Don't Look Up (2021)

[Greg]

Ah, biting satire. How I've missed you. A comet is about to destroy the earth. But rather than bringing people together, the crisis divides the country along political lines. Sound familiar? One side wants to do everything they can to stop the comet. The other side thinks it's a hoax. Plus there is a heavy undertone of how social media drives our discussions. It's all a frothy mix with a great cast. Leonardo DiCaprio and Jennifer Lawrence play the scientists who discovered the comet and must tell the president. The president is played by Meryl Streep with Jonah Hill as her son/Chief of Staff. Ron Perlman is the racist tasked with blowing up the comet. Mark Rylance is the Zuckerberg/Steve Jobs wunderkind who has a new phone app that will make you happy. Rylance also bought himself a president. And then there is Ariana Grande playing a pop star acting out her life on TV. Cate Blanchett and Tyler Perry play the hosts of a Morning Joe type show where Blanchett has to play dumb blonde so as not to make the men afraid.

Much like the movie, people are in two camps about this film. I think if you swing liberal, you'll enjoy the skewering of society. Conservatives aren't going to like it.

No sword fights.

[Drunk Monk]

I found myself identifying with Jlaw the most. Maybe it was because she began as more druggie. 

It took me a bit to recognize Cate to her credit. She won me over again here but I’ve been crushing on her for years. Leo, Mark, Ariana, Tyler were all good - especially Rylance who nailed what he was doing with being a cheap impersonation of Zuck/Jobs/Musk et.al. I even liked Jonah who I usually dislike. Meryl has gone so caricature lately but it works fine here. This was so much about the cast.

Some unexpectedly predictable beats but enjoyable overall. A bit longwinded at nearly Bollywood time (some of the beautiful earth pic could have been cut as well as the end of credit scenes). 

Some sharp satire, reminiscent of The Big Short. Smart and severe but we need that now.

There’s a lot of buzz that this is about climate change but I felt it was more about the state of media and capitalism, plus political divisiveness. It’s Meteor for the 20s. Wasn’t there another asteroid hits earth movie around that time too? 

I concur with Greg’s review. I’ll add D00M recommended because I don’t think there are any conservatives left in D00M now that LB is dead. Are there?

[Greg]

Deep Impact hit at the same time as Armageddon.

I really liked Cate. So many layers to her character. She had the most fascinating backstory but had to play dumb so as to be accepted. I wonder if this is the film Blanchett did instead of playing Lucy on "Being the Ricardos"?

[Drunk Monk]

Ah. I knew you’d know. Quite right, quite right.

Cate stole the show for me although JLaw was great too, and Leo and Mark. I suspect it was this that made Cate decline Lucy and that’s just as well. She can play Bob Dylan but I dunno about Lucy. Cate is still smokin hawt in her 50s.

The final banquet scene was really well done. That has stuck with me this morning after.

[thatguy]

I thought Rylance was particularly good. I picked Cate out immediately, but she's a chameleon. Great performance... what's with Tim Chalamet? He seems to be popping up everywhere. 

--tg

[Drunk Monk]

Agreed on Rylance. He nailed something about all those tech gurus. 

I still haven't seen Dune so it took me a while to put together who Tim was. But I figured he was significant when he got to snog JLaw...

[Greg]

He seems to be the flavor of the month at the moment.

[Drunk Monk]

Watched this again with Stacy after I recommended it (it was probably all the buzz that convinced her more than me). She enjoyed it - laughed a lot. It’s good on the 2nd viewing but not a revelation there were a few foreshadowing details I missed but not many. I did spot a blooper with Jonah’s man purse. It appears in the end credits and in the post credit scene but it couldn’t be in both places.

[Drunk Monk]

Stacy had this uncanny commentary while we watched this. At one point, she said something to the affect of what happened to Rylance’s character? His next appearance happened just as she finished her question. Then she postulated that this would end with it just going black. She was off on that one but the screen did go black immediately after for a moment at which point I accused her of watching it beforehand to mess with me. I swear sometimes I feel like Darrin trying to come up with the next sales campaign (for nunchucks) whilst Samantha is off doing witchy stuff.