PLOT: Two astronauts stranded in space desperately try to survive before running out of oxygen.
I saw Gravity in a Brussels theater last week and this is the film that prompted me to finally start a blog, not because of any overwhelming feeling of appraise (on the contrary) but rather because of a sense of unease that settled slowly but firmly as I walked out of the theater. Let me explain: Gravity is indeed a mark in film history. A “tour-de-force” in 90 minutes that takes us to unseen depths of space and manages to steadily keep audiences in the edge of their seats without the aid of Aliens or inter-galactical combat scenes but rather with a clever use of state of the art elegant filming and some mesmerizing 3D moments. This is the first feature film of Alfonso Cuarón in 7 years and a triumphant comeback, yes, but it lacks in something essential which I might define as silence and all that it entrails. The same silence we experience in Ridley Scott’s “Alien”, in Kubrick’s “2001” or in Tarkovsky’s “Solaris”, is more or less absent in this film, perhaps because Cuarón opted for a steady pace, to keep audiences wired and receptive. The film is a clinically constructed story with a good pace where everything fits and nothing is exaggerated, but by doing so, the real menace of deep space, the real mystery of the unknown, is lost, in spite of the fact that we do come to “feel space” as we have not felt before in cinema, we do not feel the utter isolation and fear that should have been present as it would have been, had the movie been shot by Stanley Kubrick.
I saw Gravity in a Brussels theater last week and this is the film that prompted me to finally start a blog, not because of any overwhelming feeling of appraise (on the contrary) but rather because of a sense of unease that settled slowly but firmly as I walked out of the theater. Let me explain: Gravity is indeed a mark in film history. A “tour-de-force” in 90 minutes that takes us to unseen depths of space and manages to steadily keep audiences in the edge of their seats without the aid of Aliens or inter-galactical combat scenes but rather with a clever use of state of the art elegant filming and some mesmerizing 3D moments. This is the first feature film of Alfonso Cuarón in 7 years and a triumphant comeback, yes, but it lacks in something essential which I might define as silence and all that it entrails. The same silence we experience in Ridley Scott’s “Alien”, in Kubrick’s “2001” or in Tarkovsky’s “Solaris”, is more or less absent in this film, perhaps because Cuarón opted for a steady pace, to keep audiences wired and receptive. The film is a clinically constructed story with a good pace where everything fits and nothing is exaggerated, but by doing so, the real menace of deep space, the real mystery of the unknown, is lost, in spite of the fact that we do come to “feel space” as we have not felt before in cinema, we do not feel the utter isolation and fear that should have been present as it would have been, had the movie been shot by Stanley Kubrick.
Am
I asking too much? Perhaps, but then I should also add that the film aims
higher
than it actually reaches, and perhaps this is why my hopes of a small
glimpse
of Genius were shattered early on.
I
do appreciate however the choice of actors, people of substance, not
young and
unknown actors.
Gravity
carries its torch very high, in that it marks a new era in cinema. The
film
ended with applauses in the theater followed by a triumphant music, and
as I walked
out of the theater and into the street, my only thoughts were of
escaping
gravity and getting myself a good Gauffre on the Toison d’or.
RELEASED:
October 2013
Director:
Alfonso Cuarón
Running
Time: 91 mn
Cast:
Sandra Bullock, George Clooney
Rating:
3 stars
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