James Gray's "inward-looking" sci-fi film AD ASTRA starring Brad Pitt

It's a much better space movie for starters!

― SQUIRREL MEAT!! (Capitaine Jay Vee)

As one of several ILXors who consider Claire Denis to be the absolute best there is.... I don't think it's much better. High Life is kind of a bad mess as well although it's a more singular mess.

highly trained emotionally distant astronaut vs. a bunch of convicts with a fuck box

Highly trained emotionally distant astronaut character that never really comes across as such due to poor directorial choices, cliched flashback moments galore (example ottomh: sad wife stopping to look at him *one last time* before she walks out door) and exciting yet incongruous action sequences vs. arid and unique "space jail" story - that, yes, includes a wondrous fuck box - that's carried by intense performances and direction from a masterful filmmaker who is obviously not in her element, genre-wise, but revels in it. I'll go with the fuck box one!

I liked both

This really did feel like a Lost City of Z sequel in many ways

As much as I’ve criticized it, I don’t think this an incoherent film at all. It’s not difficult to follow and thematically I think it’s pretty much saying what Gray intended it to. It’s just that what he’s saying with this is mostly just kind of...bland humanist garbage?

I mostly meant incoherent in the sense of strands being introduced that had little to no follow through e.g. Donald Sutherland's character or Ruth Negga saying that she'll likely be punished for letting him board the shuttle (but McBride himself was spared any kind of blowback??). Or just things that took me out of the movie completely (that bit where he's floating through the rings of Neptune was major lols).

And while I understand what Gray was trying to do with the action sequences (i.e. Brad Pitt mirroring his father's journey by causing the deaths of everyone unlucky enough to be part of his futile quest), it was kind of clumsily done and made those sequences seem like parts of a totally different movie.

I need to watch High Life, I think.

I quite liked liked the scene with Brad Pitt swiftly, accidentally dispatching of the crew taking off from Mars, as a bit of (accidental?) slapstick.

I'm inclined to agree with latebloomer, tho mb my view isn't quite as strong. What you say about the 'same social structures and conflicts that currently plague us' struck me too - maybe it's my issue rather than an issue with the film as such, but it felt like with some small narrative changes it could have abandoned the 'near future' space exploration theme entirely. It didn't seem to take advantage of anything that could be interesting about that specific setting.

This movie sucked because Brad Pitt wasn't nude in it.

they at least gave us some shirtless-and-pierced-with-a-feeding-tube action.

I kept being reminded of Apocalypse Now by Brad Pitt's quest and the Steven Soderbergh version of Solaris cos of the use of convenient location real stairs and basements and things.
Is Pitt a little old to be a major astronaut?

Wasn't overly impressed but it did look pretty good in places.

Rotten Tomatoes appears to have the critics really liking it and the viewing public not.

And I too wondered whether I would've liked it more without Brad Pitt's mumbly voiceover. So many beautiful images utterly ruined by his constant droning.

^^ this. Thought this was OK but would have liked it a lot more without abt 95% of Pitts narration, just totally breaking the spell and redundantly telling us what we're being shown. Like on the moon when the space pirates are abt to attack and his v/o is like "here we are again, fighting amongst ourselves for resources, to what end" and its like yeah no shit dude, i get what space pirates are.

You guys react as if Pitt were doing an audiobook.

lol my viewing companion actually used that term exactly, i wouldnt go quite that far. gray was obviously working under the spell of apocalypse now, but particularly for a film that already has a device where the main character regularly delivers confessional monologues onscreen, the v/o just seemed like a step too far most of the time imo.

this was fine enough, not blown away by it, not really disappointed by it.

i liked the little psych evaluations that brad pitt got. i can totally see something that monitors your vital signs and sort of talks to you and makes a judgement as to your fitness to carry out your duties as an extension of current a.i.

the moon bandits bit was so hokey. they know it's dangerous, but nasa or whatever can't be bothered to have closed vehicles or monitor for moon buggies driving across blank terrain to shoot at their people? there was too much action and violence overall for what the movie was trying to be.

I haven't yet seen the film bcz i keep missing the discount matinees.

Innnteresting related screening in NYC:

http://movingimage.us/visit/calendar/2019/10/12/detail/to-the-stars-experimental-inspirations-for-ad-astra

dreadful film, bemused by the profundity some seem to be finding

Tommy Lee Jones specializes in bemusement.

i saw that The Ringer had a roundtable on it by "space movie" nerds I'm quite sure have never seen a Gray film before.

I liked the beginning, where if Brad Pitt's mission succeeds then it means he'll need to reevaluate his past. then it all turns stupid around when the space pirates show up.

odd that gray watched so many experimental films and then didn't use any of it. he should have watched pandorum and lockout instead.

otm, embrace the schlock

i'll wait to rent this. it looked great but I've heard entirely too many people say it blows.

always a reason to go

ppl are eejits

This was ... no Two Lovers.

But, hey, probably the best movie with VFX in it I saw all year so far.

Quite liked this... similar to the Oedipal westerns of the '50s in an attempt to engage mythology with a middle-aged sensibility, through genre. Not shocked that innumerable Jedi/replicants didn't get it.

Sound design was stunning in this, really felt like being in a space pod seeing it in a decent sized theater. Voiceover was overwrought and some clunky lines but w/e, awesome score and it looks magnificent and there's maybe half a dozen stunning shots. not as good as First Man or BR2049 but still very solid.

I like that Natassha Lyonne is the greeter on the moon (or Mars? idfk)

thought it was funny when they get to the moon and the inside is every airport/strip mall, complete with Sbux and Subway

Santa Claus Conquers the Martians is better than BR2049

this is not a fuckin' space movie

idc about space movies but la flor's most tedious hour was more engaging than this

ohhhhhhhh god no

Brad Pitt did the VO beautifully.

"what am i doing here?" - both me and brad pitt during ad astra

yeah he was great, it was the script that was on the nose

I did like one of his final lines about galaxies and nebula being beautiful "with nothing underneath"

also there's a pirate chase on the moon, this is a space movie

I haven't read the reshoot story I posted a couple weeks ago (spoilers). What scenes did they add?

The story didn’t give specifics abt scenes, just that supposedly there were reshoots done against Grays wishes

Santa Claus Conquers the Martians is better than BR2049

Otm

I bet it was those stupid space wolves xp

If even that can't make it through the studio system without Disney demanding cuts and reshoots and voiceovers and extra ending scenes (and in one really dubious instance, removing a character's entire sexuality), what chance does anyone else have anymore?

— M.K. Rhodes (@mkrultra) September 21, 2019

I'd have lost at least a third of the voiceover... but it was ALL the studio's idea?

(I was confused by "Disney" until I remembered the Fox merger)

flappy, they wuz baboons

The scenes between pitt and the commander of the mars base give me a reshoot vibe, I wouldn't be surprised if those had been at tinkered with in some way. Her character seemed oddly truncated, and the way she moved the plot along seemed v perfunctory to me (I didnt totally buy that the government decided to tell the best-kept secret in the galaxy to her but not pitt, and she has the video evidence of it on her ipad ready to call up at a moments notice. unless I missed something, my memory's not clear on why exactly she had that video.)

gray said the space baboons were in his orig script iirc

yes, M K Rhodes' further tweets say that Negga's part was truncated.

obv the previous Pitt film this is most relevantly paired with is The Tree of Life

hadn't considered evaluating it along the Pitt axis. insightful!

Yeah

gray said the space baboons were in his orig script iirc

― johnny crunch, Monday, October 7, 2019 2:07 PM (yesterday) bookmarkflaglink

That is a wonderful sentence.

Thought this was pretty good--my first Gray film, will catch up with the others at some point. I thought I was clever to pick up on the Apocalypse Now affinities...but I guess every person who's ever reviewed or commented upon the film got there first. I missed that that was Liv Tyler until the credits. One unintentional laugh: when Pitt sneaks onto the spacecraft headed for Neptune, and when he fought the guy in a slow-motion space-grapple, the film seemed to follow the rule that if it's now an action film for a minute or two, somebody has to say "son of a bitch."

"Ad Astra" is one of my favourite Deerhunter songs.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tuSgpL3J1bw

this movie was pretty to look at but i couldn't get past the hokey plotting and cliched character conflicts

this was terrible. so glad I didn't see this in a theater.

it did give a lot of heft to the action/effects episodes tbh. and not sure I would have gotten through some of the other bits in one sitting otherwise.