Richard’s “Canada AM” reviews for Oct. 4, 2013 w/ Ben Mulroney
Richard Crouse reviews this week’s movies: ‘Gravity,’ ‘Runner, Runner’ and ‘Girl Most Likely.’ Watch the whole thing HERE!
Posts Tagged ‘Gravity’
GRAVITY: 4 STARS
As “Alien” famously reminded us, “In space no one can hear you scream,” but they didn’t mention anything about heavy breathing. “Gravity,” a new space thriller starring Sandra Bullock and George Clooney as two astronauts adrift in the wild blue yonder, features more heavy breathing than a Linda Lovelace movie.
Beginning with an uninterrupted fifteen-minute opening shot, director Alfonso Cuarón presents a spacy story about medical engineer Dr. Ryan Stone (Bullock) and astronaut Matt Kowalsky (Clooney). She’s an uptight novice; he’s a wisecracking vet on his final mission.
It’s routine stuff—or as routine as space travel ever gets—until a debris storm, comprised of bits and pieces of old satellites, chunks of metal traveling as fast as bullets, crashes into their space shuttle. Stone is knocked “off structure” and drifting through the inky darkness while Kowalsky uses his experience and calm to rescue her. Cue the heavy breathing as her oxygen slowly runs out and panic sets in.
The storm has knocked their communications offline and they are forced to become Space MacGyvers in order to survive.
“Gravity” is an ambitious film. A two-hander set against the bleak backdrop of space, it relies on the cast and some tricky camerawork to maintain interest over the film’s deliberately paced but slight 85 minute running time.
The story is one of survival, but screenwriter Cuarón (who co-wrote it with his son Jonás) hasn’t simply written a horror film about imminent disaster. Stone signed up for outer space travel to isolate herself from a personal tragedy, but when the chips are down she finds new meaning in her life.
It’s a good way to ground the story. The isolation of space is well portrayed, the “off structure” sequences are tense and effective and the shots of Bullock drifting in the void or floating through her space shuttle are beautiful, like interstellar ballet. As effective as the human story is in Gravity, however, I could almost imagine turning the sound down and being content to just watch the pictures. Like Laser Floyd in Space.
But “Gravity,” while beautiful to look at, is occasionally too in love with its technique. The seventeen minute long uninterrupted shot that starts the film is spectacular and overall the look will make your eyeballs dance but then there’s a scene where we see Sandra Bullock reflected in one of her own, gravity free, tears. It’s a great image but one that feels a bit too clever. It was one of the few times in the film that I thought I was watching a special effect.
The look is an achievement, but when you find yourself daydreaming about how a scene was shot, it’s a sure sign the technique has taken you outside the story.
“Gravity” isn’t an epic like “2001: A Space Odyssey” or an outright horror film like “Alien.” There are no monsters or face hugging ETs. It’s not even a movie about life or death. Instead it is a life-affirming movie about the will to survive.
Reel Guys Gravity review: Philosophical movie about life, isolation, and fear watches like a beautiful ballet Oct. 4, 2013
This is a spacey story about medical engineer Dr. Ryan Stone (Sandra Bullock) and astronaut Matt Kowalsky (George Clooney). She’s an uptight novice; he’s a wisecracking vet on his final mission. It’s routine stuff until a debris storm, comprised of bits and pieces of old satellites, crashes into their space shuttle. Stone is knocked “off structure” and drifting through the inky darkness while Kowalsky uses his experience and calm to rescue her. The storm has also knocked their communications offline and they are forced to become Space MacGyvers in order to survive.
• Richard: 4/5
• Mark: 4/5
Richard: Mark, Gravity is an ambitious film. From a technical point of view it’s a wild outer space adventure, but it is grounded by Ryan Stone’s personal story and her search to find meaning in her life. It’s not an epic like 2001: A Space Odyssey or an outright horror film like Alien. There are no monsters or face hugging ETs. It’s not even a movie about life or death. Instead it is a life-affirming movie about the will to survive. What did you think?
Mark: Richard, I think the movie is about our deepest fear: the fear of being alone. Sandra Bullock is literally adrift and detached from everything and the effect is powerful. It may take place in space but reminded me of films like Castaway and 127 Hours.
RC: It does have a lot in common with those movies, plus some mind-bending special effects. The isolation of space is well portrayed, the “off structure” sequences are tense and effective and the shots of Bullock drifting in the inky darkness or floating through her space shuttle are beautiful, like interstellar ballet. As effective as the human story is in Gravity, however, I could almost imagine turning the sound down and being content to just watch the pictures. Like Laser Floyd in Space.
What did you think of Bullock?
MB: She was great; very moving. But it’s the cinematography that’s the real star. Pure visual poetry. If there were ever a movie that deserved to be seen in 3D IMAX this is it. But the music was kind of overwrought, wasn’t it?
RC: It’s strange, but I don’t really remember the music. There is no sound in space, I guess. For me the movie is all about the visual beauty. The 17-minute-long uninterrupted shot that starts the film is spectacular and overall the look will make your eyeballs dance, although I wonder though if it isn’t just a bit too in love with its technique in places.
There’s a scene where we see Bullock reflected in one of her own, gravity free, tears. It’s a great image but one that feels a bit too clever. It was one of the few times in the film that I thought I was watching a special effect.
MB: I noticed the tears too, although I was just grateful she didn’t have a runny nose.
Gravity, WALL-E and 2001: A history of Hollywood in space by Richard Crouse Metro Canada Oct. 2, 2013
It’s one thing to feel cut off from other people. It’s another thing to be alone thousands of miles above the earth.
A new film from Children of Men director Alfonso Cuarón does a great job of showing the isolation felt by two cosmonauts who, in the words of David Bowie, are “sitting in a tin can, far above the world.”
Gravity stars Sandra Bullock and George Clooney as astronauts who get pelted by a debris storm, comprised of bits and pieces of old satellites. With their space shuttle disabled and their communications offline and they are forced to become Space MacGyvers in order to survive.
Bullock and Clooney aren’t the first movienauts to be cut adrift in space. From animated films like WALL-E to epics like 2001: A Space Odyssey Hollywood has mined the vastness of space in some unforgettable movies.
In the film Moon Sam Rockwell is astronaut Sam Bell, a Lunar Industries employee living and working on a space station on a three year contract.
His job is to tend to machines that are “harvesting solar energy from the dark side of the moon” and providing almost 70% of earth with power. His only companion is a robot / cup holder named Gerty (voiced by the appropriately named Kevin Spacey) although he can receive taped messages from his wife Tess (Dominique McElligott). The loneliness of the job is broken, however, when he discovers that he may not be truly alone.
The comparisons to 2001 are obvious, made even more apparent by Spacey’s HAL-like delivery of his robot lines, but director Duncan Jones has simply used Kubrick’s film as a visual reference on his way to creating a unique and fascinating film. Another thing he borrowed from Kubrick and many other sci-fi films of the 60s and 70s is his emphasis on ideas rather than special effects. Michael Bay this ain’t.
One of the earliest alone-in-space movies came in 1950. Destination Moon is noted as the first Hollywood movie to contain scientific representations of space travel. The story involves a two-man journey to the fifth largest moon in the Solar System and the difficult decision to leave one behind. Heralded at the time for its realism, through today’s eyes it looks somewhat corny. For example: “I know one thing,” says a spacesick General Thayer (Tom Powers), “unless these pills work, space travel isn’t going to be… popular.”
Sandra Bullock talks the emotional and physical zero-g torture, Metro. Sept 27, 2013
“I think we need to make another movie about how we made this movie,” says Sandra Bullock on the filming of Gravity, her new lost-in-space film.
The Heat star plays Dr. Ryan Stone, an astronaut untethered from her space shuttle following a debris storm. Cut loose from her space partner (George Clooney) and her ride to Earth, she drifts through the inky darkness until discovering a way to survive.
“The film is about adversities, and we were going through adversities,” says director Alfonso Cuarón. “Everything was a big challenge.”
Technically, the shoot was arduous. Recreating the zero-gravity of space required Bullock to learn to move at 30 per cent of her usual speed, and to be trussed up like a marionette on a 12-wire system and other torturous devices.
“We had a consultant from Guantanamo Bay come in,” jokes Cuarón.
Emotionally the shoot also presented issues. How could Bullock portray the impassioned inner life of the character when covered with a helmet and spacesuit for much of the performance?
“I think every actor will tell you that they are always panicked about being able to convey something with the least amount of preciousness,” she says. “If all you have are your eyes or your face, just feel it truthfully. For me, I didn’t think about being behind the visor. It was still my whole body feeling it.
“But a lot of times you’d feel yourself emoting something and they’d say, ‘No, we didn’t see anything.’ I just had to trust in what (Cuarón) saw. I saw nothing. I heard nothing. I had him in my head and I just had to trust that.
“It’s a weird profession. You have to unscrew your head and screw on this other head of what this other person is going through and you go, ‘Wow, that’s not a pretty place to live all day.’”
Working with Clooney, who she’s known since before they both were famous, also provided support.
When she was having trouble with a particular scene, Clooney sent an email with a some suggestions on how to make it work. “It’s not my business,” he wrote, “so throw this in the trash or use it.”
As it turns out, his ideas were bang-on. “That’s the gift of knowing someone for so long,” she says. “He gives you gold tidbits like that. It’s sweet.”
TIFF13: Sandra Bullock put through zero-g hell while filming Gravity By Richard Crouse Metro Canada September 9, 2013
Director Alfonso Cuarón described the process of making Gravity as “painful and gruesome” for his star Sandra Bullock.
“Bodily fluids come to mind,” says Bullock. “There was blood. Blisters.”
The Oscar winner plays Dr. Ryan Stone, an astronaut untethered from her space shuttle following a debris storm. Cut adrift from her ride back to earth and her space partner (George Clooney) she floats through the inky darkness until she discovers the will and a way to survive.
Initially the filmmakers considered using the “vomit comet”—a plane that allows you to achieve weightlessness—to create the zero gravity of space. When that idea was rejected new technology was built to facilitate the film’s thrilling and chilling outer space scenes.
“There were contraptions that took twenty minutes to get into,” says Bullock. “that harnessed you and locked you into something that you had no control over once it started.”
She describes long takes in really uncomfortable positions strung up like a marionette on a twelve-wire system, an office chair on a hydraulic lift, cameras that flew toward her and the frustration of being “attached to something and not being able to use your body the way you’re used to.”
“It was something completely new,” she says. “It was more like being part of Cirque du Soleil than what we had been used to as actors.”
The technical issues of the job were physically challenging—“I love it,” she says, “but I didn’t love it while I was doing it.”— but she adds that the shoot, emotionally, was “the Wild West.”
“Most of it was frustration and trying not to take your anger out on Alfonso. I had no one else listening to me but him so he got the brunt of it. But it was my frustration with myself because I didn’t have all the tools I was used to to get me where I wanted to go.”
“I missed being in the sun. I missed being with my son. I missed being with people and having communication. It was lonely. Luckily I got to get out of it at the end of the day and appreciate the sunshine or my boy.”
In the end the arduous shoot was worth it. There’s Oscar buzz surrounding Bullock’s performance and she even got the thumbs up from real life spaceman Chris Hadfield
“Sandra Bullock was great,” he tweeted. “I’d fly with her.”
