re the idea that there's no substance to the film:i'm tempted to read gravity as a plea for the value and fragility of our earthly habitat. inevitably for a film of this type, it places a great deal of emphasis on the simple beauty of our planet as seen from space, the "blue marble", at a distance where national boundaries become insignificant. at the same time, its narrative depends entirely on our awareness of the utter inhospitability of space. the characters exist in tiny little bubbles of manufactured atmosphere, never more than inches from the frozen void. it's such a bubble that cradles bullock womblike on the escape pod, and in that moment she's both a fetus and terrestrial life in general, sustained by a tiny slip of breathable air.
the unbounded surface of the earth is echoed by the various spacecraft and stations, ostensibly belonging to this nation or that, but essentially the same, unified by human need more than divided by tribe. marvin the martian floats around the american shuttle just as his green-skinned equivalent floats around the russian station. same cylindrical chambers, tools & utensils, buttons and instruction manuals. more than anything else, same air, same atmosphere.
i think that's the point of the malick-style business with the frog. i felt a very strong sense, at the film's close, of the beauty and almost absurd fragility of life on earth. it's not a tacked-on "message", but a natural product of the plot. the action moves from one life-annihilating environment to another, from frigid vacuum to blazing free-fall to drowning depths. i also felt in them a subtle note of warning, the reminder that however safe we feel on our home planet, earthly life is much like an astronaut, able to live only as long as a delicate atmospheric balance is maintained.
the friend i was discussing gravity with last night called this interpretation a stretch, which i suppose it is, and that's why i was so quick to agree that the film is little more than a ride. still, i have the sense that at least some of it was intentional. it's nothing too terribly deep, but perhaps substance of a sort.
― pervilege as a meme (contenderizer), Sunday, 6 October 2013 22:36 (eleven years ago)