My Review - Don't Look Up Will stream on Netflix from December 24th
My Rating. 8/10
What a surprise this satirical Comedy Si Fi Drama was for me it may well be the funniest and tragic movie this year because it has more than a ring of truth in its depiction of incompetence and ignorance.
There's plenty of clever script writing by Screenplay writer and director Adam McKay
who has very successfully in my opinion covered the most talked about problems on our planet today . He manages not so subtlety to cover Climate Change, Corporate Greed, incompetent Politicians who's only motive for action on the emergencies we find our planet facing are their prospects for reelection.
The film also cleverly portrays the intrusion and invasion of privacy by social media and the influence of television shock jocks and Jill's into our everyday existence .
The cast includes five Oscar winners (Leonardo DiCaprio, Jennifer Lawrence, Cate Blanchett, Meryl Streep, and Mark Rylance) and two Oscar nominees (Timothée Chalamet and Jonah Hill).
The premise of the story is basically the discovery by two low- level astronomers of a giant comet heading towards earth . The monster comet is large enough to destroy the entire planet in six months time. Kate Dibiasky (Jennifer Lawrence ) an astronomy grad student and her professor Dr Randall Mindy (Leonardo DiCaprio) set off to break the urgent news first to Washington but find the popular but incompetent President Orlean (Meryl Steep) more interested in her popularity polls and scandals within her Administration.
Meryl Streep as usual is brilliant and is dismissive of the messengers of doom telling them that her administration will monitor the situation and get her experts to look into it as to alarm the American public before an election would be a ratings disaster.
Leonard DiCaprio gives his most laid back performance in years as the Professor who after President Orlean's inaction goes on the top Rating Brie Evantee television talk show with Kate to break the news to the world and still the threat isn't taken seriously.
Cate Blanchett as Brie Evantee almost steals the movie at times with her botoxed airbrushed impression of a plastic media Madonna with perfect implants teeth and everything else . Brie just wants Light and bright panel guests not these gloom and doom soothsayers to keep her entertainment ratings sky high.
Jennifer Lawrence is wonderful as the feisty highly strung student who is ridiculed and told she needs media training when she really is the only one with any credibility or principles at all.
The other stand out role is Mark Rylance as Peter Isherwell a soft spoken cold unemotional Cyber Baron who can predict anyone's life experiences including future health and life and death expectancy by the algorithms that are collected by his new phone data systems.
Don't Look Up is very entertaining my only criticism is its length of over 2hours 30 minutes some smart editing could have cut half an hour off for me and made great some great deleted scenes on the DVD.
I think this film is far superior to The French Despatch which has been getting much more publicity coverage. That film also has a star studded cast including Timothée Chalamet who has a cameo in this as Yule a street gang teenager smitten by Kate.
"Don't Look Up."In my view follows the path of other great satirical films like The Great Dictator (1940) Dr Strangelove or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb 1964 , The Americanisation of Emily (1964) In the Loop (2009) Election (1999) The Interview (2014) and WALL-E (2009).
Some critics have said that Adam McKay's approach to this story lacks subtlety perhaps they're right but the time for subtlety is over if you care about the state of our world today . We certainly are at a turning point where good leadership and action on vital issues are missing . Greed dishonesty and self interest seem to be the prevailing qualities of our Leaders who are content to divide people with conspiracy theories and fake news to ensure their reelection.
