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Review by Brad Balfour<\/p>\n
The Midnight Sky Thanks to the advent of all these vaccines, we\u2019ve dodged the apocalyptic bullet. Yet it can feel like the end of days is at hand while sitting in isolation, being cut off from the world in the spaceship of one\u2019s own apartment. Sometimes when looking through Instagram, I really resent seeing people cavorting at a Christmas party or being bikini clad on the beach absorbing solar rays in glorious warmth as if nothing has happened in this last year. But those concerns are thoughts for another essay.<\/p>\n With our bright, vaccine-charged future at hand, there\u2019s a way out of this locked-down, covid-infused pandemic. We can see a glimmer beyond all this.<\/p>\n In contrast, gloom clings to world of The Midnight Sky<\/strong><\/em> like an unremovable gauze. Its unrelenting message, stated and unstated, is that the end is at hand and there\u2019s not much that can be done.<\/p>\n A planet-destroying event has occurred and the Earth is inexorably being poisoned by irradiated clouds. At one of the last functioning polar outposts on Earth\u2019s surface, the surviving humans evacuate to an underground location where they can be warehoused as they seek to escape.<\/p>\n Ragged, bearded Augustine Lofthouse<\/strong> (George Clooney) stays behind. The brilliant scientist had worked for years to find habitable planets where humanity could expand. Though it\u2019s unclear whether he had started his work because he knew the planet was ecologically doomed, he\u2019s been studying the universe for years.<\/p>\n In a flashback, he returns to one night after he had given a presentation at a gala where he meets Jean Sullivan (Sophie Rundle). The two have a romantic liaison, but his obsession with work and an inability to form emotional bonds with other humans dooms the relationship. Several years later, when Augustine encounters her again, he discovers that they have a daughter, but he chooses not to approach her.<\/p>\n It’s 30 years later, in 2049, when this cataclysmic event has wiped out most of the Earth. Lofthouse is working at an Arctic station, refusing to evacuate, knowing he\u2019s not going to last long since he\u2019s dying of an illness requiring blood infusions. Alone, he tries contacting various space missions out there, hoping to warn them about the dire state of the Earth. He finds that all but one have been decommissioned.<\/p>\n Initially, director Clooney\u2019s ambles through the delivery of these plot points; that made the grimness both diffuse and vaguely dreary. As the film shifts gear, ratcheting up the action, the characters\u2019 emotional lives takes shape in both subtle and gut-busting ways.<\/p>\n The shift from earth\u2019s dire state to the contrasting idyll of astronaut Sully (Felicity Jones)on K-23 \u2014 a habitable moon of Jupiter first discovered by Augustine \u2014 provides a study in contrasts and adds emotional depth to the narrative. Starship \u00c6ther\u2019s crew is unaware of what\u2019s happening on Earth; Augustine reaches out to them, but the antenna is too weak for him to connect with the ship as it heads back to Earth.<\/p>\n In the midst of this, a young girl (Caoilinn Springall) who doesn\u2019t speak appears in the station \u2014 she might be the missing kid who was mentioned earlier when the evacuation was happening. Augustine tries to contact his colleagues but they\u2019re all gone. But thanks to her drawing, he realizes that she\u2019s named Iris.<\/p>\n Augustine decides they must head to the weather station further north to use its more powerful array. He reaches \u00c6ther\u2019s crew, and starts to warn them when the transmission is interrupted by a meteor strike that damages the on-board radar and communication systems.<\/p>\n With communications restored, \u00c6ther’s pilot, Tom Mitchell (Kyle Chandler), hears his wife’s final words, and on seeing Earth\u2019s scorched surface, decides to use one of the space shuttles to go back and find his family. He\u2019s accompanied by Sanchez (Demi\u00e1n Bichir), who wants to bury Maya\u2019s body on Earth.<\/p>\n In their final exchange, Sully tells Augustine he was one reason why she joined NASA. She thanks him, and mentions that her mother Jean knew him, saying that her full name is Iris Sullivan. Augustine realizes that Sully is his daughter and that the young Iris is a hallucination he created to motivate him.<\/p>\n Before succumbing to his illness, Augustine tells Sully he’s proud to have met her and asks her to describe K-23 to him as she and Adewole set off to the planet where humanity might get a second chance.<\/p>\n This movie makes the weight of 2020 feel lighter in contrast. The implication is clear: we have to bear responsibility for what\u2019s happening to us, but we\u2019re still lucky; there’s a glimmer of hope now as we welcome in the new year.<\/p>\n
\n<\/strong><\/em>Director: George Clooney<\/strong>
\nCast: Felicity Jones, George Clooney, David Oyelowo, Tiffany Boone, Demi\u00e1n Bichir, Kyle Chandler, Caoilinn Springall, Sophie Rundle
\nAvailable on Netflix, December 23rd<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"http:\/\/irishexaminerusa.com\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/Midnight-Sky-Sully-300x150.jpg\")
Pregnant Sully and her partner, Commander Adewole (David Oyelowo), make a spacewalk with flight engineer Maya (Tiffany Boone) to fix the ship. They succeed, but a second meteor storm riddles Maya who dies moments after she\u2019s pulled into the ship. A broken Sully reaches out to Augustine, who tells her not to return but to slingshot back to K-23 and start a new life there.<\/p>\nShare this:<\/h3>