- DIRECTOR:
Phil Lord and Christopher Miller
- ACTORS:
Ryan Gosling, Sandra Hüller, James Ortiz, and Lionel Boyce
- PLOT:
The two most clueless astronauts in the universe (one human, one Eridian) meet up at Tau Ceti, become roommates, and eventually stumble through saving their planets from a galactic star-eating microorganism.
- EVALUATION:
While hardly a classic, an enjoyable romp that benefits greatly from Gosling's acting talents and that also marks a very welcome shift away from recent self-important sci-fi like Interstellar and Arrival.
- WRITING:
Occasionally hilarious, usually witty, and only occasionally disappointing, with no clear indications which of these characteristics were inherited from Andy Weir's source material.
- FILMING:
Great visual effects, especially in creating Rocky, a life form utterly unlike anything I have seen before.
- BEST PART:
Carl (Boyce) and Gosling team up to test out some theories of life.
- TRIVIA:
Meryl Streep cameos as one of Rocky's test voices.
- STINGER:
One of the two or three times Ryan Gosling screams in fright.
