Film Review: Gravity

Director: Alfonso Cuaron

The latest film from Mexican film maker Alfonso Cuaron takes him firmly away from any of his previous films and into the world of sci-fi with Gravity. It received rave reviews after being premièred at the Venice Film Festival before moving onto many other film festivals where it continued to impress the critics. The project saw many actors and actresses linked to play the main role with Robert Downey Jr interested before George Clooney took the role of Matt Kowalski. For the lead Angelina Jolie was initially interested whilst Marion Cotillaird and Natalie Portman both passed due to scheduling conflicts before Sandra Bullock agreed to the movie.

Dr. Ryan Stone (Bullock) and Matt Kowalski (Clooney)

Dr. Ryan Stone and astronaut Matt Kowalski are on a space mission floating above the Earth and have been in space for a number of weeks. Their mission is aborted after mission control in Houston (voiced by Ed Harris) warns them of a Russian missile strike on a satellite that has caused a cloud of debris to orbit the Earth at high speed and is heading their way. The two astronauts and the crew on-board the Explorer must battle to survive and return to Earth.

The opening shots of the shuttle just floating above Earth with the voices of the crew members slowly becoming louder and more clear is beautiful, it sets the tone for the whole movie and its simply sublime cinematography (hats off to Emmanuel Lubezki). The shots of the astronauts against the deep blue sea and the infinite skyline are a joy to watch and simply remind you of 2001: A Space Odyssey in its beauty, the comparison was inevitable so got it out of the way early. Although its worth noting that I only saw it in regular 2D so cannot comment on how good the 3D effects were.

Debris strikes the space shuttle Explorer

Sandra Bullock is soft yet steely determined in the lead role whilst Clooney is his natural easy going self as the experienced astronaut doing his last space mission. Ed Harris lends a familiar voice to mission control in Houston essentially picking the role he took in Apollo 13. The terror of being alone drifting in space is incredibly real here on many occasions and rarely has it been done to greater effect, unlike so many sci-fi movies that have gone before it didn't need an actual physical enemy to create tension and difficult situations for the main characters. As the film progresses it does lose its way in parts but this doesn't detract from the superb impression it leaves upon you.

3.5/4 Beautiful yet tense sci-fi thriller