Ad Astra

[Bartmanhomer]

This afternoon I went to see the movie Ad Astra and I'm going to tell you my thoughts about the movie.

Spoiler: My Thoughts On Ad Astra

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Today I went to see Ad Astra. It's about an astronaut trying to look for his father somewhere in space. This movie was very exhilarating for this sci-fi/drama flick. There was also a baboon in this movie as well. Well, I enjoy it a lot and it was a perfect movie because it's an Oscar-worthy movie. I'll give this movie 5 out of 5 stars for a perfect movie.

[Lvl45DM!]

Theres a lot of words id use to describe this movie but exhilarating aint one of em. Its a very slow plodding movie with pacing issues. But otherwise nearly perfect

[Bartmanhomer]

Theres a lot of words id use to describe this movie but exhilarating ain't one of em. It's a very slow plodding movie with pacing issues. But otherwise nearly perfect

I've noticed that the movie was slow but I still enjoy it despite it.

[Lvl45DM!]

I've noticed that the movie was slow but I still enjoy it despite it.

Yeah, just thought it was fair warning

[GloatingSwine]

On careful consideration I can say that Ad Astra is a movie which I have seen.

I can see that they were going for 2001 meets Apocalypse Now but don’t think they quite committed to the end. It could have done with going for some proper weirdness because everything else was just a little bit off and trying for unsettling throughout so having it end with a full on colonel Kurtz bad trip would have made it a lot more satisfying.

[Giggling Ghast]

Y'know, for a movie that prides itself on being hard sci-fi, they sure got a lot of stuff wrong.

https://gizmodo.com/what-ad-astra-ge...omy-1838363861

[Bohandas]

Y'know, for a movie that prides itself on being hard sci-fi, they sure got a lot of stuff wrong.

https://gizmodo.com/what-ad-astra-ge...omy-1838363861

I just saw it, and the part that struck me as the most egregiously unrealistic was

Spoiler

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the nonsensical technobabbke explanation about how the Lima Project was causing all these power surges due to its malfunctioning antimatter reactor. For all the sense it made the Lima might as well have been powered by Solaronite

EDIT:

Spoiler

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And the scene where they shot at him in the rocket waz a bit ridiculous too. Even if they were expecting a firefight once they got to the Lima (or were worried about landing in the wilderness on return to Earth and being attacked by bears like the cosmonauts mentioned in the article), the guns would probably be stowed somewhere. They wouldn't just be packing iron like the film depicts. Was plan A to do a drive-by and the bomb just a backup if that didn't work?

[BannedInSchool]

I just saw it, and the part that struck me as the most egregiously unrealistic was

Spoiler

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the nonsensical technobabbke explanation about how the Lima Project was causing all these power surges due to its malfunctioning antimatter reactor. For all the sense it made the Lima might as well have been powered by Solaronite

Spoiler

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And this malfunctioning carburetor is going to ignite the whole atmosphere of Earth! We have to get to it and stop it!

[Bohandas]

Actually, not that I think of it, Solaronite would actually have made more sense. It may be a fictional material but at least the ability to propogate destructive forces across the solar system is actually a characteristic that is associated with it

[GloatingSwine]

Y'know, for a movie that prides itself on being hard sci-fi, they sure got a lot of stuff wrong.

https://gizmodo.com/what-ad-astra-ge...omy-1838363861

For an article setting out to be pedantic about rocket science, they sure keep using fuel when they mean reaction mass....


Anyway, having slept on it I have decided that the way to betterise the movie would be:

Spoiler

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Cut out the moon pirates. They don't actually add anything to the movie, it's quite silly that there would be car chases with moon pirates in an allegedly serious space movie. Also have to drop Don Sutherland, sorry, his character never really did anything that Ruth Negga couldn't have done later.

Use the time saved to extend the bit at the Lima project with more and increasingly weird scenes between Pitt and Lee Jones where it gradually becomes clear to the audience that Pitt is actually alone and has gone strange with the isolation and him convincing his father to return is actually him convincing himself.

That delivers on that 2001/Apocalypse Now peak weird ending the movie needed and also refocuses the narrative on Pitt's character accepting human contact and connection which he has until that point been presented as rejecting (not being close to his father or the rocket crew despite them being shown as being close with each other, etc.

Spoiler

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And the scene where they shot at him in the rocket waz a bit ridiculous too. Even if they were expecting a firefight once they got to the Lima (or were worried about landing in the wilderness on return to Earth and being attacked by bears like the cosmonauts mentioned in the article), the guns would probably be stowed somewhere. They wouldn't just be packing iron like the film depicts. Was plan A to do a drive-by and the bomb just a backup if that didn't work?

Spoiler

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Also that whole scene was during the takeoff burn from Mars and so should have been under thrust*, so they shouldn't have been weightless they should all have been plastered into their couches and Pitt should have been spread out on the back wall probably quite violently because he was unsecured.


* The whole movie is under thrust, there should have been no weightlessness, the amount of thrust required to get to Neptune in 79 days should have generated prodigious thrust gravity, and there should have been a flip and burn in the middle.

[Lvl45DM!]

For an article setting out to be pedantic about rocket science, they sure keep using fuel when they mean reaction mass....


Anyway, having slept on it I have decided that the way to betterise the movie would be:

Spoiler

Show

Cut out the moon pirates. They don't actually add anything to the movie, it's quite silly that there would be car chases with moon pirates in an allegedly serious space movie. Also have to drop Don Sutherland, sorry, his character never really did anything that Ruth Negga couldn't have done later.

Use the time saved to extend the bit at the Lima project with more and increasingly weird scenes between Pitt and Lee Jones where it gradually becomes clear to the audience that Pitt is actually alone and has gone strange with the isolation and him convincing his father to return is actually him convincing himself.

That delivers on that 2001/Apocalypse Now peak weird ending the movie needed and also refocuses the narrative on Pitt's character accepting human contact and connection which he has until that point been presented as rejecting (not being close to his father or the rocket crew despite them being shown as being close with each other, etc.

Spoiler

Show

Also that whole scene was during the takeoff burn from Mars and so should have been under thrust*, so they shouldn't have been weightless they should all have been plastered into their couches and Pitt should have been spread out on the back wall probably quite violently because he was unsecured.


* The whole movie is under thrust, there should have been no weightlessness, the amount of thrust required to get to Neptune in 79 days should have generated prodigious thrust gravity, and there should have been a flip and burn in the middle.

Spoiler

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Moon pirates were interesting social commentary that wouldn't work if it was just being discussed. There was alot of humanity are buttheads vibe in there. Getting to Mars and Neptune, building space high buildings colonizing the moon with Subway, none of that stops us being greedy idiots.
However it would've been better if instead of just generic car chase the pirates actually stole something.
Don Sutherland was a waste. Absolutely.
I'm leery of the "Brad Pitt was actually talking to himself" thing though.

Also what was with the overt religiosity of the movie? It didnt seem to add much but characters kept mentioning god and praying.

[GloatingSwine]

Spoiler

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Moon pirates were interesting social commentary that wouldn't work if it was just being discussed. There was alot of humanity are buttheads vibe in there. Getting to Mars and Neptune, building space high buildings colonizing the moon with Subway, none of that stops us being greedy idiots.
However it would've been better if instead of just generic car chase the pirates actually stole something.
Don Sutherland was a waste. Absolutely.
I'm leery of the "Brad Pitt was actually talking to himself" thing though.

Also what was with the overt religiosity of the movie? It didnt seem to add much but characters kept mentioning god and praying.

Spoiler

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Sure, I can see how the moon pirates are supposed to be a point about how humanity has brought its resource conflicts to the stars*, and that's a cool story, it's called The Expanse, but the rest of the film does nothing with that. It's too much an introspective look at the emotional state of one person for its final revelation of "we are totally alone and need to stick together" to be understandable as a wider social comment.

So in the context of the actual film it's really just an excuse to have a car chase on the moon, but in a film where the general mood is slow and unsettling and lonely and so a car chase on the moon doesn't get to feel as awesome as the concept sounds, it was time that could have been more profitably spent at the end and it feels like it only exists because the studio wanted an action scene in case the audience was nodding off.



* Without getting into the pedantry of why moon pirates would be doing mad max car chases to steal stuff instead of being eg. wildcat miners because there's literally nothing they could steal with a couple of moon rovers that would justify the expense of trying.

[JNAProductions]

Saw it yesterday.

Didn't like the main character. He wasn't AWFUL (see spoiler) but he wasn't likable either. And since he's 90% of the movie... Yeah, didn't like it.

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Except for the fact that he directly resulted in three people dying. And faced no comeuppance for it.

He didn't report the astronaut freaking out and being scared. Which, okay, fine. But that RISKS EVERYONE ELSE WHO'S GOING WITH HIM LIVES!

And guess what? If he HAD reported it, they would've gotten someone else to take the nuke to the Lima project. Someone more competent. Someone who probably wouldn't've recovered the data, but would've been able to nuke Lima to high hell. But he didn't, and so those three astronauts died for no point.

[Bohandas]

Saw it yesterday.

Didn't like the main character. He wasn't AWFUL (see spoiler) but he wasn't likable either. And since he's 90% of the movie... Yeah, didn't like it.

Spoiler

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Except for the fact that he directly resulted in three people dying. And faced no comeuppance for it.

Maybe, but they shot first.

[JNAProductions]

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Why did he have to go to Mars? Couldn't they have pre-recorded a message and had it sent?

Why did they need to contact the Lima project at all? As soon as they got a response, they decided to nuke it.

There's a lot of questions.

[Eldan]

If you want questions, why is Lima manned at all? Why not build an unmanned outer system telescope array and send the data back? Anyway, I loved it.

[Lvl45DM!]

If you want questions, why is Lima manned at all? Why not build an unmanned outer system telescope array and send the data back? Anyway, I loved it.

Same reason we want to send humans to Mars. Drones and stuff lack the personal touch

[Bohandas]

Same reason we want to send humans to Mars. Drones and stuff lack the personal touch

And also, from Earth, it takes 10 minutes to half an hour to send a mesage either to or from a drone on Mars