"I hate space"

Hello Everyone :-)

When you were little what did you want to be when you grew up? Football player, Actor, Singer, Ballerina, Vet? Me, I wanted to work for NASA.

When I was growing up I got an Encyclopaedia for my 7th Birthday (once a Nerd always a Nerd!) and I was obsessed with it. I read it cover to cover but I particularly fell in love with the bits about space. I poured over pages about shuttles and rockets and the planets of our Solar system until I announced that I wanted to work for NASA prompting the reply from my Dad, “If you end up working for NASA I’ll drop my trousers in front of Tescos’. Needless to say my Father’s dignity remains intact…

With my predisposition for all things astronomical I really wanted to see Alfonso Cuarón’s ‘Gravity’ and in the aftermath of New Year, I went on a little bit jaunt to the cinemas to do just that.

The film is set during a mission in Space. Dr. Ryan Stone (Sandra Bullock) is a medical engineer on her first space shuttle mission aboard the Shuttle Explorer. Her team is led by veteran astronaut Matt Kowalski (George Clooney), who is commanding his final expedition. During a spacewalk to service the Hubble Space Telescope, Mission Control in Houston warns the team about a Russian missile strike on a satellite, which has caused a chain reaction forming a cloud of space debris which is heading their way. Mission Control orders that the mission be aborted but before the team have a chance to escape, high-speed debris strikes the Explorer and detaches Stone from the shuttle, leaving her tumbling through space.

This film is a lesson to us all that Murphy’s law is out to get you. Also, Space is a c**t.

Watching ‘Gravity’ is a ridiculously stressful experience. I get emotionally involved in an awful lot of films, I can’t help myself, but with ‘Gravity’ I must have looked ridiculous. I was practically in brace position the entire time. It is arm-wavingly, breath-holdingly, all-consumingly tense.

There has been lots of talk of the visuals of this film but I must say they are stunning. As a space nerd, stuff like Hubble deep space images and shots from the Cassini-Huygens orbiter make me giddy so every glorious, sweeping view of earth in ‘Gravity’ made my head spin.

Cuarón uses a series of long shots with the camera dancing around the action like a waltzing princess to great effect. When the first cut does come (about 20 minutes in) the camera changes from POV shots, objective and subjective perspectives which intentionally disorientates the audience as we spin away from Earth. And, as everyone else in the world has said, it’s one of the few films that is worth seeing in 3D, if possible in IMAX 3D.

In a film full of celestial bodies Sandra Bullock is a massive star. Bless her, Ryan goes through the wringer in this film and considering that a lot of what you hear is Bullock hyperventilating, she manages to get across the enormity of the situation she’s in. Gorgeous George is gorgeous but it’s her face that really sells this film in a performance that is arguably more worthy of an Oscar nom than ‘The Blind Slide’.

As with all good Sci-fi an ostensibly simple idea is used to express a thousand thoughts. The set-up is pretty straightforward; an old pro and a rookie face adversity. Further to that though, the film draws upon the idea of shipwreck, wilderness, how small humans are in relation to the ever-expanding universe and ultimately, resilience in the aftermath of catastrophe. There’s a bit of cod psychology in there which comes across as a bit clunky, but this film is so great I’ll forgive it a little bit of mumbo jumbo pontificating.

This film is far scarier when you discover just how plausible this situation is. ‘Gravity’ is a taut Sci-fi horror where the villain of the piece is the sheer enormity of the bastarding universe. After 90 minutes of armrest- gripping tension I was almost thankful that my childhood career ambitions went unfulfilled :-)

‘Gravity’ is still in cinemas and will be out on DVD and Blu-Ray in the UK on 3rd March.

Now let’s have a look at some

Reasons to be cheerful :-)

1. The trailer is out for the documentary‘Who’s Changing?’ is out. This Doctor Who fan film (DocWho-mentary if you will…) has been put together by the gorgeous Cameron K. McEwan who runs the brilliant 'BlogtorWho’. It might just be me wearing my rose tinted Who glasses but I think this looks really lovely :-) The DVD is available to pre-order from Amazon ahead of it’s release on 27th January.

2. TRAILER FOR ‘X.MEN: DAYS OF FUTUREPAST’!!! This looks immense. And you know… PETER FUCKING DINKLAGE!

3. A bit more Marvel let’s have a look at the trailer for ‘Captain America: The Winter Soldier’. Seems to be very different in tone to the last film, ‘Winter Soldier’ is more like a political thriller with Superheroes thrown in. I’m a huge fan of Captain America as a character so I’m really REALLY looking forward to this :-)

That’s everything I’ve got for you today!

Goodbye till next time :-)

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