Approaching the Unknown

I was told that this movie was going to be better than Gravity. Man, that's big shoes to fill and Approaching the Unknown could not fill them. For the most part, the film is total propaganda for all of us who support getting to Mars. In that sense, the film has a great concept.

Mark Strong plays an astronaut who willingly signed up for a one way trip to Mars not just so that he could get to Mars, but so that we as a whole can finally get to Mars.

It will appeal to you regardless, if you are a fan of the recent campaigns to go to Mars, but I need to warn you, if you heard the same rumor that this was as good as Gravity, it's not at all.

The story is exciting but the film making is not. I don't want to judge the filmmakers harshly on what is a low budget film with some cool art direction (I did like the space suit Strong wears), but this movie does nothing with the little they had.

All the actors in it who also include Luke Wilson and Sanaa Lathan seem to be phoning in their performances, this may have a lot to do with the bad writing to a cool story. The movie counts on a lot of dialogue that is not that interesting and puts me to sleep.

Mark Strong in Approaching the Unknown is not as interesting to watch for 90mins as Matt Damon in the Martian for over two hours. It's pretty much the same film in a lot of ways, but Strong, who I like, was not as charismatic and could not grasps me enough to keep me interesting.

I'm on the same boat as Approaching the Unknown as I would love to see Mars even if it means never coming back to Earth, and I wished this movie was better, but it's boring.

I actually loved this film, the great sense of emptiness and solitude and of the austerity of the inside of the space craft. The photography was beautifully done and really captured the mood; That sense of total isolation really came through. The allure of outer space, like any expedition, is the means to counter the technological conundrums presented and a space film presents the possibility of infinite fascination with a world we don't know and the ability to utilise technology to perform a successful expedition. This film fails miserably in an area where it was most important not to and even an 'F' student in a high school would have spotted the anomalies. You can't derive oxygen and hydrogen from dirt, it;s a silicate. Even if you could then the resultant re-combining of oxygen and hydrogen presents the same kind of instability as a weapons grade bomb. Where was all the dirt stored? Why not store more water? Secondly, in a complex space craft, surely someone remembered to install breakers or even fuses! The gyroscope was almost as incongruous as a wind up gramaphone; computers do all the guidance. Whywas the battery which was only intermittently shorted, bleeding redstuff into the water? Why did the rocket lose four boosters between theground and earths upper atmosphere- they just weren't there any more?Why was Stanaforth sent into the desert with untested equipment. Whywas he called Stanaforth, its a stupid and unconvincing name. Why wasmark strong compelled to speak with that generic mid-western Americanaccent, he was useless at it and I like him as an actor. It's all toobad as the film was visually stunning but letdown by appalling scienceand plain bad screen writing. I hate it when something so potentially brilliant is ruined by slapdash research and poor writing; this film was truly worth more than that and should be remade with the problem areas addressed. Lastly; the title is lame.

This movie is unbelievably terrible! All scientific facts are wrong and the story is excruciatingly trivial and stupid!

This movie is good. I honestly understand the bad rating, because its not mainstream and you need to understand the "zen-spirit" of it.You need to have sensitivity and some wisdom to appreciate a movie like this.Its atmospheric and poetic.Lets you experience space from an angle of basic reality and not heroism nor action.

The slow descend into madness, his monologues, it is good.

A good story isn't about a lot of action, a lot of events, it lies in the subtleties and how they come together.

Just a good movie. I guess, blade runner also had a bad reception when it was released. This movie is perhaps not meant for this generation of action spoiled viewers. I really hope this will get some appreciation along the line, so that we may see more of this quality. Real sci-fi fans will love this movie for what it is.

I can see why 'Approaching the Unknown' would not be to everyone's liking. It's very much a slow-burner of a film and is really more of a character study than anything else. With space movies I think people have come to expect drama filled, save-the-world type films and this is simply not that. This is the story of a man who has embarked on a mission that very few people on Earth would be brave enough to do, and the struggle he consequently went through.

I actually quite enjoyed it for the most part. A film with basically only one character is never going to be the most exhilarating watch, however the pacing of the film doesn't feel overly slow. Mark Strong in the lead role does a good job of being just interesting enough in what would have been a very tough role to take on.

As mentioned, this won't be for everyone. People who go into this expecting an 'Armegeddon' or even 'Gravity' type film are going to be let down and I suspect that is a lot of the reason why this film has not been received very well. However if you go in simply expecting a solid exploration of astronaut life and the challenges they can go through mentally, I think you will find yourself quite enjoying this one.