Gravity reviews

by silly girl Wed 28 Aug 2013, 12:51

Some first reviews....Hollywood Reporter:

George Clooney and Sandra Bullock star as astronauts in Alfonso Cuaron's jaw-dropping space thriller.

At once the most realistic and beautifully choreographed film ever set in space, Gravity is a thrillingly realized survival story spiked with interludes of breath-catching tension and startling surprise. Not at all a science fiction film in the conventional sense, Alfonso Cuaron's first feature in seven years has no aliens, space ship battles or dystopian societies, just the intimate spectacle of a man and a woman trying to cope in the most hostile possible environment across a very tight 90 minutes. World premiered at the Venice Film Festival, with Telluride showings following quickly on its heels, this Warner Bros. release is smart but not arty, dramatically straightforward but so dazzlingly told as to make it a benchmark in its field. Graced by exemplary 3D work and bound to look great in IMAX, the film seems set to soar commercially around the world.

“Houston, I have a bad feeling about this mission,” George Clooney's veteran astronaut Matt Kowalski half-jokes at the outset from his perch in orbit around Earth, which looms massively beneath. It's a sentiment few viewers will agree with once their jaws begin dropping at Cuaron's astonishing 13-minute opening shot, which gyrates and swoops and loops and turns in concert with the movements of the space shuttle and those of Matt, who jets around untethered while mission scientist Ryan Stone (Sandra Bullock) tries to fix a technical problem outside the ship. It's as if Max Ophuls were let loose in outer space, so elegant is the visual continuity, making for a film that will have buffs and casual fans alike gaping and wondering, “How did they do that?” and returning for multiple viewings just to imbibe the sheer virtuosity of it all.

The story, written by Cuaron and his son Jonas, is very simple and straightforward: How will the two surviving team members of a crippled American space shuttle contrive to get back to Earth before their oxygen runs out? Old-timer Kowalski, who flew his first mission in 1996, takes a self-deprecating attitude with space rookie Stone -- "You're the genius up here, I only drive the bus." -- but his smart-alecky kidding scarcely conceals his serious professionalism and vast knowledge of the ins and outs of staying alive in the frigid void.
Before Cuaron even resorts to his first cut, the peril jacks way up with word of approaching space debris, the result of a chain reaction from the Russians having shot down one of their own satellites. Suddenly and shockingly, the empty space is filled with a metallic torrent from which only dumb luck can save the exposed space travelers. In this terrifying interlude, the ship is damaged and Stone, her umbilical cord severed, tumbles toward oblivion.

Here, as elsewhere in the film, Cuaron coils the tension and visceral impact of key scenes via a startling mix of the objective and subjective, and the extreme contrast between the stillness of empty space and the abrupt arrival of terrible threats. This is achieved by switching from the eerie electronic heaves of Steven Price's insidiously effective score to total silence; from violent physical action to tight shots of Stone's face, her breath visible on the inside of her mask and her nervous inhaling and exhaling the only sounds to be heard; from the beauty of a green, blue and tan planet on one side and the depths of infinite darkness on the other; from the awe of the cosmic to the terror of nothingness, from the warmth of the sun to the coldness of eternal limbo.
These oppositions provide the sensory frame for a narrative that, soon after Kowalski rescues Stone from her trajectory into deep space, shoots off in an unexpected direction. Urgently looking for a safe haven, Kowalski spots a Russian space station in the distance which might sustain them until a rescue ship can be sent up. Their oxygen supply is running low and Stone isn't convinced they can make it. Surprises await on the Russian craft and yet again on another space vessel, and when a weightless Stone goes floating about in nothing but her underwear, it's impossible not to think of Sigourney Weaver's Ripley in Alien.
But no monsters pop out baring scary teeth, only adverse circumstances of such extremity that they place Gravity alongside Life of Pi and J.C. Chandor's contemporaneous All Is Lost as a survival tale requiring a heroically concentrated form of human resilience. Those two films involve the peril of oceans rather than space, but then Gravity, with its characters all suited up and their heads enclosed in helmets, sometimes almost seems like it's taking place under water -- except that you can see more clearly.

And seeing is what it's mostly about here, seeing space as if the film was actually shot there. It's a wonderful cinematic jolt to watch this film for the first time, as it looks as if it had been filmed, as it were, on location. Given the brief running time, it will be tempting for many to return for second and third visits just to take it all in again, to absorb all Cuaron and his team of exemplary collaborators have done. The reliably brilliant cinematographer Emmanuel Lubezki, who has shot all but one of the director's features, has outdone himself here with images of astonishing clarity that, given the finesse of the 3D here, you practically feel you could step (or float) into. Andy Nicholson's production design is mainly devoted to creating multiple much-lived-in space ships so battered and abused they resemble banged-up old cars, while Tim Webber's peerless special effects work never has a CGI look.
With all the excitement and beauty Gravity delivers, at a certain point, around the time of the final long exchange between Kowalski and Stone, it becomes clear that Gravity doesn't intend to offer more than that; it shies away from proposing anything metaphysical, philosophically suggestive or meaning-laden. For some viewers, that will be a good thing, as it avoids pretention and self-seriousness; for others, its refusal to acknowledge the eternal mysteries, to be anything more than a thrillingly made, stripped-down suspense drama, will relegate it to good-but-not-great status. The very ending is quite cool and replete with quiet cinematic as well as evolutionary reverberations.
Clooney supplies both manly reliability and welcome lightness as a guy anyone would want in their corner in a pinch, while Bullock is aces in by far the best film she's ever been in. An unseen Ed Harris supplies the voice of mission control.

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by Katiedot Wed 28 Aug 2013, 12:57

Wow. Just wow.

by melbert Wed 28 Aug 2013, 13:06

Ditto. WOW!

by Lighterside Wed 28 Aug 2013, 13:10

I second that Katie, WOW! Can't wait to see it...

by Carla97 Wed 28 Aug 2013, 13:14

Good review, can´t wait to see Smile

by Joanna Wed 28 Aug 2013, 13:41

Sounds amazing. Yahooooo

But.....why no George floating around in
HIS underwear ? headbang

by it's me Wed 28 Aug 2013, 13:41

Great, it is the best start!!! Yahooooo

by Nicky80 Wed 28 Aug 2013, 14:28

by Katiedot Wed 28 Aug 2013, 17:32

Joanna wrote:Sounds amazing.

But.....why no George floating around in
HIS underwear ?

Good point. Should we boycott it? They still have time to drop in an extra scene if we make enough noise.

by Nicky80 Wed 28 Aug 2013, 23:41

Oh great idea Katiedot hehehe That's funny

by Joanna Thu 29 Aug 2013, 00:33

Come on then Katie....you are our esteemed leader
and where you go we will loyally follow.

"Onwards and Upwards" is the cry. Loud hailer

by ktsue2002 Thu 29 Aug 2013, 00:39

Sounds fantastic. I too look forward to my own viewing party! Who wants to come? LOL

by Mazy Thu 29 Aug 2013, 00:42

I think we can safely say that they really liked it and it's a fantastic movie.
I am so happy for them. One down 2 to go.

by Mazy Thu 29 Aug 2013, 00:43

I think we can safely say that they really liked it and it's a fantastic movie.
I am so happy for them. One down 2 to go.

by LornaDoone Thu 29 Aug 2013, 00:49

I know where I'll be opening night in October... fantastic review!

by Joanna Thu 29 Aug 2013, 01:41

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Sorry can't copy it !

Gravity at the Venice Film Festival: Dread and Awe in Space

Director Alfonso Cuar‪ón weaves a majestic thriller about astronauts stranded above Earth

By Richard Corliss Aug. 28, 20132 Comments

“He has always wanted to be a director,” reads the Internet Movie Database profile of Alfonso Cuar‪ón, “and also an astronaut.” Cuar‪ón’s double fantasy comes true—and another dream, the moviegoer’s—in Gravity, a space epic of desperate peril and profound wonder.

Gravity opens the Venice Film Festival this evening with the same blast of astonishment that greeted Ang Lee’s Life of Pi when it launched last year’s New York Film Festival. Both are thrilling 3-D dramas of survival in a hostile environment, testaments to human grit and groundbreaking technical ingenuity. Both are the rare movies that need to be seen once for the “Wow!” factor and a second time to try figuring out how Cuar‪ón and his technical savants managed to make the impossible seem so cinematically plausible. No one dared to imagine this before; yet here it is, vividly realized. You are there, inside the awe and dread.

Pi, you’ll recall, was alone on a small boat in the stormy Pacific, his only companion a ravenous Bengal tiger. Sandra Bullock, as NASA scientist Ryan Stone, is stranded in space—no air, no sound, no connection to Mission Control—with George Clooney. So it could be worse.

Having served on shuttle flights since 1996, Clooney’s Matt Kowalsky is the bantering veteran, Ryan the novice: old cop, young cop. Earlier, he had transmitted a creepy, Apollo 13 joke: “Houston, I have a bad feeling about this mission.” But he also wants to reassure Ryan. “You’re the genius up here,” this Buzz Lightyear tells the Doctor Newbie. “I only drive the bus.” And he hopes she can enjoy the spectacle of being 372 miles above her shimmering home. As he rightly says, “Can’t beat the view.”

As Ryan works at fixing a glitch on the space station’s jutting metal arms, a message comes through from their ground control (Ed Harris, himself a movie astronaut 30 years ago in The Right Stuff): “Mission abort.” Debris from a satellite shot down by the Russians is headed their way; and, as bright chunks fly past, Matt still jokes: “Half of North America just lost their Facebook.” The laughter turns to terror when the rest of Matt and Ryan’s crew is killed. The space station arm jerks lose, and Ryan spins wildly around, finally catching Matt’s arm. Now they are tethered on a literally death-defying Cirque du Soleil bungee cord. They have lost contact with Mission Control, as well as access to their oxygen supply. Alone together, with time and options running out.

This amazing 13-min. sequence at the very beginning of Gravity is shown in a single shot. To say this is a marvel of camerabatics, of visual choreography, animation and physical acting (Bullock and Clooney worked on wires in front of a green screen) is to undersell Cuar‪ón’s gift as a storyteller who takes the audience on a nail-gnawing space flight. He’s a cinematic astronaut whose Mission Control is his retinue of visual enablers, led by Special Effects wizard Tim Webber. As the director told Entertainment Weekly’s Jess Cagle, “Each single bit of film is a different technology.”

Beyond technology, Cuar‪ón plays daringly and dexterously with point-of-view: at one moment you’re inside Ryan’s helmet as she surveys the bleak silence, then in a subtle shift you’re outside to gauge her reaction. The 3-D effects, added in post-production, provide their own extraterrestrial startle: a hailstorm of debris hurtles at you, as do a space traveler’s thoughts at the realization of being truly alone in the universe.

[WARNING FOR (VERY VEILED) SPOILER:] Like Life of Pi, and J.C. Chandor’s All Is Lost—which manages the even bolder narrative trick of stranding a sailor (Robert Redford) with neither words nor backstory—Gravity eventually becomes a story of self-reliance, of finding ways to survive and a reason to live. When Ryan reaches a Russian space station and sheds her astronaut gear until she’s down to Ripley’s undies in Alien, she slowly revolves, eyes closed, in a fetal position: a child waiting to be born, or die. At the end of the movie, an ancient astronaut emerges from the sea, as if to recapitulate the evolution of humankind from sea creature. [END OF TORTUOUSLY VEILED SPOILER ALERT.]

Some movies take forever to make. Gravity, which Cuar‪ón wrote with his son Jon‪ás, was in pre-production soon after the director finished Children of Men in 2006, went through two studios and more than a dozen actors for the main roles. Robert Downey, Jr., was to play Matt but dropped out in 2011, allowing Clooney to bring his nonpareil charm, bravado and maturity to the role. Cuar‪ón offered the Ryan part to Angelina Jolie, twice, and then to Natalie Portman, Jennifer Lopez, Rachel Weisz, Marion Cotillard, Carey Mulligan, Blake Lively, Scarlett Johansson, Olivia Wilde—everybody. When these actresses see what Bullock has been given in the role, and the fiery commitment she gives to it, they should all whisper a sincere, Rick Perry-style “Oops.”
* * * *
Today’s other entry, Venezia 70: Future Reloaded, comprises short films, a minute or so each, from 70 different directors, including Bernardo Bertolucci, Ermanno Olmi, Catherine Breillat, William Friedkin, Atom Egoyan, Paul Schrader, Todd Solondz and the omnipresent James Franco. Many of these auteurs mourn the death of classic 35mm film in the flowering or festering of the digital age. Yes, there are few “films” at the Venice Film Festival. Even the retrospective selections, such as Roberto Rossellini’s Paisan and Friedkin’s Sorcerer, have been restored digitally.

We should mourn the demise of a glorious century or more, when “film” meant the passage of celluloid or acetate, at 24 frames per second, through the sprockets of a projector. Now it’s almost all on disc, not pictures but pixels. But what Avatar achieved—and Rise of the Planet of the Apes and Life of Pi and now Gravity, each outdoing its predecessor in the filmmaker’s eternal quest to astonish us—represents a triumph of digital technology and human artistry. Cuar‪ón shows things that cannot be but, miraculously, are, in the fearful, beautiful reality of the space world above our world. If the film past is dead, Gravity shows us the glory of cinema’s future. It thrills on so many levels. And because Cuar‪ón is a movie visionary of the highest order, you truly can’t beat the view.

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by Joanna Thu 29 Aug 2013, 01:43

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Gravity – first look review
Xan Brooks
The Guardian, Wednesday 28 August 2013 09.14 EDT

The Venice film festival lands on its feet with a brilliant opening night thriller which sees Sandra Bullock and George Clooney flailing in space and director Alfonso Cuarón masterfully steering the ship

Spare a thought for the hapless delegates on day one of the Venice film festival. They're scanning the schedule, colliding on the stairwell and clearly struggling to find their feet and get their bearings. The opening movie offers no comfort at all. When the lights go down inside the cinema, the viewers are pitched, without further ado, clean out to the cosmos. All at once their nearest neighbour in the adjoining seat might as well be a thousand miles away.

1. Gravity
2. Production year: 2013
3. Country: USA
4. Directors: Alfonso Cuaron
5. Cast: George Clooney, Sandra Bullock
6. More on this film

Gravity, by the Mexican director Alfonso Cuarón is a brilliantly tense and involving account of two stricken astronauts; a howl in the wilderness that sucks the breath from your lungs. Sandra Bullock and George Clooney star as Stone and Kowalsky, the skittish newcomer and the wily old pro, who find themselves battered by the drifting debris from a Russian satellite. Their shuttle is holed and useless, its interior full of floating corpses, and Houston steadfastly refuses to copy. Stone and Kowalsky's only hope is make their way across the void to the international space station and possible salvation. But they're lost in the desert, wafting in orbit; each spinning and turning as they grope despairingly for the hand of a friend.

It could be claimed that Cuarón has thrown a similar lifeline to the Venice film festival, which last year got off to a stuttering start courtesy of Mira Nair's well-meaning yet half-baked The Reluctant Fundamentalist. Gravity provides an altogether more assured curtain-raiser. It comes blowing in from the ether like some weightless black nightmare, hanging planet Earth at crazy angles behind the action. Like Tarkovsky's Solaris (later remade by Clooney and director Steven Soderbergh), the film thrums with an ongoing existential dread. And yet, tellingly, Cuaron's film contains a top-note of compassion that strays at times towards outright sentimentality. Stone, we learn, is haunted by the death of her infant daughter. She has scant seconds to decide whether she wants to live or die.

Maybe it's fitting that a film about two lonely figures adrift in outer-space should itself be dominated by the cosmos. Clooney and Bullock give dogged, decent performances here, but they are inevitably shouting to be heard; utterly at the mercy of forces beyond their control. Cuaron takes the two stars and stitches them against a vast canvas of roaring sound design and terrifying 3D visuals. Ruined satellites pitch and yaw. Shrapnel zips through the darkness like shoals of silver fish. As the screening wraps up, the delegates are politely instructed to return their spectacles to an usher and not leave them on the seat. Gravity, after all, offers a stark warning of the dangers of debris, clutter and human waste. With a little good fortune, even the 3D glasses will eventually find their way back home.

by Joanna Thu 29 Aug 2013, 01:46

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by Joanna Thu 29 Aug 2013, 01:48

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by it's me Thu 29 Aug 2013, 14:50

Love it!

The space of loneliness

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from our correspondent Fabio Ferzetti

VENICE - Head down, legs in the air, spinning like the blades of a windmill,
light like leaves in the wind, joined by a cord that stretches and tangles sbatacchiandoli without mercy, the body that is contracted struggling against the lack of weight control, direction.

They had never seen two stars like George Clooney and Sandra Bullock in Gravity as scrambled. Almost invisible, hidden from suits and space helmets for most of the film (Clooney has one scene it openly), which declined in two characters that are a sum of archetypes and unprecedented together a flexible and powerful metaphor. Two astronauts went out for a walk in space to repair their shuttle that are facing catastrophic emergency.

As survivors beaten by a storm, without more channels of communication with the mother Earth. And besieged by silence, by the cosmic void, by a series of sophisticated machinery and suddenly useless, threatening, metal clusters that are no longer docile technology but brute matter and blunt. All enhanced by a 3D that for once does not have anything decorative.

Of course you think of Kubrick's philosophical science fiction, the name coming from the most quoted films of Mexican director Alfonso Cuarón, director abnormally and always surprising (Y Tu Mama Tambien, Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban, Children of men). But it is in part a red herring. Indeed in some ways Gravity is the opposite of 2001. Not only for coloring ironic dialogues (with Clooney that makes mister cool to guide and reassure Bullock, terrified therefore at risk of ending up in advance of the low oxygen), but because it is the horizon of the film itself to be different.

Kubrick turned in 1968, at the dawn of the computer age, and started from the human development of the machines, that is the possibility to simulate the brain (Hal 9000). Cuaron, who wrote Gravity with his son Jonas, reverses the perspective. Not part of the mind, but from the body (for this reason, as well as to raise the 80 million needed, choose two stars). What about the body - legs, arms, senses, reflexes - Today the machines are an integral part of our lives? What happens if we force to delegate, to rationalize, implement, we do not distinguish high and low, near and far, real and virtual?

2001 caught in the birth of the technique (the bone that became spaceship) point of no return of the human species. Gravity is the son of Google Earth, the fake omnipotence and of the deep melancholy of our years. The space race is long over. Today is the space (virtual) that enters into us, svuotandoci, not vice versa. We are the planets to (re) gain. Although "the dawn on the Ganges," as Clooney, view from up there is wonderful.

And at the end of worrying about the future is also the cinema as such, as we saw in the short (1-2 minutes maximum) turned to Venice from 70 directors from around the world (all visible on the site of the Biennale to show finished). With many children, eyes, videophones, meandering longing for the cinema of the past and of the origins, but also images that leave a mark for strength plastic or premonitory. Paul Schrader walking and philosophizing in a sling bristling with video cameras. An electronic voice that lists - in Chinese - titles and compulsory courses in cinema of the future (Todd Solondz, irresistible). Two projectors placed between the Greek islands which project into thin air (Athina Tsangari). A child who "makes" cinema building cardboard monsters (Tsukamoto father and son). A homeless man who sounds a pretty motive on the harmonica and then greets: "I do not watch TV and do not read the regional, then I'll never see." The cinema does not die. He's just being reborn.

I love you

by it's me Thu 29 Aug 2013, 14:55

Huuuu great the Variety one! Not worthy

by it's me Thu 29 Aug 2013, 22:46

Kataweb.it-Blog-bloomsbury by Fent» Blog Archive» the day of Gravity. Venice glamour with the Clooney-Bullock of Paola Casella

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Paola Casella/EUROPE DAILY
The day of Gravity. Venice glamour with the Clooney-Bullock
The film, out of competition, opens the Venice Film Festival

What Titanic was by the end of the twentieth century, Gravity, which opens today, out of competition the official selection of the Venice Film Festival, might be for the beginning of the 21st century. Ok, we shoot. But we can argue. Where Titanic told the Internet revolution through the metaphor of a liquid world of browsers in which young people were the only ones to have a chance of salvation because they knew living in the moment and to adapt gradually to the circumstances, Gravity has a present where you lost the horizon line and the severity of the real (that is, specific gravity, but also ability to remain anchored to the ground) and it floats in a global within which anything we missed not only our spacetime coordinates, but also our sense of self.

Gravity tells two astronauts, Matt and Ryan, lost in space after an accident to their spaceship, and what they must do to try to survive alone in the immensity. Both have relied on technologies, now must learn to trust each other. «Are adrift, is there anyone?», says Ryan, Dr. man named played by Sandra Bullock. And later will be a tear that fluctuates as the bubble of Lethe special effect more poignant.

"This is a film about adversity, and the need to address them by abandoning every useless resistance, says the Mexican director Alfonso Cuaron's press conference. «Speaks of the need to gain greater knowledge of ourselves, and the greatest learning experience is the acceptance». If you have doubts about an array of this philosophy, the film featured a statue of Buddha. And if you thought that Cuaron in performing Gravity had in mind 2001 Space Odyssey know that there is a scene in which Ryan cringes in fetal position.
But thank God (or Buddha?) Gravity remembers being especially entertainment, and thus divided his metaphor through a riot of images and a proliferation of special effects that make the film pure spectacle. Even the use of 3D (at the opening of an exhibition of hard and pure film) is largely justified by the fact that this story needs a third dimension, because the actors ' legs to dangle in the air and objects, deprived of the gravity of the title, must be able to float toward us.

Public participation is requested repeatedly, to the point that both George Clooney (Matt) and Bullock look straight at least once in the room, i.e. towards us. «What would you do now? "seem to ask. And more generally: How can we, all of us orient ourselves in this world split and fragmented that overflows ' unintended side effects» (the metaphor of debris in space, ready to strike at random as crazed shrapnel), a universe in may day, and regain a sense of high and low, of Earth and sky, of our body and our soul?

And since the loss in Gravity should be multi-sensory, Cuaron gives us in sound effects, claustrophobic, angles of gasps and accelerated heart beats. "I have a bad feeling," repeated the two characters. And Houston, repeatedly invoked, does not respond. Cuaron makes getting in and out of the frame as characters from their cramped cockpits and, in the case of Ryan, from his space suit, making a pack worthy of a snake: his character is what makes the deepest transformation in order to prepare for the future. «We wanted to outline a brief history of evolution, "admits Cuaron.

Once again the American cinema puts us in front of a powerful female character who finds the weapons to fight the dangers and pushes toward a tomorrow possible. «Designing my astronaut I tried to delete from my body every trace of the feminine breast and becoming an androgynous creature, "said Bullock in a Conference. But nature distinguishes male from female, recognising each useful specificity (or not) to survive. And it reminds us that gravity can be a help or a hindrance, depending on how we do work for us, or what we know ourselves at his strength.

As in Titanic, the human body becomes in turn a lever or a ballast, trap, or resource, and survives only who has the quickness to distinguish one from the other, at the appropriate time. As in Titanic finally what saves – life, but also the sense of living – is will give confidence to other human beings, and not only think about themselves. "Where you go I go," said Matt Ryan, as Jack Rose said: «I Jump, jump. " Because "it's scary when things aren't linked: isn't it?».

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by Joanna Fri 30 Aug 2013, 00:57

Thanks Lorna for copying for me.

by silly girl Sun 01 Sep 2013, 04:54

Hollywood Reporter from Telluride:

Telluride: 'Gravity' and Stars Bullock and Clooney Are Out of This World, Oscar-Bound

The film was greeted with hearty applause, not only for its awe-inspiring visuals but also for its stars' performances under the most constrained of circumstances.

TELLURIDE, Colo. -- Gravity, Alfonso Cuaron's highly-anticipated 3D drama about two American astronauts who become lost in space and struggle to survive after a freak accident, made its North American debut on Saturday night at the new Werner Herzog Theater, three days after its world premiere at the Venice Film Festival. The film, which is drawn from a script co-written by the Mexican director and his son Jonas Cuaron, was greeted with hearty applause, not only for its awe-inspiring visuals but also for Sandra Bullock and George Clooney's first-rate performances under the most constrained of circumstances. Warner Bros. will release the film stateside on Oct. 4.

I would frankly be shocked if the film isn't nominated for Oscars for best picture, best director, best actress (Bullock), best supporting actor (Clooney), best original screenplay, best cinematography, best film editing, best sound editing, best sound mixing and best visual effects.
It may sound hyperbolic, but Gravity is truly one of the most visually magnificent films that I have ever seen. It creates a sense of genuine majesty and wonder about space and space travel that has long been absent from the big screen. Indeed, I imagine that the experience of watching it is akin only to the experience that I've often heard described of seeing 2001: A Space Odyssey and Star Wars during their initial runs. This is attributable to a blend of Emmanuel Lubezki's cinematography and the visual effects work supervised by Tim Webber, both of whom are longtime Cuaron collaborators. I can't even begin to tell you how the actors were made to appear gravity-free, but I can tell you it never rang false. The same can be said for the film's sound work, which, unlike that on many other films set in space, adheres to the scientific reality of what space is actually like: almost silent, even when chaos is occurring.

As for the portrayals of the astronauts in peril, who start out as strangers but bond under pressure, one couldn't have asked for more from Bullock and Clooney, who happen to be old pals in real-life. Clooney's Kowalski is the higher ranking of the two, but Bullock's Stone is the main protagonist, and, thanks to his encouragement and guidance, she develops the confidence and will necessary to fight the odds. Bullock, struggling to remain calm under pressure, evokes memories of her star-making performance in 1994's Speed, 19 years and one best actress Oscar ago. Clooney, meanwhile, puts his famous charm to good use, and is rewarded with one dramatic scene, in particular, that should earn him a return-ticket to the Oscars.
The legacy of this film, apart from great reviews and big box-office, might well turn out to be that it restores interest in space exploration, which has long been waning, even in spite of the dangers so frighteningly depicted in the film. That would be the ultimate testament to what a magnificent moviegoing experience Gravity provides.

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by Mazy Sun 01 Sep 2013, 08:15

WOW each review just gets better than the last one. You can understand why George cannot campaign for his other movies which one do you pick? Thanks so much SG for this article.

by it's me Sun 01 Sep 2013, 09:38

Oh my! Incredible!!!

by Joanna Sun 01 Sep 2013, 10:37

Very glowing report...Roll on October here in UK !

by What Would He Say Sun 01 Sep 2013, 10:54

Joanna, go to the premier....you won't regret it. It's on a Friday, if my darling G does go, he may do Graham Norton show...my 2 favourite men on the same screen. Love4

by Carla97 Sun 01 Sep 2013, 11:56

Very good reviews. I´m so excited, tomorrow I´ll probably know when I will see this! Smile

by Nicky80 Sun 01 Sep 2013, 12:09

Great artical thanks SG

by Mazy Sun 01 Sep 2013, 22:30

This one is from Cuaron

Alfonso Cuarón On His Spellbinding Sci-Fi Film ‘Gravity,’ Starring Sandra Bullock And George Clooney
by Marlow Stern Sep 1, 2013 5:30 AM EDT

It’s been seven years since Alfonso Cuarón graced us with a film. But he’s back with a vengeance. ‘Gravity,’ starring Sandra Bullock and George Clooney as two astronauts drifting in space, is an instant sci-fi classic. Cuarón discussed the technological marvel following its U.S. premiere at the Telluride Film Festival.

Believe the hype. Gravity, the seventh movie from acclaimed Mexican filmmaker Alfonso Cuarón—and his first since Children of Men, back in ’06—is not only the most technologically innovative film since Avatar, but also the most vividly rendered cinematic depiction of space exploration ever.
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Courtesy of Warner Bros. Pictures
Cuarón’s film, which he co-wrote with his son Jonás, centers on Dr. Ryan Stone (Sandra Bullock), a medical engineer on her very first Space Shuttle mission. Since she only has six months training under her belt, Matt Kowalsky, a breezy veteran astronaut on his last mission, played by George Clooney, and another astronaut, Shariff, join Stone. All of a sudden, Mission Control (voiced by Ed Harris, paying homage to Apollo 13) orders the team to abort immediately. Debris from a destroyed Russian satellite is headed straight for them, faster than a speeding bullet. It crashes into their shuttle, Explorer, killing Shariff, along with the crew, and leaving Stone spiraling into space.

This opening, a continuous 13-minute shot in impressive 3D, is one of the most awe-inspiring film sequences in recent memory. Through some nifty camera trickery, Kowalsky is seen looping around Stone in a circuitous spacewalk as she works on fixing a technical problem, and then, when the debris hits, the perspective shifts back-and-forth from the astronauts’ somersaulting bodies to POV shots of the wreckage to tight close-ups of Stone’s terrified face. The music, too, shifts violently from strident noise to deadening silence, as do the visuals, which juxtapose the splendor of earth with the darkness of the great beyond. This is probably the closest most people—that is, ones who can't splurge on a $250,000 trip courtesy of Virgin Galactic—will get to feeling like they are in outer space.

Eventually, Stone and Kowalsky end up tethered to one another with an umbilical cord-like strap, navigating the abyss in search of the International Space Station.

In addition to the extraordinary audio-visual components—they may as well just hand the film all the effects Oscars now to save time—Bullock’s fearless performance helps Gravity approach transcendence. I don’t remember the last time I was this invested in a movie character’s survival.

Cuarón discussed the making of Gravity during a Q&A following its U.S. premiere at the Telluride Film Festival. Here are the best bits.

On where the idea for Gravity came from:
“In a way, it was because of a script that Jonás had written which is actually a film that he is prepping to direct. He showed it to me years ago and wanted notes, and I said, ‘Well, I don’t have many notes, but I want you to help me write a film like this.’ It’s a film that is very tight with only a few elements and you’re in constant tension, but through that tension, you’re juggling different things and subject matters. The movie he’s doing now takes place in the desert and there’s only two characters, so we talked about the setting of space because we thought it provided this metaphorical element that we wanted to play with. We started talking, and pretty much the whole idea came to us in one afternoon. We thought that if you have a character that’s drifting, getting further and further away from earth—where life and human connection exists as we know it. She lives in her own bubble. We wanted to do a film about adversities, and the possible outcome is a rebirth, or new knowledge.”

On making your ideas a cinematic reality:
“This whole film was a big act of miscalculation, and that’s why the film took four-and-a-half years to make. We thought it was going to be easy. When I finish a film, the first thing I do is send it to Chivo—that’s Emmanuel Lubezki, the cinematographer—and I said, ‘Chivo, look: this is a small movie, two characters, we’re done in one year,’ and for the next four-and-a-half years, he reminded me that I told him that. I knew that there was going to be some visual effects but I thought with some rigs I’d be able to achieve it. When we started to run the whole thing, it became very clear that the technology to create the film didn’t exist, so we had to invent the technology.”

On the technology invented to create Gravity:
“The problem with shooting the film is the combination of lack of gravity with long, extended takes. We tried different things, like the Vomit Comet—the plane that goes up and down—but that didn’t work. When you put actors in rigs you can feel the strain, so you can only shoot for a little amount of time, plus you have limitations because there are lots of wires around. For a big part of the shoot, there was this 9’ x 9’ empty cube, and inside the cube’s walls were LED screens. In the center of the cube there was a rig for the actor, and it was very difficult to put the actor in, and the rig would balance in different positions. What would happen is the actor would experience the point of view of the character through the projections in the LED lights. That was important because you cannot make actors go like this [spin around], so we had to keep the actors more or less still, and we moved the camera and the lights around them. Practical lights didn’t do the job so we used LED lights, because the light just travels from screen-to-screen. The cube had a gap from which the camera could see, and outside there was a long track with a robot—the ones they use to build cars—and there was a camera on the robot going in-and-out and up-and-down the track… It was like a ballet of technology going on. And outside the cube, there were just rows and rows of geeks on computers.”

On the rigors of acting in Gravity:
“Everything was really painful for the actors, so I admire what Sandra and George did. It was on the one hand painful, but also an exercise in abstraction, because they were sometimes performing against nothing—just very specific marks. Sometimes, the takes would be many minutes long, and they would have to memorize the different marks with precise timing, because [the lights and animations] was all pre-programmed. With Sandra, it was like a ballerina rehearsing cues for a long time, so when we were shooting, she would just forget about all the cues and just perform. I found it amazing what she did. She’s so precise… Sometimes, Sandra was just performing a monologue that had a lot of technical requirements. A lot of her scenes are very long and very laborious, and she’s just talking and talking and it’s just one single shot.”

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Marlow Stern is the assistant culture editor of Newsweek and The Daily Beast and holds a master’s degree from the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism. He has served in the editorial department of Blender magazine, and as an editor at Amplifier Magazine and Manhattan Movie Magazine.

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by it's me Sun 01 Sep 2013, 23:46

Now? Tiff? G too? When?

by melbert Sun 01 Sep 2013, 23:51

TIFF runs from September 5 - September 15, 2013. Gravity is playing, so I assume they'll be there.

by it's me Sun 01 Sep 2013, 23:52

by Nicky80 Mon 02 Sep 2013, 09:17

Thanks for the artical Mazy.

"Cuarón discussed the making of Gravity during a Q&A following its U.S. premiere at the Telluride Film Festival. ....."

So was this now the US premier? Or how do they mean that? The release date for the US is 4th October are they doing still a premier maybe again in LA or was this it for the US?

by Way2Old4Dis Wed 25 Sep 2013, 16:50

New review:

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I can't wait to see this movie...

by Carla97 Wed 25 Sep 2013, 18:42

Thank for the new review.

I can wait. I will see it day after tomorrow. Friday that is. Smile

by What Would He Say Wed 25 Sep 2013, 18:50

I was just looking when it is to be released here ....I came across this ....Apologies if you already have

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by Joanna Wed 25 Sep 2013, 20:18

wwhs....That picture is from Solaris.

Have you seen it ? Its a brilliant film !

by What Would He Say Wed 25 Sep 2013, 20:30

Oh F*** no! but they used it, next to dates for Gravity.....

YOU CAN'T BELIEVE ANYTHING ON THE WEB.....

but I was just wondering what to watch next....so thanks Jo x

by Joanna Wed 25 Sep 2013, 20:59

Oh you'll ENJOY that one wwhs. Thumbs up!

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by Carla97 Sat 28 Sep 2013, 15:22

Ok I´ve seen Gravity.

Before the movie started Alfonso Cuaron, director and also screenwriter (with his son) came to talk about it. At this point we were all excited to see it. Not so much after he finished talking. He talked about making movies. What is it like working with actors. About making Gravity. He said it took 4 years to finish it. Used swimming at the lake metaphor to describe it. He has only seen it in Venice and won´t watch again. His son or some other relative had fallen asleep in Venice at the beginning and haven´t seen it either, nor is planning to. He is not going to make another space movie. Ever. Clooney had teased him about his accent. He is Mexican, so Clooney had called him Tony Montana... well he didn´t have accent and he doesn´t look like typical Mexican and definitely doesn´t even remotely look or sound like Tony Montana (Al Pacino Scarface). Bullok he had chosen first and then Clooney came later. He likes to direct them, but not together and at the same time. Didn´t explain why. He had had difficulties with it, a lot. And my take on it is that everything must have been with the script. He didn´t say it, but after seeing the movie I can´t think what else it could have been.

Spoiler alert: We had to ask the same question again later... people who have seen it may have a good understanding at what point...

by it's me Sat 28 Sep 2013, 16:37

only in Venice?
then running away in every other premiere????

not good for his film
if the director doesn't want to see it!!!!!

who slept??? bah
you kidding us! Very Happy

by Way2Old4Dis Sat 28 Sep 2013, 20:42

Cuaron is famous (or infamous) for his 'artistic' sensibilities and visual perfectionism. He likes to make the movie that's in his head, and he doesn't like to compromise on the vision. To him, actors are almost an afterthought in the process.

I don't think anyone has ever described him as "fun to work with," like you hear about other directors.

I'd take his comments to mean that the movie is better than anything any of us can imagine, probably close to stupendous, but he's still disgruntled by what he had to go through to make it according to his vision.

by it's me Sat 28 Sep 2013, 21:12

hmmm
ok
now I guess I got it better
thanks !

by Carla97 Sat 28 Sep 2013, 21:13

I was not kidding, that´s exactly what he said.

Way2old4dis I understand what you are saying... about him...as a director. But unfortunately I didn´t get the same impression.

One thing I agree with you is " actors are almost an afterthought in the process".

UGH, that´s all I have to say about this. Smile

by it's me Sat 28 Sep 2013, 21:15

thanks to both!

by Bewitched Tue 01 Oct 2013, 05:38

I saw Gravity today in a private screening. Wow intense movie and definitely worth seeing in IMAX 3D.

by it's me Tue 01 Oct 2013, 07:56

huuu you know such ppl? lucky you!!!

by Bewitched Tue 01 Oct 2013, 10:49

I wish I knew people. No I won a radio station giveaway. Also the local TV station gave away tickets as well. This explains why the theater was packed. Surprised they did not ask the audience what they though of the movie afterwards.

Only thing missing from this screening, George in person. But he is in New York.

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