Went to see Ad Astra yesterday. Yeah, I know, I'm a little late to the party, but I'm an Odeon Silver Cinema addict, where those of us of a certain age, and can do daytime cinema, go to watch a film that came out a few months earlier for just three quid, and there's tea and biscuits thrown in for free. What's not to love about that?
Anyway, I digress. Ad Astra. Brad Pitt et al. It's had mixed reviews. I went along with a nagging feeling that I'd be in for a long afternoon, wondering when it might end. I got a surprise. I loved it! Sure, there are issues: like how come the 1/6 lunar gravity only applies outside? Ditto for Mars. And if they could build a radio transmitter that reaches up to LEO why not strap a lift (elevator) on the side and save on a few trillion tonnes of rocket fuel? And then there's... Okay, there were other things. But I'm staying off that road, because the film, overall, as an entertainment, was so good. The images and moodiness. The music. The sense that there are goodies and baddies in the near future, but who are they and what do they want? Which are we? The psych testing – something that will be coming to an app near you, soon, I'm sure of it – and the general sense of disorientation that pervaded the whole thing. This was a film in which to immerse, to lose a whole afternoon. Great stuff. Wish there were more like it.
