A film review by Craig J. Koban December 31, 2020

THE MIDNIGHT SKY

2020, PG-13, 122 mins.

George Clooney as Augustine  /  Felicity Jones as Sully  /  Kyle Chandler as Mitchell  /  Demián Bichir as Sanchez  /  David Oyelowo as Adewole

ORIGINAL FILM

To say that George Clooney the director has had a problematic and inconsistent career would be apt.  

Nearly twenty years ago I thought he made one of the best films of 2002 in his rookie filmmaking debut with the biographical spy thriller CONFESSIONS OF THE DANGEROUS MIND and followed that up with the fine newsroom historical drama GOOD NIGHT, AND GOOD LUCK.  He unfortunately followed that up with the forgettable period sports comedy LEATHERHEADS later that decade.  After a solid return to form with the political drama THE IDES OF MARCH to begin the last decade, Clooney then went creatively downhill with MONUMENT'S MEN and, most recently, SUBURBICON, both of which seemed equally lacking in focus and discipline. It was at this point when I started to have serious doubts again about his work behind the camera, especially after showing such unbridled promise early on. 

This brings me to his latest endeavor, a lavishly budgeted and stunningly produced post-apocalyptic sci-fi drama in THE MIDNIGHT SKY, adapted from the novel GOOD MORNING, MIDNIGHT by Lily Brooks-Dalton.  Considering his past directorial indiscretions, it's quite wonderful and refreshing to see Clooney tackle material outside of his comfort window (even though this was financed by Netflix and will largely be seen on the small screen via the platform, Clooney seems commendably focused to deliver a big screen worthy entertainment here).  There's absolutely no question in my mind that THE MIDNIGHT SKY utterly dwarfs anything the director has previously attempted, and the $100-plus budget is on screen and shows what kind of polished ambition he has with trying something new.  That, and the film tries - as all great, contemplative sci-fi achieves - to be more about tone, mood, ideas, and characters as opposed to favoring action and mayhem.  Still, THE MIDNIGHT SKY is a semi-wonky effort from Clooney that sometimes comes off as dramatically sterile and feeling like it were made up of multiple parts of far better sci-fi extravaganzas.  Nevertheless, Clooney deserves props for dreaming big with this production and delivering in many respects. 

And, to be sure, it's a real treat to see Clooney return in front of the camera in a lead role after a four year absence.  He plays a futuristic cancer afflicted scientist named Augustine, who in the BLADE RUNNER-Y year of 2049 is stationed in a massive observatory and research station in the middle of the Arctic Circle.  A cataclysmic event...know as "The Event" (and largely unexplained in the story) has ravaged most of the planet, leaving him to potentially be one of the last people on Earth.  Dealing with that hellish prospect would be bad enough for most men, but Augustine also faces a tortuous medical routine to deal with his advancing cancer, and he knows that his own days are limited despite The Event.  As far as he knows, the only other humans that might be safe and sound are those not on the planet, but rather on the interstellar spaceship Aether, which is on its way back to Earth.  Augustine makes it his mission to contact the vessel and warn them not to come home. 

The astronauts on board Aether are, of course, none the wiser about their planet essentially dying, which is greatly complicated by the fact that all radio communication with Earth has failed.  The scientists on board - Sully (Felicity Jones), Tom (David Oyelowo), Sanchez (Demian Bichir), Mitchell (Kyle Chandler) and Maya (Tiffany Boone) - have located a safe and inhabitable planet that could sustain life for all of humanity, but there man not be any people left for this planet after the worldwide ecological disaster of The Event.  As the film segues back and forth from Earth to space we learn that some of the few surviving people that were working and living on Augustine's station were evacuated, but he decided to remain to try to contact Aether.  His mission is severely complicated with the appearance of Iris (Caoilinn Springall), and young mute girl that was apparently and accidentally left behind.  Realizing that he now has to keep himself and this child alive - and the fact that his station is ill equipped to contact Aether - Augustine decides to suit himself and Iris up to brace the hellishly cold journey to the nearest weather station in hopes of securing contact there...and hopefully before The Event decimates what's left of the Arctic. 

Of the things that I liked in THE MIDNIGHT SKY one of them would have to be Clooney himself, who has arguably never played such a physically broken down and frail character in a film in his career.  Clooney seems to have embraced the fact that he's quickly approaching 60 and is wisely taking roles that play more up to his advancing years, and Augustine is no exception.  Clooney seems deeply committed to the part and is superb, and he also has some nice, unforced chemistry with young Springhall.  Much of their relationship is verbally one sided (she never seems to speak), but they have a bond via their mutual need to survive at whatever cost.  There's also genuine angst and heartache with these poor, doomed souls, and the script by Mark L. Smith is quite solid at relaying Augustine's intense sense of despair that he must subvert when partnered with the child, realizing that he has to be a strong anchor for both of them while facing the frigid landscapes that they must navigate through to make it to their destination. 

Clooney also crafts a handful of stunningly realized sequences that are arguably as masterful as any he's attempted.  In particular, I admired many of the sequences in the outdoors, which seems like a combination of (by the director's own admission) practical location shooting and VFX augmentation.  There's an enthralling and scary escape sequence featuring Augustine and Iris attempting to escape from a makeshift shelter outside that's about to be swallowed up by broken ice and frozen water.  There are also some stellar space sequences featuring the Aether crew, one of which involves them making much needed repairs in space that will have definitive visual echoes of GRAVITY (that coincidentally starred Clooney).  Cinematographer Martin Ruhe finds many visually arresting ways to frame these two vastly different settings and environments while somehow managing to make them feel mutually tied together.  Cross cutting between both sometimes feels fluid and other times a bit messy, to be sure, and this has the negative side effect of reducing the pacing to sluggish extremes (this is not assisted either by multiple flashback montages featuring a young Augustine - thanklessly not shown as a digitally de-aged Clooney - that are sprinkled in and never feel germane to the main thrust of the film until much later on).   

Here's the main issue, though, with THE MIDNIGHT SKY.  I rarely felt anything for these characters and their plight.  The performances are terrific, but something just seems to be off from allowing us to make meaningful dramatic connections with this group of separated characters in space and on the ground.  Beyond that, THE MIDNIGHT SKY seems to be borrowing liberally from many films more than it perhaps thinks it is, leading to a sensation of disappointing creative deja vu.  The plight of Augustine and Iris feels like a winterized version of THE ROAD, whereas this Arctic stations in the middle of nowhere and with inhospitable dangers lurking everywhere feels akin to THE THING.  Throw in some THE MARTIAN and, as mentioned, GRAVITY and THE MIDNIGHT SKY occasionally seems light on innovation.  Everything builds to a would-be shocking and melancholic twist ending that is maybe tipped off a bit too aggressively by those aforementioned flashbacks into Augustine's life.  I didn't necessarily hate this bit of audience manipulation, but the revelations made here do come off as a bit of a tacked on cheat.