Here's how you know Project Hail Mary is a work of science fiction: It's about the disparate nations of Earth pooling together their resources and intelligence to confront an apocalyptic problem'in this case, the pending death of the sun, due to a mysterious alien substance. The film, co-directed by Phil Lord and Christopher Miller, is based on a novel by Andy Weir published in 2021, when the world was haphazardly confronting the coronavirus pandemic; intentionally or not, the book felt like a nakedly optimistic bit of counterbalance to international chaos and discord. The screen adaptation is similarly heartening, even cheerful'it suggests that a can-do attitude and some cutting-edge technology might be enough to see humanity through calamity. (Ryan Gosling's sparkling smile and finely tousled hair have been thrown in for good measure.) Is that perspective naive' Maybe, but Lord and Miller, who previously engineered similarly bouncy adventures such as 21 Jump Street and the...
learn more
