Interstallar (2014)

This is a Christopher Nolan movie. So when it does what he does best—shake you out of your seat with cinematic brilliance—it's terrific. I mean terrific. There are effects, like the black hole, or the various spacecraft maneuvers, and even a few wild dashes through cornfields, that work so well you don't need to think about why they are happening. You are immersed, and impressed, and wowed.

But Nolan is more clever than deep it seems. A movie like "Memento" takes the slimmest of terrific ideas (a reordering of time in the brain) and make it amazing to watch. Movies like his Batman trilogy avoid even cleverness and work with pure energy and mythology. But in all of these there is no sense of what you would call "meaning." They are entertainments.

"Interstellar" is purely horrible science—it's the butt of endless jokes on the web. But behind all the liberties and mistakes there, the movie is trying to say something "deep" about being human in an inhuman universe. About the special qualities humans have to be innovative, to procreate, and most of all to love. This is a bowing down to the power of love. Love conquers all, that kind of thing.

Maybe it's the brother, Jonathan Nolan, who is responsible here as the co-writer. The grandiose ideas the two of them present in "Batman Rises" are wonderfully impossible and almost laughable if you take them out of context. (In context they're part of the whole great success of the movie.) But "Interstallar" takes itself seriously. Way too seriously for this kind of material and with no grip on the science, not even a hint of it. As a fantasy, it could have gone so much farther, as a piece of art based on reality, well, go see "Gravity" for an alternative that makes a better (imperfect) attempt to follow the rules of nature.

There is of course the plot here, saving the world, saving the species, saving your family. You have to just go with the flow here, as well, since it's all a bit romanticized in a Spielberg/Cameron kind of plasticky gloss. It frankly made me sick—and yet it was so well filmed I liked it. That's the kicker—Nolan is terrific with the camera, and with the vision of making things vivid and big.

See this movie for all of those best things. I saw it on a celluloid (non-digital) IMAX screen and in those portions of the movie shot in full 70mm large format, the effects were memorable. (The movie alternates between standard widescreen 35mm film and full, academy ratio 70mm, which is taller and has far more detail. The normal theater presentations approximate the effects, but in a more normal scale and resolution.)

Obviously this movie has won a lot of people over. I'm not sure who they are, but it's reasonable to be blown away. Nolan has openly defended himself against all the complaints—as if everyone is wrong and we just don't get it. Fine. If you want a hilarious rundown of some of the many logical problems of the movie, see http://popwatch.ew.com/2014/11/08/interstellar-plot-holes/ or type interstallar plot holes entertainment weekly in google.

But what until you see it first and just enjoy it on its own terms.