The indomitable human spirit can show up in the most unlikely of places…

It’s a rare combination when a piece of storytelling gets to be uniquely but also really, really nice.  Project Hail Mary is the unique combination of the epic science fiction storytelling of some like Interstellar that isn’t afraid to sprinkle in the sweetness and humanity of something like E.T.: The Extra Terrestrial.  This movie allows us to bow in awe of the magnitude of the cosmos while allowing us to keep some whimsy about heading out into the great unknown.

Science teacher Ryland Grace (Ryan Gosling) wakes up on a spaceship light years from home with no recollection of who he is or how he got there. As his memory returns, he begins to uncover his mission: solve the riddle of the mysterious substance causing the sun to die out. He must call on his scientific knowledge and unorthodox ideas to save everything on Earth from extinction… but an unexpected friendship means he may not have to do it alone.

Full disclosure; Project Hail Mary isn’t necessarily an original piece of cinematic storytelling but it takes the greatest hits from many that have come before it to make the future and the great expanse a little less terrifying then it actually is.  It’s one of those gorgeously expansive science fiction movies that doesn’t move its faith away from the characters in leading us down the narrative path.

Obviously the pedigree here in this film is first rate as the directorial team of Phil Lord and Christopher Miller craft a visual narrative that is worthy of the IMAX format that they shot in. This is an undeniably beautiful and big film which is exactly what it needed to be, which makes the realities of this essentially being a character study all the more fascinating as bounce from spectacular set piece to some genuinely intimate moments of humanity.

Based on the novel by Andy Weir, Drew Goddard’s excellent adaptation never deviates from the portrait of an ordinary guy thrust into an absolutely extraordinary situation.  This could have easily devolved into something more heroic where our hero needs to “cowboy up” to save the world, but instead gives us the more relatable journey of a man who doesn’t chase heroism but actually has it thrust upon him out of necessity.

It’s a credit to star and producer Ryan Gosling because he manages to give us a performance here that balances the line between “aw shucks” and “WTF” as he finds himself on this spaceship tasked with saving humanity.  He’s not a barrel chested action hero, he simply a man with the moral code to do the right thing and do everything that he possibly can.

While we can’t undersell the work Gosling does here carrying a large portion by himself or opposite his new CGI alien best friend in Rocky, this film really works as well as it does because of Academy Award Nominee Sandra Huller.  As the head of the ground mission and the team trying to save the world, she channels some genuine moments of compassion with the realities of bearing the weight of the survival of the entirety of humanity resting on her shoulders.  She’s fantastic in bearing the realities of the situation while we get lost in Gosling’s dreamy eyes.

At its core there’s a lot of the spirit and ideals of Gene Roddenberry and Star Trek at the heart of Project Hail Mary.  While we’ll grant that it’s not perfect or even the grander sort of social statement we need about the fate of humanity in these complex times, it’s in the films flaws that we extract the charm and the hope that by hook or by crook, as a species we’ll eventually figure it all out and make ourselves better in the process.