THE MIDNIGHT SKY REVIEW

 *MAY CONTAIN SPOILERS*

Although George Clooney is best known for his acting, including in films such as Ocean’s Eleven, Up in the Air and Gravity, he has also impressed with his directing, with Good Night, and Good Luck and The Ides of March. Unfortunately, his recent films, The Monuments Men and Suburbicon were disappointments, with the former’s narrative being described as slack and the latter struggling to balance social satire, racial commentary and murder mystery. Clooney’s latest film, The Midnight Sky, looked like it could be a return to form for the actor/writer/producer/director with its interesting premise.

The Midnight Sky focuses on Augustine Lofthouse (Clooney), a lone scientist in the Artic who races to warn a crew of astronauts, including Sully (Felicity Jones), Adewole (David Oyelowo), Maya (Tiffany Boone), Mitchell (Kyle Chandler) and Sanchez (Demián Bichir), about a mysterious global catastrophe that’s affected Earth.

When the trailer for The Midnight Sky was released earlier this year, my interest for it increased as it looked like a compelling and thought provoking feature. Because of this, I was surprised when it began receiving mixed to negative reviews from critics. While The Midnight Sky isn’t a terrible film, it is disappointing as it’s not as great as it could have been. There’s a lot of potential, unfortunately, the end result fails to meet the high expectations I had.

The Midnight Sky’s premise surrounds Lofthouse, a lonely scientist, who must quickly warn a crew of astronauts, who are planning on returning home, about the global catastrophe on Earth. While this could have made for an exciting feature, Clooney chooses to make a slow and quiet drama. Patient viewers will struggle to sit through the first hour which focuses on Lofthouse trying to communicate with the astronauts whilst taking care of a young girl, Iris (Caoilinn Springall). Through Iris, the terminally-ill Lofthouse, who planned on dying on Earth, is given a reason to keep going. Although the relationship between Lofthouse and Iris is effective, prior to watching The Midnight Sky, I saw a spoiler revealing Iris’ true identity. This impacted how I perceived Iris. The film also frequently cuts to the astronauts on the space craft, Aether, which is returning from Jupiter after discovering a habitable moon named K-23. While I was hoping that their scenes would add to the drama and suspense, not much happens apart from a predictable meteor shower that results in the death of one of the astronauts. I can imagine this sequence was only added in to prevent the film from becoming too boring. The connection between the two settings isn’t established until its anticlimactic ending. 

Although the story wasn’t as compelling as I was hoping it to be, The Midnight Sky benefits from the impressive dramatic performance by Clooney as the terminally ill Lofthouse. For most of his acting career, he was always associated with charming characters, especially in the Ocean’s trilogy, however, by hiding his good looks with white facial hair, Clooney is almost unrecognisable. I found The Midnight Sky to be at its most interesting when it was focusing on the relationship between Lofthouse and the silent Iris as it reminded me of the relationship between Hugh Jackman’s Logan and Dafne Keen’s Laura in Logan, however, it’s not as powerful. Although the rest of the cast, including Jones and Oyelowo, deliver solid performances, their characters are underwritten and aren’t as interesting as they could have been. I don’t understand the decision behind making Sully pregnant other than giving somethiing for the astronauts to talk about. After discovering that she’s having a girl, this leads to the rest of the crew discussing potential names. This lead to me thinking that Sully would give birth on board the space craft, however, the film ends with her still pregnant. 

Because little is known about Lofthouse, Clooney tries to give his character some background by adding in a few flashback sequences where the scientist is portrayed by Ethan Peck. I think that this scenes were unnecessary and forgettable. The Midnight Sky would have been better if it had focused entirely on Lofthouse’s current life and the sequences involving the astronauts. 

The most impressive aspects of The Midnight Sky lie in Alexandre Desplat’s powerful score and Martin Ruhe’s breathtaking cinematography. Desplatt’s score emphasises the dramatic scenes and is most effective during the quieter scenes. Rube captures the beauty of space. Because I watched The Midnight Sky at home on Netflix, there were several times where I wished I could have seen it at the cinema and that’s mainly because of the stunning visuals.

The last decade has seen the release of several of the best science fiction films, including Christopher Nolan’s Interstellar, Denis Villeneuve’s Arrival and Alfonso Cuarón‘s Gravity. Although The Midnight Sky isn’t the best sci-fi film to be released recently, I can imagine Clooney found inspiration from Gravity for the scenes set on the Aether. The meteor shower sequence is where The Midnight Sky is at its most intense. 

Although The Midnight Sky wasn’t as great as I was hoping, I still think that it’s a good film that is worth watching as I can imagine that there will be those who will appreciate that Clooney has created a character based film rather than a predictable space adventure that prioritises its unconvincing special effects instead of telling a meaningful story. It’s just a shame that The Midnight Sky doesn’t explore its premise enough to leave much of a lasting impression.

6/10