The gripping visually spectacular Gravity is less a sci-fi film than it is a basic Man Against Nature (mostly Woman Against Nature) survival tale set in space. A catastrophe strikes a space station, and it’s in doubt whether the two survivors (Sandra Bullock and George Clooney) will be able to make it back to Earth or be forever lost in space.
The skeleton of the story may be simple, but Gravity is an exceptional experience because writer-director Alfonso Cuarón, in a triumph of special effects, captures both the messy nuts and bolts of space travel and the potential lethality of the space environment. I’ve seen my share of space movies, but I’ve never experienced a better sense of the terrifying dark and silent vastness of space. A human in space is suspended in an infinity in which, without a man-made propulsion device, he/she can only helplessly drift. Space is not so much hostile to humans as it is indifferent to our tiny existences.
The technical marvels of manned space missions have dulled us to the reality that space-walking astronauts are just one broken tether or one lost grip from floating away and becoming lifeless space lint. Cuarón brings his audience into that reality, and keeps our tension acute during Ms. Bullock’s Wild Ride.
The Mexico City-born Cuarón will certainly receive an Academy Award nomination for directing. Now Cuarón is an amazingly gifted filmmaker – he also wrote and directed Children of Men, my #2 movie of 2006 and Y Tu Mama Tambien, my #1 movie of 2002. Along the way, he also directed one of the best Harry Potter movies – Harry Potter & The Prisoner of Azbakan (the one with the Dementors, Sirius Black and the werewolf).
There are essentially only two characters on the screen, and Cuarón benefits from two instantly sympathetic movie stars, Sandra Bullock and George Clooney. Clooney, of course, can do anything on the screen, and he nails the less complex role of a The Right Stuff style space jock. (In a wonderful nod to Apollo 13 and The Right Stuff, Ed Harris voices the earth-based NASA control chief.)
I’m generally not a huge fan of Bullock but acknowledge her ability to sometimes excel in comedy (The Heat) and to bring something extra to action (Speed). But I’ve gotta say that she’s never been better than she is in Gravity. Here she plays the Everyman role of a person with ordinary skills thrust into overwhelming peril – the kind of cinematic part that made icons out of James Stewart and Tom Hanks. There isn’t a false moment in Bullock’s performance, and she keeps us rooting for her on whole wild ride.
Gravity currently has an unbelievably high 96 Metacritic rating because critics are rightly acknowledging Cuarón’s achievements in directing and special effects. Gravity is without flaws, and it’s damn entertaining, but I’m not going to rate it as the year’s best; I think that some indies and foreign films are more emotionally compelling and have more textured stories. But Gravity is definitely the best Hollywood film of the year so far.