THE EMPIRE
F*ck me, if there’s one thing Drew Goddard is gonna do, it’s write a great script.
If you don’t know who he is, he’s worked on a few things. Lost. Buffy The Vampire Slayer. The Cabin In The Woods. Daredevil. Oh, and a film called The Martian. Why does that one matter? Andy Weir wrote the book that the film adapts. And Goddard adapted his most recent book, Project Hail Mary, once again.
Directed by Phil Lord and Christopher Miller, Project Hail Mary is about precisely that. Throwing a ‘Hail Mary’ and hoping it lands. By all accounts, that’s every decision in the story. Every choice a character makes is a ‘Hail Mary’.
“Will this path I choose, lead to the best outcome?”
The film does well to build on the weight of these. The film shows Ryan Gosling as ‘Dr. Ryland Grace’ through flashbacks and flashforwards. This reflects the outcomes of both past and present. And it also presents the journey he takes at the same time. Somewhat amnesiac at the opening of the film, by the end you’ll wonder which identity he has come to share his own self-image with most.
Lord and Miller go balls-to-the-wall, embracing all things practical. NoFilmSchool drop a great riff on this. “I think that if you’re given over $100 million to make your movie, you should always be looking at ways to do things with practical effects”. And Project Hail Mary is evidence of this. It feels real. Gosling feels like he’s in space. Meeting rocks. And saving the Earth. That lacklustre fake sheen removed from the movie, simply because they tried to make as much of it as real as possible.
Throw in a solid soundtrack, with wonderfully tuned picks for the right moments, then Project Hail Mary could be the first great film of 2026. Dripping in hope, laughs and IV bags full of vodka. It deserves to be seen on the biggest screen you can find.
100 - 10
10
Turn your brain off, because this movie will do the thinking for you. Oozing sci-fi, great jokes and your new favorite rock, Project Hail Mary is a stellar start to 2026's cinematic calendar!
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