Unbelievable.

Rating: 7/10 (9 October 2013)

Sorry, Sandra and George, the film is just too incredible to be a good film. It's like making a movie about circus lion tamers and showing the introduction of a new and savagely ferocious feral lion into whose jaws the lion tamer then instantly proceeds to safely put his head and after leaving his head inside the lion's jaws for more than ten minutes pulls away as the jaws snap shut and the crowd roars its approval. Not believable. The reality would be a headless, eaten human corpse and an angry feral lion seeking both its freedom and more victims.
This movie stretched reality so far beyond the breaking point that I could NOT like it. I did like the absolutely gorgeous CGI special effects....very powerfully done, very beautiful.
I did not like the CGI special effects for their absolute breach of credulity.
I usually like the acting of Clooney and even to some degree, although she is far from being a strong actress in my esteem, that of Sandra Bullock. But here I found Clooney a clichéd version of some of the many characters he's played: insouciant at times, self-absorbed at times, seemingly in control even when all conditions indicate a total lack of control---in essence he was too much Clooney in Space for the horror of what was unfolding for his and Bullock's characters.
I didn't believe in his character.
Bullock is very limited in her ability to convey strong fear---which was necessary here----my primary objection to her role playing in Gravity. Might another actress been better? Sure, but they would have been stuck in the same surreal and incredible CGI imagery as was Bullock. But someone else who could more authentically project emotions would have been better than her.
I do not wish to write a review with spoilers in it, and in this I am not as able to convey most of my criticism of the special effects and the script. . . .but this is where I most dislike the movie. Things such as running out of oxygen and then continuing to breathe and function for five more minutes, or being burnt alive yet being unscathed aren't exactly the stuff of realism----but this entire movie is built on such staggeringly overt bloopers. Is it any wonder I didn't like it?
"Gravity" watches like a good short story reads. There are enough twists and turns to keep the viewer intrigued and just as there is an intensity in the short story form---a compression of dramatic action that allows the short story to be very powerful and memorable ---so it is with "Gravity."
So the movie does have an intensity . . . which is why many people will like it, regardless its awful script shortcomings and errors. But a good short story invites the willing reader to believe in the protagonist's plight . . .and if that belief isn't there, the story suffers as a result.
Such is the case with this movie---it just isn't believable enough to allow me to buy into it. Had they toned down the severity of the near misses, reduced the repeated number of escapes from sure-death scenarios I think it would have been much more believable, and far more powerful a movie.
Color me unconvinced.