Modern Classic

Rating: 9/10 (7 December 2013)

"Gravity" (2013), directed by Alfonso Cuarón, is at its heart, a film of survival, of battling an inhospitable environment against all odds, with no help and little chance of success. Framed like this, the film looks less like a science fiction film and more like a tale of survival. Cuarón has endeavoured to make the space environment as realistic as possible, from the interior of space stations to the movement of the human body in zero gravity. Imaginatively utilising 3D, he shoots the many scenes set in the deathly silence of space to simulate the appearance of the camera "floating". The audience feels like they too are in the midst of space, buoying alongside Clooney and Bullock. This creates a sense of credibility throughout and makes the peril the characters face even tauter. Cuarón has crafted a milieu that is ideal for showing the fragility of humanity against the vastness of the cosmos; writing the screenplay with his son Jonás, they populate the drama with only two characters to reinforce the emptiness of space.
These two characters though, are the audience's anchor, and are refreshingly well-written, recognisably human, reacting to events in a way that conforms to reality. Both Clooney and Bullock are excellent, never letting the extensive CGI dominate, while being appropriately ordinary enough to allow the viewer to identify with them, particularly Bullock. This is crucial for a film that concentrates on so few characters.
The cinematography by five time Academy Award nominee Emmanuel Lubezki perhaps acts as another character in the film, being the prism through we which enter the drama. Starting with a bravely held shot of Earth, it permits us to slowly make sense of the conversation over the radio between the astronauts and NASA (represented by an un-seen Ed Harris, one of the stars of "Apollo 13" [1995]). It continues with an extraordinary, thirteen minute long, continuous shot that is supremely virtuosic, their incredible duration carried on throughout the entire film. Yet this isn't done for its own sake; in doing so, Cuarón brings you into the film and introduces a sense of claustrophobia with people stuck inside their spacesuits and the cramped interiors of escape shuttles and space stations. This had to be worked out in immense detail far in advance of shooting, meaning cinematography and editing (by Cuarón and Mark Sanger) is intimately linked.
The music by Steven Price is very good, allowing for silence where there needs to be, and overall this exemplar of pure cinema, with no villain except the harshness of the universe, is probably the best original film of the year. It masterfully builds tension and character simultaneously and remains resolutely human throughout.
Hollywood can still surprise.