I rate this movie 11/10 to signify it's greatness. Perfection. Mind-blowing. A workout for your brain. I want to have debates about it. I want to write research papers on it. Amazingly unbelievably awesome. This is the kind of movie that opens up your mind. Lots of amazing scenes with epic music. A killer story told flawlessly. Perfect directing by the best ever. Great cast with great acting. A deep psychological aspect explored for numerous characters.
The most renowned theoretical physicist who is an expert on cosmology was brought on to keep the science honest, as well as a retired astronaut who's been to space five times. One of the rare movies that is better the second, and even the third time watching. The only movie I have ever liked the most the fourth time. I keep picking up on more things and a better overall understanding. So many parts are extremely moving and powerful. It does an awesome job of making you feel what the characters are feeling.
EDIT on tenth viewing: This movie destroys me every time. Numerous tears EVERY TIME. And I don't just mean at the obvious emotional parts. There are so many moments where I am in complete awe at the beauty of the filmmaking I'm experiencing, to the point of tears. The way the story all comes together and the "epiphany moment" is so perfect that it brings me to tears.
When watching movies, I sometimes think, "this is the best thing I've ever seen" or "this is the coolest thing I've ever seen." I know it's hyperbole and I've said it many times, usually at one or maybe two scenes in a movie. During Interstellar, I feel this way for about 40% of this three hour movie. Every time I watch, it re-emphasizes that it is CLEARY my favorite movie of all-time. And that musical score alone gives me goosebumps for so much of the movie. Hans is the GOAT. Nolan is the GOAT.
(10 viewings, 12/2/2016, 2/26/2020, 1/11/2022, 8/9/2023)
SPOILERS
I was randomly thinking about Interstellar, haven't watched it in at least 6 months. I thought about one hypothetical that intrigued me: what if the tesseract is such that it can only be placed inside an already collapsed black hole. If plan B was what "originally" happened and Dr. Brand survived, future people figured it out, and they want to save those they left behind on earth, they need to find a love-link between someone who goes into a black hole and someone on earth smart enough to be able to solve the gravity problem = Cooper and Murph. Doctor Brand knows this because she knows Cooper loves Murph, knows he sacrifices himself by falling into the black hole, knows Murph grows up to be her dad's understudy, so she has the future people (eventually, after her death) put the machine in the same black hole that Cooper falls into, thereby making the entire plan work. INTRIGUING. Will need to confirm on next viewing... after watching again, I like this as a viable theory, but it conflicts with another theory I had about the "original" mission being completed without Cooper.
Lots of awesome concepts that made me think, like Murphy's Law not applying close to a black hole, human survival instincts and it encompassing your children, love being a quantifiable scientific force, the black hole and time relativity. The robots are cool and original. Really awesome visuals of things I've wondered about but never really imagined. I liked the depiction of the 5 dimensions in 3D in the daughter's room. The way everything connected is very awesome. The different planets are so interesting with ice clouds and giant tidal waves. The endings are perfect.
Something I noticed that I didn't realize the first time is the reason his son became dark and a little crazy. He was still a good person, even after experiencing the death of his son, Jesse. However, once his wife convinced him to let go of the idea that his father was coming back, he gave up on everything in life and became a horrible husband, father and brother.
The relationship between Coop and Murph is the best relationship I can remember in any movie I've seen. The primary underlying theme in the movie is the love between a father and his daughter being able to transcend space and time, which is the key to her getting the information she needs to save the world.
From Interstellar group chat discussion:
-Or the other theory I had was that originally plan B was the one that worked and a colony survived and eventually was able to do what they did and wanted to save all the people that ended up dying on earth and try to make plan A work
-So she finds out that plan a was a sham. That the professor had already solved the equation years ago before she even met him. That he knew even with solving the equation that they couldn't figure out how to get the people off earth. She found out they knew they were never coming back and they were going to let everyone on earth to die. So every day since she was 10 that she has been hoping her father would come home was a lie. She should have never been hoping. Her entire 20 years that she dedicated her life to working on this was a complete waste. That should break a person. Murph is a beast.
-The love between them was the only reason the world ended up being saved. It's the only reason she kept trying that hard after all those years. It's the only reason she went back to her house in her room. It's the only reason she saw the watch again. It's the only reason she figured out that the watch twitching was her dad sending the data.
12/2/16: I watched interstellar again wow. I found a flaw in my theory that in the original timeline they used Plan B without Cooper, and then when they became advanced they went back to try to get Cooper so they could save the people that died on earth. The problem is, how would they have gotten past the problems with re-docking onto the spinning blown up ship after Mann backstabbed humanity. But it actually makes perfect sense because in the original timeline Cooper would not have convinced them to go to Mann's planet, Brand would have convinced them to go to Edmund's planet which was the right one. In that "original" timeline, love still saved humanity since it helped her choose the right planet.
The most renowned theoretical physicist who is an expert on cosmology was brought on to keep the science honest, as well as a retired astronaut who's been to space five times. One of the rare movies that is better the second, and even the third time watching. The only movie I have ever liked the most the fourth time. I keep picking up on more things and a better overall understanding. So many parts are extremely moving and powerful. It does an awesome job of making you feel what the characters are feeling.
EDIT on tenth viewing: This movie destroys me every time. Numerous tears EVERY TIME. And I don't just mean at the obvious emotional parts. There are so many moments where I am in complete awe at the beauty of the filmmaking I'm experiencing, to the point of tears. The way the story all comes together and the "epiphany moment" is so perfect that it brings me to tears.
When watching movies, I sometimes think, "this is the best thing I've ever seen" or "this is the coolest thing I've ever seen." I know it's hyperbole and I've said it many times, usually at one or maybe two scenes in a movie. During Interstellar, I feel this way for about 40% of this three hour movie. Every time I watch, it re-emphasizes that it is CLEARY my favorite movie of all-time. And that musical score alone gives me goosebumps for so much of the movie. Hans is the GOAT. Nolan is the GOAT.
(10 viewings, 12/2/2016, 2/26/2020, 1/11/2022, 8/9/2023)
SPOILERS
I was randomly thinking about Interstellar, haven't watched it in at least 6 months. I thought about one hypothetical that intrigued me: what if the tesseract is such that it can only be placed inside an already collapsed black hole. If plan B was what "originally" happened and Dr. Brand survived, future people figured it out, and they want to save those they left behind on earth, they need to find a love-link between someone who goes into a black hole and someone on earth smart enough to be able to solve the gravity problem = Cooper and Murph. Doctor Brand knows this because she knows Cooper loves Murph, knows he sacrifices himself by falling into the black hole, knows Murph grows up to be her dad's understudy, so she has the future people (eventually, after her death) put the machine in the same black hole that Cooper falls into, thereby making the entire plan work. INTRIGUING. Will need to confirm on next viewing... after watching again, I like this as a viable theory, but it conflicts with another theory I had about the "original" mission being completed without Cooper.
Lots of awesome concepts that made me think, like Murphy's Law not applying close to a black hole, human survival instincts and it encompassing your children, love being a quantifiable scientific force, the black hole and time relativity. The robots are cool and original. Really awesome visuals of things I've wondered about but never really imagined. I liked the depiction of the 5 dimensions in 3D in the daughter's room. The way everything connected is very awesome. The different planets are so interesting with ice clouds and giant tidal waves. The endings are perfect.
Something I noticed that I didn't realize the first time is the reason his son became dark and a little crazy. He was still a good person, even after experiencing the death of his son, Jesse. However, once his wife convinced him to let go of the idea that his father was coming back, he gave up on everything in life and became a horrible husband, father and brother.
The relationship between Coop and Murph is the best relationship I can remember in any movie I've seen. The primary underlying theme in the movie is the love between a father and his daughter being able to transcend space and time, which is the key to her getting the information she needs to save the world.
From Interstellar group chat discussion:
-Or the other theory I had was that originally plan B was the one that worked and a colony survived and eventually was able to do what they did and wanted to save all the people that ended up dying on earth and try to make plan A work
-So she finds out that plan a was a sham. That the professor had already solved the equation years ago before she even met him. That he knew even with solving the equation that they couldn't figure out how to get the people off earth. She found out they knew they were never coming back and they were going to let everyone on earth to die. So every day since she was 10 that she has been hoping her father would come home was a lie. She should have never been hoping. Her entire 20 years that she dedicated her life to working on this was a complete waste. That should break a person. Murph is a beast.
-The love between them was the only reason the world ended up being saved. It's the only reason she kept trying that hard after all those years. It's the only reason she went back to her house in her room. It's the only reason she saw the watch again. It's the only reason she figured out that the watch twitching was her dad sending the data.
12/2/16: I watched interstellar again wow. I found a flaw in my theory that in the original timeline they used Plan B without Cooper, and then when they became advanced they went back to try to get Cooper so they could save the people that died on earth. The problem is, how would they have gotten past the problems with re-docking onto the spinning blown up ship after Mann backstabbed humanity. But it actually makes perfect sense because in the original timeline Cooper would not have convinced them to go to Mann's planet, Brand would have convinced them to go to Edmund's planet which was the right one. In that "original" timeline, love still saved humanity since it helped her choose the right planet.