"Marooned" meets "Cast Away"

Rating: 7/10 (6 October 2013)

*** Caution: this contains spoilers. ***
I did not see the 3-D version of this; we saw it in a regular theater, so I can't comment on the 3-D aspect.
I will offer one caution for those who are prone to motion sickness: there are almost no static shots in the entire film. The entire scene is usually rotating, and on multiple axes, though rotating slowly, nothing is ever still, not even the background; if you suffer from motion sickness easily, this may be a film to skip.
This film reminds me of some films involving space travel, particularly the spacewalking scene in "2001: A Space Odyssey" (1968), "Marooned" (1969), and "Apollo 13" (1995), all of which depict a crisis situation in outer space.
It also reminds me of single-person survival story films such as "The Naked Prey" (1966), "And I Alone Survived" (1978), "Cast Away" (2000), "127 Hours" (2010) and the book "Adrift: 76 Days Lost at Sea." Each one depicts a person dealing with an unexpected life-and-death situation using their own wits.
"Gravity" beats them all in the visual depiction of spacewalking and the views of Earth from space. The special effects are realistic and convincing. The shot that included the aurora borealis was stunning. Expect this film to be nominated for awards in cinematography, editing and visual effects - all well-deserved.
Where it lost points with me was with the scenario and script, and the overall believability.
*** Spoiler warning again. Spoilers follow. ****
There isn't much expository information of why they are up there in the first place. Yes, to fix the Hubble telescope or whatever it was. But they seem to work carelessly and the character played by George Clooney seems to be like a 5-year-old on vacation, joking and wasting fuel by flying around aimlessly. I would expect astronauts in space to be more serious about their work - certainly during rest periods they can laugh and joke around, but at work I would expect them to be far more serious considering those conditions.
Even when a crisis happens, Clooney's character never really quits the jokes and even flirtations in the face of life-threatening conditions. I would expect a professional astronaut to be more serious, especially during a crisis period. Oh come on man, you're in grave danger and you're still flirting and joking?
The scenario that creates the crisis is a little hard to buy, but accepting it on face value, it's plausible. What I found hard to believe is that it didn't immediately become an international emergency; even though radio contact with Houston was lost there were apparently no other attempts to re-establish communication. It seemed like the world didn't care what happened to the astronauts and they were truly on their own. I remember the Apollo 13 crisis when it actually happened, and the world was worried and many people praying for their safe return. I found it hard to believe that there was little to no attempt at communication from the ground.
I also found it hard to believe that Sandra Bullock's character actually could survive such a series of mishaps and disasters. Any one of them could have easily resulted in the character's death, yet she escapes them all, without even much damage to her hair and makeup. I'm happy for the character she made it through all that but it still seems incredibly far-fetched.
The reappearance of George Clooney's character dropped the believability factor down to zero. It didn't even help to realize that it was just a dream sequence. How would he be able to tell her what to do with the landing thrusters in a dream? What would have been more believable would be if he were to get into radio contact with her again, even just for a minute or two, to tell her what to do about the landing thrusters. That I could have bought as just a lucky break for her. The dream sequence seemed like a gimmick.
The re-entry into the atmosphere and the convenient water landing (and her unlikely escape from the flooded craft) rather than a rough landing on land, with her final ability to just walk away from the whole thing also strained credibility. But hey, when it's your day it's your day.
I did like Sandra Bullock's work throughout the film and her feeling of being happy to be back on solid ground again was palpable. And Clooney did the best he could with the poorly-written role. Two Oscar-winning, A-list actors did the best they could do given a flawed story and script. The cinematography and special effects, though, are the real star of this film.