I watched this last year as an accidental run of depressing Sci-Fi flicks I found on streaming services: Prospect, Aniara and A Quiet Place. The last one was Horror too but it’s set in the near future as some time had passed since the monsters arrived. I mentally shelved Astra because it sucked. The others had bleak premises and moments while only one had a tragic ended, the other two had cautious optimism. Astra had little to nothing going on from start to finish. I think the pitch went like this with writer/director James Gray: Hey, I have an idea, let’s make a Sci-Fi movie that’s even more boring, depressing and implausible than Interstellar. Oh yeah, we’ll cast an equally uncharismatic Brad Pitt since McConaughey did this before. I think Liv Tyler can do the emotionally crippled lady bit so the audience won’t think she’s Anne Hathaway.
Then comes the horrible Science and premise. Somehow, the hero’s dad led an expedition to the edge of the solar system to find intelligent life. The public was told all hands were lost decades ago but now NASA (or whoever) has deduced that dad is alive and he’s causing disruptions on Earth; some weird magnetic blasts you see at the film’s opening. The government needs Brad to travel to Mars, say a few words into a space microphone which may confirm the expedition’s last known location and leave. Instead, Brad becomes Captain McPunchy as he hijacks another rocket with three astronauts on their way to kill dear old dad with a nuclear bomb. The conclusion is pretty anti-climatic, Brad convinces dad (Tommy Lee Jones) to cut the crap with whatever he’s doing to harm the earth, blows it all up anyway and returns to Earth, ready to be less distant with Liv Tyler.
Throw in some really odd side matters which were really more interesting yet go nowhere:
- Traveling on the moon’s surface is dangerous due to armed parties attacking anyone they think is trespassing on their claims.
- An emergency stop to see why Scandanavians were in space with dangerous primates who killed them.
- Life on Mars really sucks.
- The Moon is a destination for very rich people.
Stir briskly with horrendous inaccurate Science (or none) namely a lake on Mars and getting to Neptune in a matter of weeks without relativistic side effects…you have this movie. If you’ve sat through Interstellar, you’ve suffered enough, especially with what Austin’s favorite dumbass who made good calls acting. If you’ve seen neither, just don’t bother. Now if you have Apple TV (the channel), watch the much better, more accurate For All Mankind.