Proof that even the most revered of creators and largest of film stars can have their movies just disappear
. Fargo and Legion creator(/adaptor) Noah Hawley's inaugural motion picture has ambition, but lacks
any true drama or excitement. He takes this very sensationalistic true
story (of a female astronaut so fixated with her colleague that she
drives across the country non-stop wearing a diaper to stalk him) and
uses it as a launching pad to examine the probable existential crisis astronauts potentially face after going into space.
Hawley intriguingly uses aspect ratios to try and visualize the headspace Natalie Portman's Lucy is in --a vintage TV 4:3 ratio to represent the mundane life (and the majority of the film is viewed this way) with a full screen when she's in space or in awe, and letterboxes widescreen when her headspace starts thinking beyond the moment, beyond her control. There's also a couple extra-wide establishing shots that kind of muddy this whole idea. A lot of Letterboxd contributors seemed put off by the shifting and sliding aspect ratio. I can see how in the theatre it would be so overt, too much so, but on the smaller home screen it never gets too distracting, except those aforementioned ultra-wide shots which are so few they seem out of place. But part of the problem may be Hawley's used to TV where he has time to develop his visual language, and with this movie there's just not enough time, or perhaps not enough meat to the script to really affirm its use. I liked its effect overall but I don't think it really did exactly what the director wanted it to do.
Which, I guess, could pretty much be said for the whole picture. He wants to get into the headspace of this intelligent, gifted woman, to get away from the late night talk show jokes and find what truly drove her to this crazy banana pants obsessive man-crazy stalker. Acts one and two short us that Lucy came back from space not herself, and at times the characters in the film even vocalize reasons why this is, but Hawley takes Lucy's madness a bit too gradual over these first two acts and when she starts to become truly unhinged it ramps up really quickly, but it's not like a usual cinematic breaking point, and I think Hawley in trying to keep some semblance of reality made it more unrealistic. he should have went for something more daring, using his aspect ratio visual language to sell Lucy's breaking point and her subsequent delusional nature.
Portman holds the film adopting Holly Hunter's accent if not her usual warmth. It's a tough sell to make a character who is so detached from their own existence the central focus of a 2 hour movie, and to convey that detetchment honestly and make it engaging or entertaining. This film needed a bit of relief, and it got a bit of it out of Ellen Burstyn, but it could have gotten so much more out of Tig Notaro, Zazie Beets, Nick Offerman and Dan Stevens. Given the humour in Hawley's TV shows, it's surprisingly absent here,
It's not even close to the calamitous misfire some report it being, but it doesn't live up to the best of Hawley's TV work. I had much anticipation for this movie but after a middling to poor reception at TIFF last year, it basically got a buried release and then just disappeared.
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