This romantic comedy with a twist follows two college students as they join forces in order to be reunited with their significant others, embarking on a lively journey that takes them wildly... Read allThis romantic comedy with a twist follows two college students as they join forces in order to be reunited with their significant others, embarking on a lively journey that takes them wildly off course.This romantic comedy with a twist follows two college students as they join forces in order to be reunited with their significant others, embarking on a lively journey that takes them wildly off course.
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Moonshot comes to us from producer Greg Berlanti's Berlanti-Schechter Filmsin the second feature film produced for HBO Max following 2020's unpregnant. The movie is the first major release for director Chris Winterbauer and writer Max Taxe with Winterbauer's previous credits being mostly short films and a feature called Wyrm which appears to have never been released. On paper the film seems like an okay setup for a light sci-fi comedy romance film, but in execution it falls flat with two leads who don't fit as a couple despite the movie's attempt to make them.
Cole Sprouse plays Walt as a slacker who hasn't accomplished anything and somehow thinks going to Mars will fix all his problems. He meets a random girl, Ginny, at a party and takes this as "love" and uses it as an excuse to trick someone into helping him stowaway. Lana Condor plays Sophie who's tightly wound, abrasive, and condescending and seems and the character despite having more drive than Walt by comparison carries airs of superiority that honestly just grated on me. Both these characters are awful and their chemistry is virtually non-existent. At the relative "height" of their "romance" Walt and Sophie never feel like they go above mildly tolerating each other let alone romance especially in comparison to ancillary characters like Cameron Esposito's Tabby and Sunita Deshpande's Celeste who make you wonder "why are we not watching a movie about these two?".
Moonshot evokes the feel of a number of other similar movies with bits of Wall-E, Silent Running, or even more recent films like Love and Monsters and it just doesn't come anywhere close to the level of these movies you can't help but compare it to. Maybe if our two leads had the slightest bit of chemistry to them or endeared themselves, but they don't. Even in the third act nadir Sophie still has more chemistry with Calvin than with Walt and the movie wants us to root for Sophie and Walt as a couple. The one element I can say kind of worked was Zach Braff as space entrepreneur Leon Kovi whose whole gimmick basically boils down to laughing at how much of an idiot Walt is and his turning Walt into an interstellar punchline by Memeing while a little pandering was probably the high point of the humor in this movie which probably speaks to how inert the humor truly is. There are also some moments of visual wonder and genuine awe in the movie tat almost work, but most of the time the setting isn't fully exploited and it might as well be a cruise ship for all it effects the plot.
Moonshot is not good. It features two unlikable characters portrayed by actors with no chemistry and pales in comparison to similarly themed films that are better. Zach Braff's brief performance at the end was kind of entertaining and there's individual moments that almost work, but this is one you can skip without missing much.
Moonshot is definitely tailored for young viewers, and in that sense it is entertaining, funny, and cute. I found the beginning to be weird or slow, but once they get into space things start to pick up. I also thought the chemistry could be better between the two, as some romantic scenes felt too forced. But they are meant to be a quirky and 'different' couple from most romcom couples, and I thought they were able to pull that off together.
Among the hilarity, Moonshot primarily featured some light drama centered on two young people trying to figure out who they are and what they want to be, culminating with Walt giving Sophie advice about her relationship with another Mars-dwelling Dude. If properly executed and written, it would be a good starting point. However, the film tries to combine two genres by juxtaposing lightly combative banter and forced tender moments against Ikea Basics Spaceship backdrops, which, despite establishing a more cheery and optimistic tone than the usual austere dystopian-future fodder, feels like two ideas crudely stapled together. After seeing this, I honestly believe that Wall E and EVE had more chemistry and a better storyline than this film and lead casts.
In short, if you have nothing to do and nothing to watch one evening, you can stream it. Because- Moonshot appears to be a different kind of rom-com, but it tells the same old story. For me, it is only a one-time watch film.
Did you know
- TriviaThe board game being played by Sophie's family while on Mars is Terraforming Mars, a real game released in 2016.
- Quotes
Leon Kovi: You remind me of a young me, Walt. Emotionally, that is. Intellectually, it's more of an apples to... whatever a much smarter fruit is. What's a smarter fruit, Walt?
Walt: Papaya?
Leon Kovi: Papaya! Yes! I'm the papaya. Do you know why the papaya came to Mars, Walt?
Walt: Taxes?
Leon Kovi: No, no. I'm a billionaire, Walt. I don't pay taxes.
- ConnectionsFeatured in Half in the Bag: Moonfall (2022)
- SoundtracksGet Away
Written by Bart van Dalen and Danique van Kesteren
Performed by Donna Blue
Courtesy of Snowstar Records
By arrangement with The Greater Goods Co.
- How long is Moonshot?Powered by Alexa
Details
- Runtime1 hour 44 minutes
- Color
- Sound mix
- Aspect ratio
- 2.39 : 1