Interstellar: the early reviews now look promising...

[glych t.anomaly]

it could be that there was no way to ensure humanities survival via sending something back to get them to adhere to it.

humans are FUCKING dumb.

So in respect to that, i think that they did it in a way that allowed for humanity to leave the planet which would then force them to survive differently, not allowing for the degree of fragmentation that exists on our planet goal wise. ( rich vs poor, powerful vs powerless )

 

[Spinsah]

I caught this at Scotiabank IMAX last night, and it really is glorious to see the film in 70MM and IMAX stock - the sound in that room is also booming. It was an incredible theatrical experience and a remarkably ambitious piece of film making.

It's such a treat to see science fiction reasonably executed on that scale, so I think it's easier to forgive the half-cocked narrative devices and stunted character development. Interstellar warrants comparison's to 2001 in it's scope and execution, but certainly not in it's literary intelligence. As singular a technical director as Nolan is, his screenwriting is rather average.

All that said, I think Interstellar succeeds as more than just a technical achievement. There are some great moments exploring the human consequences of relativity and enough juicy quantum mechanical musing to keep the hard sci-fi fans reasonably engaged.

It might not be a classic or even a great film, but as a theatrical experience it's one of the more profound outings I've had in recent memory. It blows a roughly comparable film like Gravity out of the water.

If you have an inkling to see this film, seeing it in IMAX really is a must.

 

[Zorro]

I thought this was shot really well, the acting was solid and I loved that it made you question concepts of space and time (Star Trek fans will recall the classic episode where Picard, Troi, Data and LaForge get caught in a space time rift on a shuttle - love that one), but what I was really wondering about after the film ended:

SPOILER ALERT...

... was that if it was the colonized humans from the future dropped a worm hole / time portal to help save humanity, could they not have tried to leave a solution for humans to use to deal with the crop failure and save Earth? Am I reading all that wrong?

Is that not answered with Caine. When he states that we weren't meant to stay on earth?

 

[mute79]

SPOILER ALERT...

... was that if it was the colonized humans from the future dropped a worm hole / time portal to help save humanity, could they not have tried to leave a solution for humans to use to deal with the crop failure and save Earth? Am I reading all that wrong?

Well, they did, they picked Murph.

But, what I don't get is if humans needed help from the aliens who turned out to be future humans, then how did humans evolve to the point of helping themselves? In other words, the blight wouldn't have destroyed the civilization or humans wouldn't have advanced enough to be able to help themselves later.

 

[DJ Vuvu Zela]

I think what many are missing is that you have to place the Tesseract inside a black hole, so the only way for people from the future to help the people of the past would be to find the one man who survived an encounter with a black hole.

 

[Bass-Invader]

I thought this was shot really well, the acting was solid and I loved that it made you question concepts of space and time (Star Trek fans will recall the classic episode where Picard, Troi, Data and LaForge get caught in a space time rift on a shuttle - love that one), but what I was really wondering about after the film ended:

SPOILER ALERT...

... was that if it was the colonized humans from the future dropped a worm hole / time portal to help save humanity, could they not have tried to leave a solution for humans to use to deal with the crop failure and save Earth? Am I reading all that wrong?

The centre of a black hole is called a singularity because it is an infinitely small point that has a huge mass. Because it is infinitely small, much of the math used to describe stuff goes awry.

In particular, gravity causes space and time to curve. At the singularity, the math used to describe that curvature yields infinite quantities. Both space and time curve into themselves infinitely (whatever that means).

The film suggests (with all the talk about gravity supposedly being the only thing that can act across time) that this means that it is in the singularity where dude can use gravity to affect things backwards in time. I think what they are getting it is that it's the only way to do this, and is why the complicated sequence of events underpinning the film had to happen rather than people just finding a future climate fixing device hanging out in orbit or something.

 

[Klubmasta Will]

i finally saw this last night, at scotiabank IMAX. i loved it, but also had a number of questions and gripes. i will read this thread first over the weekend before adding my own comments.

it's great when a movie makes one want to continue discussing it afterwards.

 

[silver1]

Saw this movie Friday night at Scotiabank IMAX (before it gets the boot for The Hobbit).

My overall thought on it is that this is a movie on the whole is not greater than the sum of its parts.

There was a ton of pieces that I thought was spectacular on their own, but I left the movie thinking overall it was good, not spectacular.

Then climax I thought they telegraphed a mile away from midway through the movie and I wasn't overall satisfied with it.

But it was visually spectacular in IMAX (both visually and audio) and I thought the acting performances were very strong.

 

[alexd]

Saw this movie Friday night at Scotiabank IMAX (before it gets the boot for The Hobbit).

WHen does it get the boot from IMAX?

 

[silver1]

WHen does it get the boot from IMAX?

I'm assuming that Hobbit will replace it in IMAX theatre starting the 17th when Hobbit comes out.

 

[alexd]

I'm assuming that Hobbit will replace it in IMAX theatre starting the 17th when Hobbit comes out.

Fuck, I better get on this then.

 

[randyval]

I liked it a lot, but who are they, and not the they who did everything in the movie. but the they who built the 3 dimensional space inside the singularity. which makes perfect sense that the handshake in the wormhole was coop on the way back. right at the moment he succeeded. i guess traveling so fast he was 130 years old, and just in time for the orbiting base camp over saturn to come pick him up.

 

[acheron]

as far as I could discern the "they" in all cases was us, humanity. once humans figured out how to take advantage of gravity-time, we progressed to the point that we were able to construct the 3D environment for Cooper - we created the opportunity for ourselves to make the discovery, closing the loop.

 

[JamesM]

The humans became the Q. Just say it.

 

[rave jedi]

Fuck, I better get on this then.

Alex, I certainly hope you got a chance to see this movie in 70mm IMAX at the Scotiabank Theatre because I just looked at the website and as of today it stopped playing it in IMAX. The new Hobbit movie doesn't start until the December 17th, but nothing seems to be playing in their IMAX theatre until then.

Cineplex.com | Showtimes


I believe the only theatre you can still catch it in real 70mm IMAX is the Coliseum in Mississauga before December 17th when the Hobbit movie takes over the theatre.

 

[alexd]

OK, finally saw this movie last night. As a huge sci fi fan, I was really disappointed at the 3 hour waste of life spent grasping at plot, wanting to like it. The acting sucked, the plot was held together barely, if at all, by random pseudoscience. The special effects were mediocre at best, and it seems they may have spent most of the budget on superstar salaries.

What were they going to do with those 10 million fertilized eggs? Implant them in Anne Hathaway?

If my daughter held a resentment for 23 years and then saved the day at the end by looking at a wristwatch... Holy fuck.

I give up. I just hope they don't make an Interstellar II.

How did resentful bitchydaughter age 23 years while Michael Caine didn't? Weren't they in the same time zone?

2001 was an epic space adventure with really deep meaning. Comparing 2001 to this Hollywood schlock is obscene.

 

[Polymorph]

yeah I watched this last night, and my impressions are:

-the 1st 45 minutes, I was concerned that this would be like another meandering Terrence Mallick "Tree of Life" film, that meanders around big Existential Questions, while boring the crap outta me....

- which is why, once they hit Space, I was rivetted, 'til the end. Loved the weird Space problem 2 do things...

- After that, yes, one must filter through what was wonky pseudoscience and what was based on actual Quantum-Mechanical/Relativity/Gravitational Theory based on Higgs Bosons and otherwise scientific *fact*. The fact that Nolan actually tried to be *intellectually stimulating* like that is worthy of note (and he knows it).

-In short, not a disappointment. That being said, I liked "Gravity" more.

 

[Bernnie Federko]

Question (via Quora): Interstellar (2014 movie):Why was the worm hole created near Saturn?


A: It's a homage to the classic sci-fi movie 2001: a Space Odyssey by Stanley Kubrick and its original novel by Arthur C. Clarke.

Something surprising in Interstellar

In the original story, a black monolith was placed on Saturn's moon Japetus, which is a portal (not necessary a wormhole) to a mysterious space where the protagonist traveled through. However, in the movie adaptation, the final destination of Saturn was changed to Jupiter because of technical problems (it was extremely difficult to make a convincing model of Saturn with its beautiful rings back in 1968). So 46 years later in Interstellar, Chris Nolan with his VFX crew and state-of-the-art CG technology, created the beautiful imagery of Saturn, and placed the opening of the space portal at where it should be.

To me, it's as cool as Elon Musk using Nikola Tesla's original AC motor design 126 years ago to create modern electric cars -- places his idea at where it should be.

 

[Bernnie Federko]

OK, finally saw this movie last night. As a huge sci fi fan, I was really disappointed at the 3 hour waste of life spent grasping at plot, wanting to like it. The acting sucked, the plot was held together barely, if at all, by random pseudoscience. The special effects were mediocre at best, and it seems they may have spent most of the budget on superstar salaries.

What were they going to do with those 10 million fertilized eggs? Implant them in Anne Hathaway?

If my daughter held a resentment for 23 years and then saved the day at the end by looking at a wristwatch... Holy fuck.

I give up. I just hope they don't make an Interstellar II.

How did resentful bitchydaughter age 23 years while Michael Caine didn't? Weren't they in the same time zone?

2001 was an epic space adventure with really deep meaning. Comparing 2001 to this Hollywood schlock is obscene.

Totally not fair to compare the two movies (IMHO). One was about the Meaning of Life, the Googleplex, and Everything, the other is a Space Romp exercise.

To each their own.

 

[rave jedi]

Even if Alex thought the movie sucked his opinion is not valid. Only reason because he didn't see it in real IMAX the way it was intended.

 

[Primavera]

Even if Alex thought the movie sucked his opinion is not valid. Only reason because he didn't see it in real IMAX the way it was intended.

Agreed.

Seeing this in a non IMAX screen or at home on a Blu-ray or even worse some pirate download = not the same movie / experience.

 

[Bernnie Federko]

The 70mm print in IMAX was astoundingly awesome

 

[alexd]

Even if Alex thought the movie sucked his opinion is not valid. Only reason because he didn't see it in real IMAX the way it was intended.

 

[acheron]

...has arrived on the 'web... just fyi

 

[praktik]

Yes looking forward to seeing what my plasma does for it - downloaded IMAX yesterday... staying away from 70MM print as I think this is best for people with more advanced home theatres (thinking advanced projectors) than a simple flatscreen, even if big....

that said can't see that any of the available torrents yet are the purist 70mm version...