Don't Look Up (2021)
Don't Look Up
- 3.5/5 Cameras 🎥🎥🎥.5
- Directed by: Adam McKay
- Starring: Leonardo DiCaprio, Jennifer Lawrence, Meryl Streep, Cate Blanchett, et al
- Where to find it: Netflix
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Political satire can be a dangerous game, particularly in
recent times with political opinion in western society being the most divided
it has been for decades. This makes a film like Don’t Look Up a risky venture
almost guaranteed to be divisive. But with a large budget, a stellar cast, and
a strong marketing push from Netflix, Don’t’ Look Up should be a sure-fire hit.
But is it any good?
Don’t Look Up focuses on a Ph.D. student Kate Dibiasky (Jennifer
Lawrence) and her teacher Dr. Randall Mindy (Leonardo DiCaprio) who work in the
field of astronomy. Kate notices a previously undiscovered comet in the sky
which Randall works out is on a collision course with earth and will make
impact in around six months, wiping out the majority of life on earth. In an
effort to save the world they go to the government and media in an attempt to
raise awareness of the comet to allow a solution to be put in place. Throughout
the film, they are met with apathy, indifference, and derision by many people
they speak to, despite having irrefutable evidence that what they are saying is
true.
If this sounds familiar to some, it’s because the comet in
the film is an analogy for climate change, and the whole film is essentially a
satirical take on how saving the planet from a disaster we can all see coming
has for some reason become a political issue to be debated rather than solved.
It’s a message I agree with, and it carries it in a way that manages to be
fairly obvious but not to the point of being insulting.
Even if it didn’t have a message to carry Don’t Look Up
would be an enticing movie based on its cast alone. Leonardo DiCaprio and
Jennifer Lawrence take the main parts, playing the teacher and student who
first discover the comet. Both give strong performances, being two of
relatively few characters in the film that feel like more than simple
caricatures. Elsewhere we have Meryl Streep as the president of the United
States in a clear parody of Trump. Jonah Hill plays her chief-of-staff/son.
Blanchett and Tyler Perry show up as current affairs talk show hosts more
focussed on entertainment than the truth. Yet more famous actors play parodies
of more real-life roles. In most cases, they ham it up, and in all cases, they’re
nothing more than outlines rather than developed characters, but they’re
undeniably entertaining most of the time.
The shallow nature of
these roles allows them to come in and out of the film at will, which helps
with keeping the pace up, but in doing so gives the film a fairly choppy,
inconsistent feel as certain sequences and characters outshine others. Also, by comfortably breaching the two-hour
mark the film does run a little longer than I feel it needs to, and could
easily be made a tighter, more satisfying piece by shaving off twenty minutes
or so. This would also help with the aforementioned inconsistency. Also, and
perhaps a little unfair of a criticism, but the film felt a little self-congratulatory
to me, like the Hollywood elite were giving us a patronising lecture about how
we’re not holding politicians and big business to account.
Despite these flaws, I was entertained by Don’t Look Up. Sure,
it’s a little heavy-handed in its satire and it could do with a spot of
editing, but it’s a funny studio comedy coming at a time when big-budget
comedies like this are going out of fashion. And while yes, I found its
delivery a little patronising, I’m still glad it carries the message it does.
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