The first question you might ask from the safety of your audience seat when it comes to films about high stake risks is ‘why are you up there in the first place?’. Medical engineer, Dr. Ryan Stone (Sandra Bullock) decides to train on her first mission in outer space with veteran astronaut Matt Kowalski (George Clooney.) But, when you see the view, hear the space-suspended silence, and hear her pain about the death of her daughter, you understand why she took this risk…This is a woman with nothing left to lose.
And so the movie becomes a spiritual odyssey of Bullock dodging satellite debris until she finds herself safely tucked inside – the sole survivor – of #107 Space ship. It is there that the movie becomes a spiritual revelation…her surrendering to the universe as she strips out of her aluminum foil clothing into her tank top and black shorts, doing a sort of elegant Esther Williams swim as if the spaceship were the womb and she’s about to be reborn into whatever the universe has in store.
There is something powerful about a woman in powerlessness. In films like Castaway or 127 Hours we see men at the end of their rope, with the deepest of human condition in a longing to survive. But in this, it’s the opposite…Bullock’s character is ready to go to her death if that’s what’s intended. Outer space is as near to heaven as one can get. Or, if she lives, she’ll live in gratitude. Feet on solid ground this time.
Clooney is a star and that star-power even shines through in the small space of his astronaut helmet, a veteran, a man to be trusted and reckoned with, just like how he called out commands in The Perfect Storm, except this time his performance is based only on his face and his voice.
Director Alfonso Cuaron gave us The Children of Men, a powerful film that had us right there alongside Clive Owen, but this time, in this, he has up there, truly feeling the trance of free-floating, and lost in outer space. ♔ ♕ ♚ ♛