Film reviews: Ryan Gosling's goofy charm keeps Project Hail Mary moving smoothly
Ryan Gosling in Project Hail Mary
As existential threats go, interstellar micro-organisms devouring the sun is a real doozy.
But it’s not just our solar system being targeted in (12A): The organisms, we learn, are attacking every detectable sun in the universe except Tau Ceti, 12 light-years away.
Dispatched on a one-way mission to discover why Tau Ceti is immune, Ryland Grace (Ryan Gosling) wakes from hibernation to discover the rest of the crew dead and no idea of what he’s supposed to be doing — which is no surprise, because Ryland is actually a middle school science teacher who was co-opted to the mission at the 11th hour.
Adapted from Andy Weir’s novel by Drew Goddard, and directed by Phil Lord and Christopher Miller, Project Hail Mary follows a similar trajectory to Weir’s , in which a Robinson Crusoe-like figure is obliged to adapt to extreme conditions to survive — although here it’s not only Ryland’s survival that’s at stake, but that of humanity too.
Oh, and there’s also the alien civilisation of the Eridanis: An eyeless, five-legged creature Ryland dubs ‘Rocky’ — voiced by James Ortiz — has arrived at Tau Ceti, on a similar mission to Ryland.
Despite the epic nature of his quest, the shambolic Ryland is given a low-key comic reading by Gosling: There’s plenty of slapstick in the first half as the inexperienced Ryland gradually comes to terms with zero gravity and tries to communicate with the irrepressible Rocky.
Things do get a little more serious in the second half as Ryland starts to realise the magnitude of his role as a doomed saviour, and while the story as a whole can feel a little episodic as Ryland takes on a series of tasks of increasing complexity, Gosling’s goofy charm is the lubricant that keeps all the parts moving smoothly.
★★★★☆
A Belfast-born couple who emigrated to Glasgow after a Troubles-related tragedy, Stella (Lesley Manville) and Gerry (Ciarán Hinds) take a (12A) in Amsterdam to enliven the dark days of early January. At least, that’s Gerry’s belief; Stella, a devout Catholic whose faith has always been mocked by Gerry, has deeper issues that she needs to address, and especially the state of ‘unmoored drifting’ in which their marriage finds itself.
There’s a formal quality bordering on the austere to Polly Findlay’s direction of Bernard McLaverty’s story — adapted by Nick Payne —and understandably so: While Ciarán Hinds and Lesley Manville receive equal billing here, this is very much Stella’s story as she embarks on a spiritual quest, seeking out a like-minded Catholic sisterhood in Amsterdam and asking the kind of profound questions that Gerry prefers to drown in booze. “What if we’ve cut the cloth of our lives all wrong?” she asks her husband, to which Gerry, very wisely, offers no reply. Wholly believable as an aging couple who bicker their way into a tentative state of grace, Manville and Hinds are both superb.
★★★☆☆
(2019) ended, with the newlywed Grace MacCaullay (Samara Weaving) drenched in blood, having survived her wedding night by killing off all the in-laws who were trying to kill her.
Alas, Grace quickly discovers that the MacCaullay’s are only one of a group of families who enjoy a lethal game of hide-and-seek, and soon Grace and her younger sister Faith (Kathryn Newton) are running for their lives through a country club dedicated to the worship of Satan.
All of which is blackly comic, of course, but while both Samara Weaving and Kathryn Newton are great fun as the unkillable sisters, and Elijah Wood is quietly hilarious as a stone-faced lawyer presiding over the diabolical events, the gratuitous violence concocted by directors Tyler Gillet and Matt Bettinelli-Olpin eventually becomes a little ho-hum.
- all theatrical releases
