Yadda Yadda I’ve not posted in awhile. Mostly because I have hidden a dozen posts that I didn’t like. Because of that feels like I’ve not been around forever, and for that I am sorry. I hope you if you read this at some nebulous point in the future that you enjoy it, and don’t hold my mortal failings on me too much. With all of that said, hi! I am writing about a wonderful movie based on a great book by Andy Weir called Project Hail Mary. Let’s not waste anymore time and get right into it.
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What is Project Hail Mary?
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Andy Weir has been a science fiction writer for what seems like the better part of a decade (.. I did look it up, it has been around 15 years since The Martian came out — another incredible book / movie that I HIGHLY suggest.) He has a really nice style of making sure that he grounds most of what he is doing in fiction in reasonable science that is possible by the year the thing happens. Is everything in it perfect? No, haha, why would it be? That is the Fiction part of Science-Fiction after all. Does it have a lot really great calls of real science, helps spark ideas that lead to new technology, and the normal other tropes of Sci-Fi? Yeah it does, and it does it really well. Keep in mind with this review I have NOT had the opportunity to read the book of Project Hail Mary, and know that some of the stuff from the original book was different in the movie (mostly things were collapsed for time, and to make the story flow better on screen), and because of that I cannot speak directly about the book in what follows.

The name of the book/movie has to do with the “Hail Mary” — An interstellar craft that is traveling from Sol (our star) to Tau Ceti (another star that is similar to our own which actually exists) while also being the last ditch chance that the Earth can survive the dimming of our star. And what type of thing has the people of Earth forcing them to try to send a craft for the very first time to another complete solar system? A rather interesting line of single cell creatures aptly named Astrophage (literally meaning ‘Star-eater’) that have been breeding on Venus under the atmosphere and then attacking Sol in this line of radiation that connects the creatures with our star known as a Petrova line. Now that might seem a lot of gobbledygook but I wanted to get out of the way as quickly as possible to give the basics of what the name came from so you could have some idea of what is going on.

Now I will try to keep any type of big ‘spoilers’ out of here, but there are somethings I will not be able to not talk about. This is a science fiction film, and some tropes are very regular in them: aliens, space travel to places beyond earth including sometimes far off worlds, and of course science that might be slightly or greatly outside of what we are use right now on Earth. So with those things in mind you have to have some type of expectations of what the book/movie might look like going forward. The ship is basically what we could construct right now, but with several caveats; there is suspended animation / coma sleep for the crew members, some scientific instruments that we have not made yet for use on a crewed ship, and of course the fact that we do not have a good way to create long term and Earth feeling artificial gravity the way that is talked about in the movie. (Just a quick note here — we *have* tested the style of artificially created gravity, but we do not use it for any sustained way currently in space.)

The film itself, and sadly again I don’t know about the book so some of these facts are the same obviously but some are potentially not, is about a main character named Dr. Ryland Grace (Played by Ryan Gosling). He is a middle school science teacher, but had done his PhD in Biology about the concept of there being creatures that would not need water or even be carbon based to exist. Being sort of laughed out of higher academia, he is pretty down on his luck but loves teaching kids. Interrupted from his day to day by a government person named Dr. Eva Stratt (Played by Sandra Hüller), the story starts shaping up to explain the creatures we have found and the issues that are about to start really plaguing Earth because of it. The film, however, starts with Dr. Grace waking up on a ship in the middle of space having no memory of what is going on, or who he even is. Because of this, the movie plays parts of his past out of order as he sort of slowly remembers them I assume in the book. He is now alone, in the middle of an area of space that he doesn’t know, and must now if you have read or seen Andy Weir’s other book The Martian ‘Science the shit out of it’ to figure out what to do. The rest of the film is Dr. Grace’s attempt at not only solving the problem that is plaguing Earth, but also to survive to give the data to people on Earth to save our Sun. The other protagonist I would say we need to mention here is “Rocky”; the rock-spider looking alien that is also on the same mission as Dr. Grace. He becomes Dr. Grace’s confidant throughout the mission and they slowly learn how to truly trust each other to accomplish the task between species to hopefully save both of their worlds.

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Story Beats – Do they hold true for the Science and the Fiction?
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The movie applies three main story beat types throughout the story that I think, before we go any further, very well. Each of those things emphasis’ one or both the core definitions of what science fiction has going for it. The idea that the film does each of these well make the it stand the testament of time to me in this genre. This film will, because of these pieces, I believe stand the test of time as a great sci-fi film; much like Andy Weir’s predecessor The Martian (… I should just do a review of that — I loved the book and movie… but I digress) the work should stand for itself as time passes.

I will break this film up into these three major story beat ideas, and try to be minimally spoilery throughout, but this is your last warning that even as I try there will be some minor spoilers throughout this.

Story Beat 1 : The Past or The Setup

Ryland Grace is a man with no memory of where he is from, where he is suppose to be going, and has to rediscover this about himself. These pieces of imagery slowly filter into the story the course of the film. Dr. Grace’s time with children, connecting to the scientific community again, slowly allowing him to connect to people directly, and finally find himself again all circle into this area of the story beats that while I list first are actually scattered throughout the story as I’ve made mention before now.

These memories seem to bubble up like when you remember something from your past as you are parsing out a thought through the moment of time you find yourself. He thinks of his children he is working to save with his mission, be it as that is slightly tainted by the fact that he is on this mission against his own will (The fact that even before the film gets to that memory you have small little breadcrumbs building to it is just such a wonderful way to build the thought in the audience’s mind before they get there.) This leads to his scientific understandings, and musings with other scientists as things are going in the ‘present’ time of the story (Please see the next section for that story beat.) He rediscovers the passion for his work in these discoveries, and that brings him back to a more ‘full’ version of himself.

His character arcs have several what seems like weird directional moves in the story, but each brilliantly bring a more complete character together. Blending both science and fiction at the same time in this part of the story beats really does bring a better whole than if they had just stood on fiction alone. He gets to have his cake, and eat it too if you forgive the silly prevalence of that phrase. The build out of his characterization gives Ryan Gosling another opportunity to shine with his acting ability being almost completely different in these scenes, than where it goes into the next pick up story thread until it coalesces into this complete character framework that I could probably write an entire other post about by itself.

Story Beat 2: The Present or The Confrontation

With how the story plays out, giving these two conflicting but concurrent running story beats for the audience, the fact that a science fiction movie can deliver such emotional moments, and emotional impact for the arcs of the characters throughout the sudden shifts you see in it is a testament to the excellent writing in the story. Starting with the good chunk of Ryland having to remember who he is, having to remember why he is there, and how he got there leads the story into the natural progression as it tumbles through. Some small spoilers of course here, but this is where humanity has its first intelligent first encounter with a different race of creatures. The aptly named Rocky, being a sentient self locomotive rock that is shaped either like a crab or a spider depending on your view who comes from another world named Erid, becomes a secondary protagonist that will steal the spotlight of many different scenes, but the charm and emotional toil of the relationship between Dr. Grace and it becomes the focal point of the story line even while continuing the work against the clock. Both characters have a world filled with friends and family that are going to directly suffer if they do not succeed.

Building off of the first moment that we are introduced to Rocky, and their ship, we get the feeling that their technology is quite a bit more advanced than ours. The later moments of the movie shows that much of their technology seems to be based on harmonics, and strings, almost as if they are taking the concept of ‘string theory’ to mean something physical and spacial that anyone can directly intersect with. They seem to be able to synthesize practically any thing they wish or that they can think. Very spider-like in the regard, the first time they truly interact leads to the Eridian ship basically 3d printing a tunnel for the characters to first interact through as if it was able to simply conjure up any type of printable material Rocky wishes to imagine. The concepts here give Rocky this ability to slightly ‘take over’ Dr. Grace’s ship so they can work together to stop the Astrophage.

Caring for one another, and the story working through the climbing action of solving the problems with the Astrophage, leads both characters through this present part of the story. Dr. Grace, the consument scientist, asks many questions of Rocky and tries to learn all he can about the Eridian’s habits. He also in turn shares Earth, and Earthling life with Rocky to explain who and what he is as well. They start to share a kinship that is beyond that of just two desperate workers to a task, but one of genuine care and regard for what each has gone through. Each sacrifices for the other to help build out the solutions for their problems and helping secure their lives. Without trying to spoil anything else here I can say that this really did make them feel hand and glove of relational for the story. Fiction as it is sometimes can feel utterly ungrounded in sci-fi, but with how their characters work between each other makes the craziness or ‘out there’ness of the genre feel as natural as you reading this on your computer or on your phone as you sit somewhere randomly in our world. Even 30 years ago, that would have felt a bit out of sorts, especially on the side of phones, but now it is so common place we take almost advantage of the technological age we are in now. In the movie they feel like they are trying to make the best of each of their backgrounds to build this utopia that could be possible between the two species without it ever feeling like, ‘nah this could never happen!’

Story Beat 3: The Future, or The End

Don’t worry Metal Gear Solid fans, I am not trying to somehow back fill this with some type of random reference to the legendary sniper of MGS3 lore. Keeping in the three parts of a story style, this section will be relatively short as well so that I don’t spoil the ending of the movie / book so you will seek it out for yourself. But I will say that the ‘future’ of the version of the universe that this ends with is just staggeringly wonderful. Again such a blend of the fiction with the science leaves you with wondering even more about the world. It becomes somewhat easy these days with closed style stories such as this to beg for more to come after. So far as much as I can tell; Andy Weir has said nothing about a sequel to the book so I doubt *right now* there will be more, but I would richly love to have more of this story available. If it never happens the satisfaction with how this wraps up truly is perfectly okay with me, and does not make it feel less because of that. It ends the action with a hopeful uptick in how things could play out from that point forward for everyone involved. Everything that can has a good ending point attached while leaving a bit of mystery to the future of the characters still there.

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Story beats end here, I believe, and have all followed a steady and excellent showing of a piece of Sci-fi media, but in a way that makes it feel more believable than a Space Opera like Star Wars. Taking the places that it does to build these believable fiction has become one of the hallmarks to me of a film that should stay the course over time, but people slowly seem to forget about them because technology changes, and the ‘groundedness’ becomes almost an anchor on their appeal verses at the time being the biggest boon for its appeal. Of course this particular gripe is more to do with how we consume media and how we have over time changed what, as a society, we deem to be something that reaches those mythical tiers of ‘legendary’ status in film especially. Maybe one day Andy Weir will still sit as one of the greatest science fiction writers of all time, and for that I do have hope, but as of now I worry this film will get good run in theaters, and of course when it first comes out to home viewing and then slowly slip out of the zeitgeist for the next new shiny object we get obsessed at for a short period of time.

Of course, I am the guy who still thinks Scott Pilgrim Vs The World will always stand as one of the greatest films of all time (along with The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou…) so perhaps my doom-saying nature is wrong. But hey, at least for the time being, Rocky and the story of how he helped Dr.Grace lives happily in my heart, and hopefully for a long time to come.

I hope you take the time to check out the film. It probably only has about another 2 weeks in theaters before it is available for home viewing. It is worth the price of admission in my opinion and I think you will have a wonderful time. Until next time though,

ILYJTWYA,

-Phil