Project Hail Mary

I just got out of IMAX and I’m still in awe, project Hail Mary is an adaptation that reminds you of why cinema is so fricken awesome dude visually its gorgeous. So many scenes were recreated just as i imagined them from the book, elevated in a way that was just so beautiful. the fishing scene is one of the most tense things i’ve watched in years, i haven’t sat up in my cinema seat like that in forever. brought me back to watching the docking scene from interstellar for the first time (although i haven’t had the pleasure of seeing interstellar in cinema). The score by Daniel Pemberton is so good. It genuinely elevates every scene it needs to. builds tension, and then strips everything back at exactly the right moments. There were points where it genuinely made me tear up or just made me feel like I was levitating. As an adaptation PHM is smart about what it choses to prioritise. yes some of the more emotional and deeper relationships are sacrificed in the movie, but they’re not totally lost just delivered in a more quiet manner. the film leans into a more visual and relational storytelling and focuses more directly on grace and rocky’s relationship than others, and that works fine. It especially shines in how impactful rocky’s injury from his sacrifice for grace was. I couldn’t think of a better ryland grace than Ryan gosling, he carries the first chunk of the film on his own and makes it look effortless. He truly sells his panic and vulnerability throughout the film whilst being a goofball. “I’m having a moment” is exactly how i felt watching this film i actually really appreciated how they changed stratt. Sandra Hüller brings a level of humanity that isn’t always as visible in the book. at first that felt like a shift that I was like “ok whatever I guess” with but she is the same way in the book we just don’t particularly get to see that. her decisions are still incredibly hard and she still has the literal weight of the world on her shoulders but in the movie you truly do see this vulnerable side of her that’s always been there underneath that ruthlessness. The karaoke scene completely sold that interpretation for me, it’s a small moment that says a lot about the pressure she’s under. I did find myself wishing we did get that more emotionally heavy feeling of the book especially diving deeper into the bleak stakes for humanity and Grace’s on earth relationships (DuBois my goat) but for condensing 500 pages into a 2.5 hour movie you can’t have everything and what they did focus on works brilliantly. this film understands and respects its source material and transforms and elevates it into something beautiful. amaze amaze amaze 👎👎👎