Up and Coming Weekly is a weekly publication in Fayetteville, NC and Fort Bragg, NC area offering local news, views, arts, entertainment and community event and business information.
Issue link: http://www.epageflip.net/i/422861
NOV. 26 - DEC. 2, 2014 UCW 21 WWW.UPANDCOMINGWEEKLY.COM Interstellar (169 minutes) was pret t y good. It 's too bad t hey didn't go w it h t he or ig ina l ending ; Mat hew McConaughey 's head on a fet us f loat ing in a space bubble while "A lso sprach Zarat hust ra" played in t he back g round. Even so, it def initely reminded me of 2001: A Space Odyssey. If t he ending was a lit t le opt imist ic, I g uess t hat 's ok ay. I was hoping for some of t he nihilism in t he or ig ina l scr ipt ( McConaughey 's charac ter ar r ives back on Ear t h to f ind ever yone dead), but not ever y mov ie c an end apoc a ly pt ic a lly. In t he near f ut ure a second dust bowl and w idespread crop failure t hreaten a ll life on Ear t h. Cooper ( McConaughey) is a ret ired NA SA test pilot t hat now specia lizes in eng ineer ing gadget s to auto- far m his vast acreage of cor n. He lives w it h his fat her-in-law ( John Lit hgow), daughter Mur phy ( Mackenzie Foy) and son ( Timot hée Cha lamet). Mur phy t hink s t here is a poltergeist haunt ing her room, but her fat her t ur ns t hat into a teachable moment and inst r uc t s her to gat her ev idence and draw conclusions, bec ause, science. Soon af ter a massive dust stor m premat urely ends a loc a l baseba ll game Cooper and Mur phy f ig ure out t hat t he poltergeist is send- ing t hem coded messages v ia g rav it y (again, bec ause, science). T he coded messages lead t hem to a secret gover nment inst a llat ion r un by Professor Brand ( Michael Caine). Sec ur it y does not appreciate a civ ilian breach of t heir bunker and Cooper get s t asered (or t he near-f ut ure equiva lent) into uncon- sciousness. He awa kes to f ind himself in t he presence of a robot ic mini-monolit h c a lled TA R S ( Bill Ir w in, a k a Mr. Noodle) and a chick scient ist , A melia (A nne Hat haway). Some amusingly sex ist banter fol- lows regarding whet her or not A melia is properly credent ia led to do science, and Cooper seems ready to c a ll her toot s and pat her on t he behind as he tells her how he likes his cof fee. I mean, a lady Ph.D.? T his rea lly is science f ic t ion! Since t he civ ilians were smar t enough to brea k into t he sec ure facilit y, mov ie r ules dic t ate t hat t hey be immediately brought into t he fold and fed top secret infor mat ion t hat w ill change t heir lives. Despite hav ing not f low n for NA SA for at least 10 years (and proba- bly 15), Cooper is recr uited for a specia l mission t hrough a wor mhole to assess t he habit abilit y of planet s ex plored by an advance team of ast ronaut s. He f lies t hrough it w it h a physicist , Romilly ( Dav id Gyasi), a geog rapher, Doyle ( Wes Bent ley) and A melia . Once on t he ot her side of t he wor mhole t hey f ind a black hole c a lled Gargant ua, and t hey are forced to pr ior it ize t heir planet ex plo- rat ion based on available dat a . A melia arg ues for t he planet where her boy f r iend landed bec ause lady scient ist =sent iment a l nonsense about love, but she is over r uled. A f ter I recovered f rom t he A nne Hat haway induced headache, t he rest of t he mov ie was well done, especia lly compared to t he potent ia l t rain w reck f rom t he earlier versions of t he scr ipt . T his one is def initely wor t h check ing out , and I w ish I had waited for t he IM A X version at t he Pat r iot 14 T heater. Now show ing at Wy nnsong 7, Market Fair 15 and Car mike 12. Lady Scientists Have So Many Emotions Interstellar (Rated R) by HEATHER GRIFFITHS HEATHER GRIFFITHS, Contributing Writer. COMMENTS? Editor@ upandcomingweekly.com. 910.484.6200.