Totally Breathtaking Cinema

Rating: 10/10 (4 May 2014)

Gravity (2013) directed by Alfonso Cuaron "Life in space is impossible."
That's how it opens, this quote and darkness and then we're sunning up to the majestic slow- turning orb of the Earth rising up and out of us as if the screen has suddenly become a window on an alien and dangerous environment. We can already hear the crackled voice of George Clooney and other astronauts and the pinprick of white against the endless dark soon resolves itself into a space shuttle. This is a stella film not because of the stomach-wrenching effects - in Imax cinemas people were suffering vertigo - and not because of the massive screen stars that are Clooney and Bullock. This is such a powerful story because it understands its own theme and reverberates to it through every act.
"Life in space is impossible." And we are fools to try, we are puny, pathetic, childish gods who think we can buck nature and the enormity of space humbles us utterly. The effects are seamless, so seamless that we don't notice them although 81 of the 90 minutes have been created digitally by the British company Framestore. It is the story here that trumps all technical brilliance and there's that commodity in spades. Sandra Bullock is excellent and it is the puniness of her one human life held up against the immense, indifferent cold of space that begins to turn that opening theme into its antithesis. Life in space is impossible, but life for Dr Ryan Stone on Earth has been impossible too. Her daughter died in a freak fall before the age of five and she is lonely, grieving and lost. Her marriage broke apart and she fell into her work. Now lost in space after a cataclysmic event destroys her shuttle she must try to make it to the International Space Station to find a way back to Earth.
Space is silent, space is pure action and reaction and we get some beautiful experiences of the Newtonian mechanics of colliding objects as the the swarm of deadly shrapnel that destroyed the shuttle orbits the Earth again and again lacerating Stone's other chances of survival.
Life in space is impossible yes, but Stone survives against the odds, giddy from lack of oxygen, giddy on still being alive and locked in the capsule of the space station Clooney manages to get her to before he bows out, she spins in the foetal position truly alive perhaps for the first time in years.
This is transformative, incredible cinema, adventure, drama and deadly beauty in such a breath- taking package you'll need to take travel sickness pills. Of course it's had all of the plaudits and Oscars and sparkling reviews, a virtually unheard of 97% on Rotten Tomatoes for example.
But the reviews are all true, space without the terror and stomach-churn of going there and what is so poignant and clever is that out there in a place where life is impossible we discover that no of it matters, the politics, the petty nonsense and that what we have, our mortal, puny lives is the single most unifying thing that binds us. Life is possible here and only here. Gravity pulls us to our home, gravity holds us here and within its thrall we have the glorious opportunity to truly appreciate what a wonder being here at all is.
You need to see this film, ideally at the cinema, if you can bear it, at an Imax. Probably best not buy popcorn in the foyer though.
***** Five stars