The past ten years have provided a lot of perspectives on the question of extraterrestrial life. If there were aliens out there, would they really want to come to America? Could they really be any worse than humanity ourselves? The film Project Hail Mary finds some unique perspectives on the subject amidst a narrative that’s rather familiar.
Dr. Ryland Grace (Ryan Gosling) awakes from deep sleep on a spacecraft, quickly learning that he’s the only survivor of the three-person crew. Grace figures out that he’s on a one-way mission to a distant star to prevent microorganisms from eating the sun. As the Hail Mary approaches its destination, Grace encounters an alien spacecraft piloted by a five-legged alien who resembles a pile of rocks.
Dubbing his new friend Rocky, Grace bonds with the alien as they figure out how to stop the organism and save their respective planets. Grace develops a system of communication with Rocky based on echolocation. Periodic flashbacks to Grace’s time on Earth reveal some of the particulars of the mission, organized by Eva Stratt (Sandra Hüller).
Based on the 2021 novel by Andy Weir, directors Christopher Miller and Phil Lord seem to be attempting to recapture the cinematic magic of another adaptation of Weir’s work, The Martian. The duo even enlisted Martian screenwriter Drew Goddard for their first effort in the director’s chair since 2014’s 22 Jump Street. Godard’s screenplay evokes plenty of the humor from The Martian, not always to the film’s benefit.
Gosling puts in great work in the lead role. Grace is sweet, funny, and easy to root for. Like the Hail Mary ship itself, sometimes it feels like Gosling could be operating on autopilot, a broader problem as the narrative hums along.
There’s an innate sense of sadness to Grace’s life that Lord and Miller refuse to allow Gosling to work with, limiting the impact of their competent but forgettable work. Project Hail Mary is a beautiful film to watch. The special effects are great, and the physical set of the ship is well-made. It’s hard to shake the idea there’s something missing here.
Project Hail Mary suffers from an intense lack of suspense. There are predictable hiccups along the way, but the film doesn’t know how to get its audience to buy into its drama. The 156-minute runtime is excessively bloated for a feature that really doesn’t have anything original to say.
Miller and Lord never seem to care that Grace is essentially a one-dimensional character. The flashbacks hint at something more substantive that never really arrives. There are some interesting strands related to the nature of memory that aren’t explored in any meaningful way. Gosling gets a few moments to show off his signature charm, but not many, a peculiar dynamic across a film where he’s often the only human character.
Mankind made it to space because of ambition. Project Hail Mary has no ambition, a film simply content to go through the motions of what people expect from a science fiction narrative. Lord and Miller, along with Gosling, are consummate professionals. The fact that they have nothing interesting to say somehow doesn’t completely sink their work, a fairly impressive feat of its own.
Project Hail Mary is an underwhelming exercise in competent filmmaking. Science fiction at its best tends to evoke a feeling of awe and wonder. It’s hard to be blown away by anything on the screen when the narrative doesn’t offer much besides memories of earlier, better work.
While at least twenty minutes too long, there is some fun to be had watching Grace and Rocky exchange their thoroughly unoriginal banter. Project Hail Mary could have been something great. It doesn’t appear that anyone involved with the film cared about such a lofty goal. The end result is an entertaining time at that theater, but nothing worth saving humanity over.