A story of two astronauts caught adrift of their space shuttles and only one of them survives to return miraculously back to earth

Rating: 8/10 (5 February 2014)

For a lot of young people, going to space is a thing of dreams. The thought of leaving behind Mother Earth and entering the realms of the awesome celestial bodies captures our imagination like nothing else. This movie is one for such people. The realistic way the thrill of space has been captured through 3-D and animation technologies, just about outdoes our wildest flights of fancy. The movie begins with a dramatic message about the infiniteness and utter silence of life in space. The 13 minute opening shot introduces us to the astronauts Dr. Ryan Stone (Sandra Bullock) and Matt Kowalsky (George Clooney) working with a space shuttle. They get an alert about a debris-attack and are asked to abort all operations immediately and return to the shuttle. But Dr. Stone (Sandra) takes a fraction of a minute too long to wind up, and already the swirling debris is upon them. It is not long before she is violently hurled adrift of the shuttle, and her final moments of communication with mission control (voice: Ed Harris) involved her frantically trying to relate her co-ordinates to him as the whole of Space revolved dizzyingly around her. The story develops from there, as she drifts untethered through space, and eventually after many adventures manages a miraculous return back to earth. In the process she encounters a multitude of crises, her initial sense of horror about her utter loneliness negated somewhat on gaining Kowalsky's companionship. Kowalsky revamps her spirits, and they use the thruster packs in their suits to reach the International Space Station. Somehow, by the skin of her teeth Sandra manages to cling on to the metal surface and get inside the station but in the process Clooney sacrifices himself in order to save his colleague. One can find glimpses of amazing selflessness and bravery as the final act of Kowalsky is to motivate his partner to propel a capsule to the nearby Chinese Space Station. Then, without a fuss or a goodbye the man drifts into the dark swallow of Space where he'd soon become just another piece of orbiting junk. The most stunning and symbolic visual imagery is achieved at this point when inside the safety of the oxygen-circulated chamber for the first time, Sandra sheds her astronaut's suits and she's shown swirling round suspended, surrendering herself to the whim of the planets. The complicated gravitational forces present make her rotate beautifully with the symmetry of a ballerina, as one equates the likeness of a fetus inside a womb to be symbolic of rebirth. The spirit of the movie is one – of trying, even when there's nothing left to try for. Soon after, Stone suffers existential dilemma when inside the Chinese Space Station she realizes her capsule has no fuel. She shuts down the oxygen supply to her chamber, turns up the radio and prepares to commit a painless suicide. But just at this poet she has a delusional vision of Kowalsky returning to her shuttle and she imagines him giving her a motivating speech that ultimately makes her decide to try to make one final effort. Before she activates the escape capsule, she gives one final message to her late daughter through the dead Kowalsy that her mom is not giving up. Therefore, through the use of the latest 3D technologies, and by taking the audience on a breathtakingly vivid journey through space Cuaron tells a simple story of our journey through life, of facing all our adversities and of overcoming them. The core beauty of it lies in the exquisite visuals, in the odd moments of drifting through soundless space and watching the sun rise over the Eastern hemisphere of the globe and realizing the privilege of human existence. The conversation between two human beings detached from Earth, realizing the magnitude of their smallness in comparison to the Universe. The orchestra reaches a crescendo when the imaginary Kowalsky delivers the final portion of his monologue to Stone inside the capsule cabin: "Ryan, it's time to go home", and suddenly the implications of this simple phrase get magnified, as it brings home all the reasons why we should carry on with our struggle through life at all. A moment that all viewers alike can identify with. Finally, Sandra deploys the escape capsule at the critical point and it bursts through the earth's atmosphere as the voice of Life resumes again in the form of mission control's radio. The capsule spears down on a lake and catches fire as Sandra escapes through the hatch, sheds her suit underwater and breaks through the water surface to breath Earth's air once again! As producer David Heyman summed it up: "Alfonso has given us beautiful, elegant film-making. Simple on the surface. The complexity of it challenged everybody. But none of that is visible. It's great." True words one has to say!