Sometimes a filmmaker's head gets so far up their arse it can't come out again - I can't helping thinking that's what happened here for Chris Nolan, as talented as he is. There's so much exposition and theoretical physics that I had trouble wrapping my head around it; I'm quite prepared to admit I'm not the smartest cookie in the box but it was just plain confusing too much of the time. When I saw it there was this group of ten year old boys who trooped out of the movie still with 20 minutes to go - I think this is why it's not going to be a block buster.
For all the work done developing the story, far too much of this felt like a first draft - scenes end early, dialogue feels as though it needs another polish, exposition was clunky rather than smooth, far too much talk going on instead of using images to tell the story, too much dialogue coming from Matthew McConaughey (I'm glad he had a comeback, but I don't really want to see him in movies any more).
For a movie where the world is going to end a surprising amount of characters were selfish brats, such as McConaughey's daughter, Anne Hathaway's love struck astronaut. Too much of it didn't ring true - I'm not talking about the physics, more things like that random mention modern day society was insisting the Moon landings were fake (this didn't feel real) and nasa refused to drop bombs because of some food war thing; Hathaway wanting to base a mission on love. Moments like McConaughey and Hathaway realising 23 years have passed are tossed away; ditto McConaughey being reunited with his daughter (wouldn't he be curious at all to meet his children?). Why wouldn't everyone in the world be keen for a science mission to save themselves? Why wouldn't everyone want to find what happened to Hathaway? And I note Nolan still can't help using talking robots.
Stunning special effects and some terrific sequences, such as landing on the all water planet full of massive waves, and the Matt Damon sequence (even if he too is given too much to say). There is decent emotional kick to the story and it is worth watching especially on the big screen - I just wish they'd streamlined it and not keep using "well 2001 was confusing" as an excuse.
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