Home Show Ad Astra

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Watch great shows right here on the Vocal Now Network, and of which we are one. Welcome. Because it's time for another home show.
Number 487 for those of you playing the home game. My name is Rob, I'm the executive producer of the Clubhouse Podcast, and when I was a kid, especially in elementary school, all I wanted to do was be an astronaut. That was the only thing I wanted to do in life.
As we all know, they probably didn't quite work out that way, but it's okay. But I'm not alone for this particular episode. Joining me is the official fact checker of Sooner or Gator Productions, and a man who thinks a lot of things are out of this world. You may know him as Igboonu, but his mama name I'm Don Ford, I'm a calm Don Ford, hey brother.
There is extra terrestrial life, I'll put money on it. Because back in 1984, we saw you a phone Wyoming. Me, my uncle, my dad, and my cousin, and to this day, we still test to it. And if we could go to the moon, there's other life forms that could come here.
Well, if it's as they said in contact, if we're not alone, it's an awful big waste of space.
Exactly. Whatever we do one of these, it is to review something. This is no exception. James Gray, co-writes, and directs a brand new movie called Ad Astra.
So we start the soul thing? Yes, we've got to think Josh and our best friends. All I did in a great and marketing. We love our vendors. They let us see movies and stuff early so we can talk to you guys about them, and you can make the best possible choices for your entertainment dollar.
So here's how this works. Brad Pitt plays really big bride. He works for space command, basically the military. It's something not so distant future.
And he does his job. He's good at his job. One day he's working on a space station and a bunch of energy flares happen from deep space.
That end up killing thousands of people around the world. Bad news. Bad news. So Roy is also kind of an absentee husband to Eve played by love Tyler.
And he's pulled into a very top secret meeting with very top secret people who basically tell him he needs to go to Mars because they think that these power surges are coming from a spacecraft out by Neptune that disappeared 17 years ago.
Oh, by the way happens to have been captain by his father. They think that's a lot of space for the last 17 years stayed by the great Tommy Lee Jones. So he has to go to Mars to transmit a message to him to try to bring him home and we can fix this whole thing.
And it is in the future like you said, and they actually have colonies on the moon. They have colonies on the Mars on Mars. He has to go to the moon first and then to Mars to get there.
But it goes a little bit deeper than that and then we'll just leave that where it is. I think there's going to be a lot of people that go to this film if they don't listen to our podcast or read our reviews at www dot the clubhousepodcast.com. That's our website that may go into this with a bit of a different vibe than I think it's supposed to be throwing down.
Because just today because I've been on vacation this week. I've been watching a lot of TV getting caught up on a lot of things and especially seeing the ads for this film and the trailers that are out there.
They kind of pitch this movie a little bit different than I think it actually is because it makes it look like it's this sweeping space epic action film and it's really, really not.
There is action. Oh, yes, there is. But it's not it's not the dominant factor of this film and there is a lot of space travel in this, of course.
It is billed on the MDib as adventure drama. Close. But I think this is more of a dramatic piece than it is. I think I want to put those words towards in the reverse order.
Drama than adventure because there is an adventure piece of this like we said, but it's not it's not a sci-fi film per se.
It's not a Star Wars or something like that. The way I the way I pitched it was if Kubrick had directed apocalypse now in space.
Good way. I like that. That's the best way I could put it. And I think if you go into it with that mind frame, it might work out a little bit better for you.
We were very fortunate to be in a press only screening in an iMacs auditorium, which talk about membership haven't its privileges.
That's why we love allied. We love all our vendors. That was a great job. This is a solid two hours.
This is the second Brad Pitt movie in a row. I don't know about you, but I'm still trying to figure out exactly what I watched between this and once upon a time in Hollywood.
Okay, you're bringing that's the one you're talking about. Yes. This is the second Brad Pitt movie we watched in a row in the last six weeks.
I can't say I didn't like this film because I enjoyed it. I thought it's a very richly told story. I just...
I'm glad I went into this as cold as I did because if I had watched a bunch of trailers and stuff going in, I'm not sure that I would have enjoyed it on the level that I did.
Now again, not going to be in my top ten of the year. Oh, no. Nor years if I'm not mistaken. No, no.
No, no. But it's not going to be the bottom ten either. Would you agree with that or would you not?
This is one of those conflicting movies. I'm right there with you.
Because there are some things I love about it, which I put in my written review at www.clubhousepodcast.com.
That is still our website. The visuals on this are beautiful.
Agree 100%.
It made you feel like you were there. What point did you go, hey, when did we get a studio on the moon?
Yeah, exactly. Because they really colonize it. I mean, it's in the future. We don't know how far, but it's more than five years from now.
And the title of the film, I believe, is Latin and it's two the stars. It's like that translates to.
And there's colonies on bars, there's colonies. So it's in the distant future. But when the moon scene, like with the chase on the moon scene, it's all I'm going to say.
Which they show a little bit of that in the trailer, but not very much.
Yeah, but that scene there being spoiler free. But obviously there's, you know, space and all that.
The that chasing on the moon felt like you were literally on the moon. It looks great.
Because all the footage you seen of like Armstrong and all the other astronauts on the on the moon.
It they really made that look like you were there. And when they go over a certain area where it's now, it's pitch black. That's the way it is.
I would that's one of the very few things in the last few years. I would like to see a feature at on how they actually put all that together.
Because that looked amazing. The Marsles really good. Not as great as the moon, but what blew me away was the Neptune stuff.
Absolutely. Great. When they go through the rings, but look, the coloring, Neptune, the beautiful, that kind of blue purple.
And I was going, this, this is like realistic. I love the visuals. And I max really enhanced that.
Oh, yes, absolutely.
Another thing I really loved about this film is, yes, there are things wrong that is scientifically impossible, which I put in my review again.
But I love how the movie, the, the Martian with Matt Damon, Matt Damon show the dangers of space travel in a way.
But this one really did like that one scene where they had a little scuff and they propel and you, yeah, this really shows that space travel can be dangerous too.
For what we know of it. I mean, you have to give yourself a little bit of suspension of disbelief to this.
But you would think like you watch this and you go, you know, the logic sound like that one scene went all of a sudden.
Yeah, the air pressure.
Yeah, and so space travel, yeah, it'd be great to go into space, but they tell these astronauts, like they gave Armstrong and Aldrin and all those guys, they gave them suicide pills.
Oh, absolutely.
Just in case something happens, hey, and you're going out to space, we don't want to have a horrific death of you being in space for 18 days without food or water and all of a sudden you're going to die that horrible death.
So they're, you know, it shows the dangers of space travel, which I really enjoyed also.
But there were some suspension of disbelief, which I'll kind of tell you off air.
Okay.
But here's the thing.
I looked at my phone and I rarely ever pull out my phone during a screening, which I appreciate.
Yeah.
And I put it down real low just to see what time it was when a certain thing happened.
Okay.
The first 90 minutes was basically just a trip.
That's it.
I can see how you say it was just it started off kind of good like the scene from way up high as I'm going to say.
Getting to the moon was good, but it's just like he's just taking a trip.
That's the first 90 minutes.
And then the last 30 got real kind of I understand the dramatic is the best way to all put it in the.
The issues of relationships I'll say right to be spoiler free.
But it's just like I didn't get the payoff out of it.
It was just boring, boring, boring, boring in 90 minute.
I'm going to Neptune.
Woo.
That's 90 minutes.
The first 90 minutes.
I could see how you'd say that to me.
It was more about studying Roy and who he was and how he came to be who he was.
And with the possibility of his father still being alive.
All of a sudden really what he may be alive.
Knowing that he had to come to grips with his father disappearing when he was a kid literally and not paying attention to him.
And find out there might be a different truth now.
So if you think your dad is dead and now it's possibly alive, you're like whoa.
And there's a whole lot of there's a lot of layers to that.
Yeah.
And there's also a lot of ancillary character because really this is the bread pits movie where everybody else.
I mean, and I'll give you Tommy Lee Jones, but you've got people in this like Ruth Nega from Loving.
And she was also on Agents of Shield.
You had Donald Sutherland.
Natasha Lee Yone has a small role in this, which was weird.
Good cast.
Kimberly at least has a small role in this.
And all of the and live Tyler, of course, they're all very small parts that could be kind of throw away roles.
But they do, but they all play their part to keep his journey moving.
Yeah.
And I think that's, that was the intention by this film.
Now, when you look at James Gray, this is a guy that a couple of years ago,
directed a film called The Lost City of Zed, which we watched at the Dallas International.
You watched the idea.
And you hated it.
This is a huge improvement.
I can say that.
But I could definitely, like I said, at the top of this, I can see how people would go into this.
And this not be what they thought it was.
If you take it for what it actually is, I think it's a little bit easier to digest.
Because we're coming out of, excuse me, we're coming out of the summer movie season.
Yeah.
So we've spent the last four months blowing stuff up and shooting lasers and aliens coming to earth.
And all of these big, budget, big movies, then you get to something like this.
And it's just a little bit different.
And I think this is, I think there might be a lot of people are going to leave this film disappointed, unfortunately.
Because like you're saying, from the trailers, they're going to come in thinking it's this kind of film.
And that might be the bait and switch of the trailer.
And they're going to come out thinking, what was that?
A lot of people are just, I don't know.
And the thing that bugged me, it just that the narration by pit,
the thought narration reminded me of Christian bail and Knight of cups in a song to song.
And it reminded me of a malloc film.
And this is where the apocalypse now part of it came to me because that was a lot of what apocalypse now was.
Was Martin Sheen's inner dialogue.
And I'm a big fan of inner dialogue because it gives you more depth.
And because again, this is really a character piece for Roy.
It really gave me a deeper understanding of who he was.
Well, it does that.
Yeah, I understand that if you didn't say nothing, I see why they kind of did it.
But it just, I think it got too much and they had talk for talk safe.
And it got to the point where you remind me of a malloc film, unfortunately.
And this, this budget was 80 to 100 million.
Okay.
That's good for what I think the CGI was.
That was probably a good chunk of it.
Yeah.
I'm surprised.
I thought I'd be honored.
And I also read this week that, you know, again, Brad Pitt to me has, especially this year,
he has really become the Robert Redford of my generation.
He is really, I mean, he has really come into his own,
but I read an article this week that said he is not going to be doing any lobbying himself for any awards.
He's not pitching himself at all.
Okay.
Part of me wonders if this comes off the success,
especially come award season for a film called Gravity a few years ago.
Loved it.
But I think this one also can stand on its own.
This is just one of those films that it has an audience,
but I don't know that it's a mass audience, if that makes any sense.
Yeah.
I think it's trying to be in a way like you're seeing Gravity,
but it falls short big time.
I love that one.
That was a great film.
Those are great films of the year.
Because it really showed the dangers of space travel well and was very realistic.
But yeah, I guess that a file analysis.
Yeah.
Alright, the way we do the file analysis on this show,
we're not going to give you a thumbs up, thumbs down, letters, numbers,
planet rings, anything like that.
We're going to ask up to two questions.
Question number one is, would we see this film again?
If the answers no, then we're done here.
But if the answers yes, the follow up question is going to be how far will we be willing to go to do so?
From the best of the best of the worst of the best, here's how it works.
Full price at a theater, down to a twilight, down to a matinee, down to an early morning,
down to the second run of the dollar theater, down to going somewhere to obtain a physical
copy, down to streaming, down to cable.
Don, would you see Ad Astra again?
Yes.
Alright, I already know what your answer is, so you just tell me.
Well, the only thing that saves it from the no was the visuals, so get the cricket
trip to get the least, the bottom of the spectrum, the barely above a no because of the visuals.
I will also say I'd see this again.
I'm going to go a little bit above you.
I would say if you've got a decent home theater system, I would say either stream it or
rent a copy of it, because it's beautiful to look at.
Oh, yeah.
It's just not.
That's one of those movies for guys who like movies kind of things.
It's a thing.
Yeah, it was just another second one.
That was just too, so.
But it is co-written and directed by James Gray.
It is Ad Astra for in a soul thing.
Yes, I think Josh and our best friends, Alan integrated market.
We love our vendors.
They let us see movies earlier so we can talk to you guys about them and you can make
the best possible decisions for your entertainment dollar.
Let's do the plugs.
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So until next time, for Don and the Empire, I'm Rob.
Clubhouse is closed.
You don't get Brittany Palmer in this.
She can be, you know, she can help on the space station.
I think you hear me.