Review of Ad Astra (2019) by Keithdow — 21 Sep 2019

"Below the surface, there was nothing.".

This quote from the movie pretty much sums it all up. To say that 'Ad Astra' failed to meet our astronomically high expectations would be a cosmically vast understatement. We'll get to that in a minute, but first we need to address the issue of the human buffalo sitting to our right who at first served as an annoyance, but as the movie painfully played on, became a welcomed distraction.

We've never seen a fellow patron shamelessly double-fisting popcorn into their mouth before, much less grunting it all down like some wild bison inhaling a pile of feed out on the plains. His form was both well-practiced and impressive.

In addition to the popcorn, he also ordered a personal thin crust sausage pizza. When it arrived, he whispered something to the runner. Much to our surprise, it was a request for a salt shaker. Because everyone knows that if there's one thing a sausage pizza doesn't have enough of, it's salt!

The application of the salt was quite liberal, of course. Not just a sprinkling over the entirety of the pie before eating it, mind you, but applying it to each individual slice before they were to be consumed for that extra bit o' salty goodness. And if you think we're exaggerating how much salt this human-bovine hybrid consumed, after the pizza was eaten, he literally swirled his index finger through the greasy salt streaks that remained on the tray and licked it. Mmm-tastes like an early onset heart attack!

Now back to the actual film review. Let's put it this way: you know there's a massive problem with the film when serious action sequences are drawing laughter from the audience. We couldn't laugh. We were too offended by the ridiculousness of it all.

To put it plainly, 'Ad Astra' has some of the most absurdly unrealistic scenes of any space movie we've seen. If you know anything about physics, botany, nutrition, astronomy, or just about any other branch of science, 'Ad Astra' will make your brain hurt.

Add to this the fact that the plot, production design, and cinematography are all quite horrid, and we've got ourselves a classic Razzie situation on our hands, people. Oh, and just one more thing: several media outlets have labelled the film "one of the best space movies in years.