Brad’s star quality shines in sci-fi spectacular
BRAD PITT shoots for the stars in this grandiose and epic existential sci-fi drama – a breathtakingly beautiful journey to the loneliest edge of the solar system which explores humanity’s need for companionship.
Playing an obsessive astronaut sent on a mission to find his father and save the Earth from destruction, Pitt displays none of the humour he demonstrated so recently in Quentin Tarantino’s Once Upon a Time in Hollywood.
Instead he is required to be at his most insular and least starry and he smartly calibrates his performance to the material to establish and anchor the melancholy tone.
Tommy Lee Jones is cast as his father and is equally subdued, even while playing god in space, and much like poor Liv Tyler as Pitt’s wife, he isn’t overburdened by dialogue.
As a psychological examination of the inability of men to communicate with each other, this is far from boldly going where no film has gone before.
That’s no surprise, as grief, isolation and a troubled father-son relationship, is the familiar stomping ground of director James Gray. It also follows a similar path as his repetitive 2016 period adventure, The Lost City of Z, which saw TV star Charlie Hunnam carry on up the jungle.
Yet the craftsmanship is typically superb, as Gray takes the journey into darkness in a style reminiscent of Francis Ford Coppola’s Vietnam war masterpiece Apocalypse Now, and moves it into space – we even have a bloody episode with space baboons. Gray also ambitiously apes the visual and sound design from Stanley Kubrick’s sci-fi classic 2001: A Space Odyssey. And where Kubrick explained nothing, Pitt’s voice-over fully reveals his feelings of remorse and regret.
On my first viewing I found Ad Astra ponderous and pretentious, but the second time around I found its blockbuster action scenes more exciting, and I enjoyed its thoughtful, elegant and graceful rhythms far more.
On a third trip I’ll probably love it.