYFALL, was another espionage thriller given the IMAX treatment even though it was already a stellar flick on its own.
Then there are the films that depend entirely on their IMAX 3D/IMAX/3D elements to make them even remotely noteworthy - and there are too many to mention. Practically any big-budget action film or thriller these days is given the IMAX treatment. Most of these films are barely above-average experiences without the razzle-dazzle, though. Watch them in standard format - and you end wondering what the hoopla was all about, unlike the previously mentioned films which were terrific to begin with. GRAVITY falls somewhere in-between these two groups: it is definitely no masterpiece as everyone is trumpeting, but at the same time it has enough good things about it to keep it from being an average experience.
The action and thriller elements are well-staged by the writer-director team of Jonas and Alfonso Cuaron, and even in standard format, the technical effects are impressive. They are even more so in IMAX 3D. This part of GRAVITY works very well, and we found ourselves on the edges of our seats. The only quibble here is that there aren't that as many reversals or complications as you would expect. Our protagonists are usually able to solve their problems fairly easily. One sequence wherein Ryan "dreams" a solution to the thorniest issue she faces is subtly touching, but also may seem awfully convenient and contrived. How you receive it depends on how invested you are in Ryan as a character.
Which leads to the real reason GRAVITY isn't quite the masterpiece classic everyone seems to be trumpeting it as: the human element. Matt Kowalski is somewhat interesting, and we do get some nuance and dimension to him, but Clooney seems to be playing, well, George Clooney again: basically the same cocky, confident guy with hidden sensitive depths that we've seen in OCEAN'S 11, 12, & 13, and most of his oeuvre. Given that Matt is (SPOILER) actually in very little of GRAVITY's running time, this normally wouldn't be a problem because Ryan Stone is the actual protagonist of this movie - and she is more fleshed out than Matt. So what, then, is the problem? It pains me to say this, but: Sandra Bullock.
I love Sandra Bullock. She is my favorite movie comedienne, and always lights up any comedy she's in, even the undeniably weird and bizarre ALL ABOUT STEVE. Bottom line, this woman can make me laugh like no other. However, as a dramatic actress, I find her to be a bit stiff and inexpressive - quite simply, hard to read. And in dramatic films, emotional transparency is paramount. Her Oscar-winning turn in THE BLIND SIDE side-stepped this tendency because she was playing such a fiery, flamboyant character who was also quite open and funny, so the role tapped into many of Bullock's strengths. However, when she is playing dramatic leads who are more reserved and introverted, she ends up being remote and inscrutable. This made her characters in films like THE NET, THE LAKE HOUSE, and PREMONITION a little hard to get to know. To her credit, though, Bullock manages to bring a muted sense of vulnerability to these roles - but it sometimes isn't enough.
In GRAVITY, Ryan Stone's backstory is admittedly moving: she lost a four-year old daughter in a mundane accident at nursery school. Unfortunately, without the right kind of expressive actress to tap into this heartache, the saddest backstory in the World won't matter. It's not that Bullock is bad. She is okay, even good in certain scenes - just not good enough. During what should be her centerpiece moments (Ryan's suicide attempt and her subsequent hallucination of Matt returning to "save" her), Bullock isn't quite as moving as she should be. During these setpieces, I kept thinking about who would have been more emotionally-transparent and powerful in the role: Charlize Theron, Julianne Moore, Julia Roberts, Gwyneth Paltrow. All of these ladies have the capacity to say a thousands words with a single glance - and that is the kind of actress needed for this role.
What hinders GRAVITY from being a true classic, though, is its third act. Even with Bullock's miscasting, this movie might have fared better if writers Jonas and Alfonso Cuaron hadn't decided in the late going to turn Ryan Stone into a wisecracking action hero in the John McClane (DIE HARD) mode. These quippy punchlines undercut the emotionalism that the Cuarons tried to cultivate in the first half of the film. I particularly loathe the "I hate space" line. After that point, I realized that GRAVITY was not going to live up to the hype. You might argue that humor is sometimes an unexpected and welcome element in life-or-death situations, and I would agree tentatively with you. Here, though, it comes across as facile and cheap - especially with the cerebral approach taken by the first and second acts of the film.
Then there's the ending, with bombastic music blaring over scenes that are supposed to signify Ryan Stone's "rebirth" as a human finding her inner strength and second wind. Let's just say that at this point, the Cuarons completely throw subtlety out the window. Had Ryan's emotional transformation and character arc been more moving, we might have found this denouement satisfying. As it is, it comes across as too easy, unearned, and perplexing. Too bad, too, because with the right kind of development (and the right actress), this could've been an emotionally-dynamic ending. Instead, it's merely over-the-top and almost silly.
There's a lot of Oscar talk surrounding GRAVITY and its stars, and I have to say we are quite amused by that. GRAVITY is certainly a good film - but it is nowhere near as good as everyone is making it out to be. And as much as I love Sandra Bullock as a comedienne, her abilities as a dramatic actress are not as flawless. Her work here is competent, even good in some parts, but it does not deserve an Academy Award. The areas where GRAVITY deserves Oscars are in the technical areas of Visual Effects, Cinemtatography, and Sound Effects. In the areas governed by human emotion - acting, writing, directing - it is merely good. And "good" is simply not good enough for an Academy Award. For that, a movie should be special.
And GRAVITY is not. In the end, GRAVITY is not the movie event of the year. It is, however, the most overrated movie of the 2013.
