[Rating: Minor Rock Fist Down]
In select theaters Friday, December 10, on Netflix Friday, December 24
In case the last 20 months didn’t illustrate just how bankrupt we are as a species, director Adam McKay has a movie to beat folks over the head with that undeniable fact. Pooling all of this century’s worst instincts, technological developments, political fuckery, and social trends into a veritable improv comedy skit that runs about 120 minutes too long, Don’t Look Up drives home a point that hardly needs making, and makes it about seven times in case anyone missed it the first six. Stocked with almost every bankable star Hollywood has to offer, the film boasts a few well-earned chuckles and interesting performances, yet wears its premise out by the end of the first act: abandoning its audience to live in a fictional hell only slightly worse than their reality.
McKay also penned the script for Don’t Look Up and should be commended for wasting absolutely no time getting his story out of the blocks, opening with PhD candidate Kate Dibiasky (Jennifer Lawrence) discovering an Earth-killing comet before the credits have finished rolling. Her program advisor, Dr. Randall Mindy (Leonardo DiCaprio), confirms the math and starts raising the alarm with NASA and the government, leading to a meeting at the White House with President Janie Orlean (Meryl Streep) and her staff. When Kate and Randall explain the apocalyptic implications of their discovery, they find both the president and the press largely unimpressed, failing to trend as little more than a Twitter speedbump between political scandals and celebrity romance news.
Mixed into all of this are B-plots about Randall flirting with the entertainment industrial complex and another about tech mogul Peter Isherwell (Mark Rylance) trying to commodify the end of days. Very little of it is played straight, with each scene fashioned around some piece of social commentary that exhaustively establishes (and re-establishes) how hot-take culture and know-nothing politics have twisted the 21st century into a self-sabotaging quagmire capable of arguing with the sky mid-fall. McKay and his film have a lot to say about how the intersection of big tech, political analytics, shareholder earnings, and vapid pop culture is driving the larger global discussion, yet if the last 20 months haven’t made that painfully clear, a black satire stocked with the “Hollywood elite” isn’t going to change any minds.
And for those that are on the same page as McKay and see the tragic similarities of a real-world timeline and a fictional one where the doomed are lobbied into advocating for their own demise, this is nothing less than exhausting. Every day, every hour, a person can get online and watch a parent scream at a school board for mandating policies that will keep their kids safe. Likewise, after just five minutes on Twitter, anyone can track down a clip of a state governor championing infrastructure projects that they voted against, or another of a hospital patient railing against vaccine mandates just hours before they are put on a ventilator.
As a joke it works well enough for a couple of minutes, sure. “Ha-ha: look at all these people obsessed with identity politics and celebrity gossip while their literal doom hangs above…oh wait! Just like COVID!” Audiences can laugh at fake characters toying around with their fictional lives all day, but when that escapism sticks its finger in the eye of every person watching it, reminding them of cherished loved ones who died alone, gasping with panicked gulps for reasons that are near-identical to the ones presented in Don’t Look Up, the joke just doesn’t sustain.
In fact, after about a half an hour, the humor dissipates and all that’s left is depression and a sad feeling of resigned acceptance that a comet crashing into Earth and wiping out this mostly-failed experiment called humanity wouldn’t be the worst thing. Which leads to one hell of a realization at about the mid-way mark: this movie actually makes one root for the comet.
This leaves the actors and their characters in a curious spot, for Lawrence and DiCaprio both experience interesting character growth and do marvelous work, yet are trapped in a movie stuck in the first gear of its own concept. Lawrence in particular is as sharp as she’s ever been playing a smart, capable scientist that finds herself vilified because of her confidence and refusal to abide by classic feminine tropes. Rob Morgan is another standout amongst the cast as Dr. Oglethorpe, a sympathetic ally to Randall and Kate who brings a much-needed dose of reality and humanity to all the scenes in which he appears. This cartoonish satire from Rylance and Jonah Hill (as the president’s son/Chief of Staff) runs up hard against the quieter, more nuanced work of Morgan and Timothée Chalamet (as a disaffected yet highly religious youth), both of whom very nearly rescue the picture at times.
At 145 minutes, it’s just too much though. The movie has top-tier actors doing some fantastic work, so there are a few laughs and more than a couple touching moments that highlight some interesting arcs, but the oppressive dread that hangs over all of them is just too familiar, too fresh. It just isn’t a good time, and when Don’t Look Up starts to drag in its second act, this bad vibe has nowhere to hide and guts whatever buy-in audiences might have up to that point. It works in spots, but like the characters, once the audience looks up and takes stock of what’s really going on, there’s little fun to be had.
“Obvious Child” is the debut novel of Warren Cantrell, a film and music critic based out of Seattle, Washington. Mr. Cantrell has covered the Sundance and Seattle International Film Festivals, and provides regular dispatches for Scene-Stealers and The Playlist. Warren holds a B.A. and M.A. in History, and his hobbies include bourbon drinking, novel writing, and full-contact kickboxing.
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