Interstellar
Posted: Tue Feb 28, 2023 10:47 pm
The Most Dangerous Story Ever Told: Ecological Collapse, Progress, and Human Destiny by John Halstead
was just thinking of this and i came across an article a while back after it came out. John Halstead explains a little about the problematic nature of the movie(moreso in its themes and messaging about environmental damage-what our responses should be to it). i used to like this movie when it came to most "hard" sci-fi films that i had on my list, still good to watch every now and then- but always felt there was something that bugged me about this besides the lackluster theme of "love saving us all" and the deus ex machina asspull plot point of Coop going to the black-hole and being the higher-dimensional entity that ultimately gave his daughter Murph(in basics the second half of the movie)the opportunity for saving the entirety of the human race.
this scene in particular illustrated to me that this movie was not about enlightening it's audience in regards to the perils of space travel-but meant to embolden and tell a tale of hope-it's a movie after all, some liberties are obviously gonna be taken but i still find some problematic philosophies when it comes to what Christopher Nolan has put out in here.
the female teacher in this scene- while she's obviously wrong about the fact that we didn't go to the moon(most folks who think otherwise are most likely disingenuous or ignorant of the work that went into getting there); she's not necessarily wrong about the fact that teaching people tales of leaving this planet for greener pastures with the "advanced" technology is a dangerous way of thinking in terms of how we view our environment, not as something to be cherished or taken care of- but a tool to use and extract before eventually throwing it away. it sucks that the one person who was on to something- has to be painted with a luddite/history revisionist bias.
we can distract ourselves with stories of humanity becoming more advanced and prospering in this society as our reality starts to close in on us, but i do have to wonder if there is a deus ex machina event out there similar to that mysteriously placed black hole by the bulk beings in interstellar- or something entirely different.