Space is cold, both physically and emotionally.

Rating: 10/10 (8 October 2013)

To see a world in a grain of sand And a heaven in a wild flower, Hold infinity in the palm of your hand, And eternity in an hour. William Blake These words came to mind after my experience with this movie event called Gravity. I've read the spoilers; I read the stories on the making of the film and how in its conception it was not technically possible to achieve; I counted the positive and negative reviews and always came back to my question "How is it this film only recently came to my attention?". I followed all the news as Jackson tried to keep the filming of his Lord of the Rings trilogy private with great attention. I knew the stories from numerous readings throughout my life and how blown away I was upon my first viewing of Jackson's interpretations (which unfortunately that excitement didn't spill over with the over-bloated Hobbit installments). Gravity offered just single word that ultimately captures both the scope and plot of the movie so perfectly, it would be hard to make it any simpler or complex.
The father and son teaming seems very successful in the sculpting of this story. I became aware of Alfonse during the Harry Potter days. Indeed, The Prisoner of Azkaban is my favorite piece of the franchise. Then he released the gritty "Children of Men" with his epic 7+ minute single shot exodus scene twords the end of the film. For me, sitting under water for 7 minutes would seem impossible, but I don't think I dared breath as the fighting raged on during that ending segment. I have also rarely (if ever) seen a movie where the cast of on-screen actors was limited to two for the duration of the film, with only voices being a part of the credit list.
As suggested before, this is not so much a plot driven movie as it is a personal account of a chain of events set in an ominously empty environment. You sit in a theater. The lights go out and suddenly you are projected into space. You sit like an astronaut in your seat but instead of a suit and helmet, you are holding your popcorn and observing the focus through a pair of special glasses (we were given the wrong ones). You are immersed in the dark. Action picks up fairly quickly, and as any good story that is based on the laws of Murphy you get bumped around from one catastrophe to another. I found myself actually flinching behind the 3D glasses as shrapnel gets thrown at you from the various wreckages and once again I found myself not breathing. Going into this knowing the length is only 90 minutes long, you are open to all sorts of parallel time lines. At the end, which leaves you back in something more familiar, you take a deep breath of satisfaction and know things are going to be "All right". My only comment that could be considered somewhat negative was once the right 3D glasses were obtained, my first impression was "This is kinda like looking through a ViewMaster".
With enough twist and turns, a solid beginning and a solid end and incredibly produced you wonder how other films that lay in the quagmire of mediocrity stand a chance to even make it to the big screen. Then again you realize that some directors have incredible talent and vision. I read somewhere that James Cameron was involved in the initial development and said it was impossible to do simply because the technology was unavailable. I am happy to say this did not deter Alfonse Cuarón. His vision became an extraordinary reality.
I rarely go to an IMAX simply because I'm a cheapskate but I don't regret going to see this one bit. Confining this to a 60" diagonal high definition screen could not possibly give you the scope and "gravity" of this movie. See it big. See it 3D if you can handle it. See it. -B