A reach for the stars with lost potential

Rating: 6/10 (8 November 2014)

There is a lot I like about this movie. I love the overall themes of the end of mankind on this planet and trying to find a new "home". Everything you'd expect to work in a film of this budget does work: It looks awesome, the actors are good, the score is great etc. These things are what make this movie worthy of the prize to a ticket.
While I give Nolan credit for taking on these huge themes, I don't think he quite delivers with this one. Of course with a movie like this there's gonna be plot holes and you could nitpick it to peaces and that can be enjoyable part of a movie too. The biggest problem with me was the human side of the story on the emotional elements. I do think Nolan did good job convincing us of how hight the stakes were on this mission. And I enjoyed the elements about the relevance of time and how years past in the earth while they've only experienced a couple of hours. The big human element of the story is the relationship with a father and a daughter and that just doesn't work well enough. It's almost laughable how long it takes for the daughter to forgive her dad for leaving her for the sake of mankind. Even though she works in the same facility that send her dad away in the first place. I guess it's dramatically better that she sends her first message to him when she's the same age he was when he left but it just doesn't make much sense. Also Brand's speech about love being an element that reaches over time and space is just laughable. You could do that with any other emotion and still have it make as much sense. I also found the emotional scenes to bee too manipulative. I just didn't feel for the characters as much as I should have. The scene with Cooper and old Murph was just stupid. They haven't seen in decades and have both experienced more than most people could imagine with huge emotional package. And they spend like two minutes talking to each other. And Coopers grand children and grand-grand children don't even talk to him even though he's supposed to be some kind of a legend. They just silently leave the room when he arrives.
In general the movie was just overly chewed and explained. They should have left more stuff up to the interpretation of the viewer 2001's style. But I still don't regret seeing the film. It is quite an experience visually. And for that reason the stuff that doesn't work is such a shame.