5 Reasons Why "Interstellar" Could be the Best Movie of 2014

With Gravity cleaning up at the Oscars last year,  Guardians of the Galaxy dominating the box office this Summer, and a new Star Wars film right around the corner, sci-fi is suddenly... kind of cool. Leave it to Christopher Nolan, however, to make it even cooler.

Interstellar, Nolan's follow-up to 2012's The Dark Knight Rises, is set to be one of the biggest films of the year - in terms of subject matter and, presumably, revenue - bar none. With a joint script - co-authored by Christopher's brother Jonathan - that's been in development since 2007 and a cast that just won't quit, here's my personal top five reasons why Interstellar just might be the best movie of the year.

1. It's a Continuation of the McConaissance

Just in case you've literally been living under a rock for the past year, sci-fi isn't the only thing that's cool again: so is Matthew McConaughey. With an almost perfect triad of movies under his belt from 2013 - Mud, The Wolf of Wall Street, and his Oscar-winning performance in Dallas Buyer's Club - not to mention 2014's near perfect HBO series True Detective, McConaughey has the chance to blow us all out of the water once again. From the extremely limited amount that we know about the film, McConaughey will be playing Cooper, an astronaut/father who is forced to leave Earth in search of a new home for his kids/the rest of humanity. As Detective Rust Cohle would say: alright alright alright. Wait. No. Wrong character.

2. This is some of the promotional art for the film:

It's beautiful and subtle and everything you would expect to see from a film about the endless possibilities of space. And it basically taps into that unrefined subconscious area of anybody who dreamed of being an astronaut when they were a kid (which was pretty much everyone, right?) I couldn't find who designed the posters, but it's better than about 95% of what studios think are smart ideas for posters these days, including this little gem. 

3. The Script is Super Secretive (and Hans Zimmer is composing) 

Alright so that's technically two reasons. Nolan, already notorious for keeping his scripts under wraps, has been more tight-lipped than ever before about the Interstellar script. So tight-lipped, in fact, that he wouldn't even give the script to his long time collaborator,  Hans Zimmer. According to Variety, Nolan gave Zimmer a one page sheet of text - that gave no hints about the film whatsoever - and told him to base the score off of that. Zimmer said that "the page had more to do with my story than the plot of the film. He knows how to get under my skin." The score will also be a step in a new direction for the duo, who have reportedly decided to scrap their loud, stringy, booming bass noises for something a little more different. 

4. The Film will Actually be Shown on Film

For it's limited release in North America (in approximately 240 theaters) Interstellar will be projected in 70mm and 35mm formats, alongside the 70mm imax projections in at least 40 locations. The film is an exception to Paramount Studios initiative to stop releasing movies on traditional film stock as opposed to digitally. Filmmakers like Nolan, J.J. Abrams, and Quentin Tarantino have all stepped forward in defense of classic film stock, even though it's becoming less and less common - and practical - for theaters. 

5. This is the full cast list:

Right here. Enjoy. Not to mention the actual plot, which has something to do with black holes and Matty McCons saving the world/ looking great in a

space suit. I've heard rumors - TOTAL RUMOR RIGHT HERE, TAKE IT WITH THE BIGGEST GRAIN OF SALT YOU CAN FIND - that the trailers don't even show footage from the second half of the movie, which, by the way has an incredibly long and exciting running time of 169 minutes. Yes, your butt will be sore, but so will your brain. In a good way. Hopefully. Here's a trailer if you're so inclined.

Movies: to Score or not to Score?

The simple fact that films typically have a musical score always seems to slip right by me when I'm actually making any kind of short film or TV show myself. It's just not something that I would typically think about. Good audio? Sure. Sound effects? Yeah, why not. But never a score. This lead me to thinking, hey, who says that films need to have any kind of music or instrumentality at all? That, in turn, lead me to google, which lead me to some interesting websites, which lead me here, to this blog post.

As behind-the-scenes as they typically are, we all know the names of a few movie composers: Hans Zimmer (please click that link for your own sake), Danny Elfman, and of course, the legendary John Williams. Their scores don't just add noise to all of their respective films: they add feeling, and set a tone for any given scene or even the movie as a whole  If you need an example for a really amazing score that is spot on in terms of creating an entire atmosphere for a film, look no further Howard Shore and the Lord of the Rings trilogy. It doesn't just add tension or give scenes a certain flavor: it's music that like, I could actually see hobbits playing out on their front porches. Or whatever hobbit holes have instead of porches. Dirt clods? I don't know. 

 But what I'm curious about is if some films rely too heavily on composers and a musical score in order to fix what would otherwise be a weak script. Recently, there was a video going around the internet called "Star Wars without Williams." While it was meant to be funny, it also pointed out something pretty important: this throne room scene is super awkward without music. What was once a jovial and triumphant scene is now just echoey and weird. Don't get me wrong, I like Star Wars as much as the next guy or gal, but Audio (and script) - wise, Lucas kind of dropped the ball here. 

On the opposite side of things, however, is it possible to have a good film without any scoring at all? Sure. Just check out No Country for Old Men, The Birds, and 90% of Castaway. The key to scoring films, as I'm slowly but surely finding out, is to balance a good script with subtle yet powerful music. Emphasize certain emotions or themes that you want to have emphasized, while at the same time making sure that your film could still be successful without the music shoving those emotions down your throat. If you're looking for some more interesting info on how composers mess with our emotions, you check out a BBC article on that very topic right here.

The Music and Script of Inception

After talking about the spinning hallway in Inception during class it got me thinking about this complex and intriguing movie. Underneath the effects there are many other great things this movie has including its music and story.

First for those who have not seen the film, Inception is a 2010 film written, directed and co-produced by Christopher Nolan one of my favorite directors who has done movies like The Dark Knight and Memento. It was also nominated for a Best Picture Oscar. Leonardo DiCaprio stars and plays Dom Cobb, a specialized thief. Instead of robbing, banks he steals ideas from the unconscious minds while they are asleep and dreaming. This is called extraction. Cobb has been on the run and unable to go home to America to visit his children because he is wanted for his wife's murder. Cobb is offered a chance to go home and have his old life back if he could perform the impossible task of inception; the planting of an idea into someone's subconscious. That is Inception in a nutshell. It is a lot more complex and a definite watch for anyone who loves science fiction, action or heist movies.The music from Inception is just beyond epic. Hans Zimmer, who has worked on movies like The Lion King, The Dark Knight, and Rango, completed the score. Now the score is described as a very electronic score but the coolest part about Zimmer's Academy Award nominated score involves Charles Dumont's 1956 song "Non, je ne regrette rien." In the movie this song is used as a "kick" to wake up them up. To know they are running out of time in the dream the song softly starts as headphones are placed on the dreamer's ears. The music builds and then they are awakened.

Now as explained in the film, time moves differently when people are dreaming or when they are dreaming within a dream. ("It's a week the first level down. Six months the second level…"). Zimmer used this information and incorporated this into his soundtrack. Listen carefully to "Non, je ne regrette rien" and then to Zimmer's "Half-Remembered Dream" from the soundtrack. Do you see what he did there? When slowed down the song, like it would be in the dream world for the characters. Check out this video for an audio comparison. Another user also did the opposite and sped up "Half-Remembered Dream" to have it sound like Dumont's song!

Two final points, one small and one large, I want to bring up involve the story and the script, which was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay. Let's start small first. Nolan was so detailed when writing the script that some of the character names are allusions. Ellen Page's character Ariadne is an "architect" who creates the various dreamscapes, which are designed like mazes. The name alludes to a princess in a Greek myth who aided by the hero Theseus by giving him a sword and a ball of string to help him navigate the labyrinth, which imprisoned the Minotaur. Ariadne in the movie aids the hero Cobb and the rest of the characters on how to navigate the dream mazes.

The other point I must bring up when talking about Inception is the ending. The ambiguous and controversial ending involves a spinning top wobbling. For the characters in the movie they each have a totem that allows them to find out if they are dreaming or in the real world. For Cobb if the top stays spinning he is dreaming but the ending fails to show if the top falls or not because of the abrupt cut. In other words the audience is unsure if the final sequence of the film is reality or just another dream. While many of speculated and even came up with theories involving Cobb only wears his wedding ring during dreams and that is your clue to look for, Nolan has denied this. When I first saw the movie I was a little confused and looked for clues to find out what happened but after my second viewing I realized how it doesn't matter what happened. Whether he is dreaming or not, Cobb is not looking at the top for the answer but is looking at his kids. If he doesn't care, neither should we. Nolan has backed this in interviews but the audience is free to believe whatever they want. Maybe they should sleep on it and dream their own ending to this wild movie.