Slingshot | Film Review

 

An astronaut (Casey Affleck) struggles to maintain his grip on reality while embarking on a potentially fatal mission.

This was a really random choice, as it wasn't something I heard much about before it came out, and I don't really love movies set in space. But I'm a fan of the actors involved so that was reason enough to check it out!

I liked this film more than I thought I was going to, but that doesn't mean it was that good!

The film kind of tells two stories, the one about what's happening in space with the crew (Affleck, Laurence Fishburne and Tomer Capone), and the past love story on Earth between John (Affleck) and Zoe (Emily Beecham). I was a lot more interested in the love story than the space story until the last maybe 30 minutes of the movie. I wanted to see so much more of it.

But in saying that, whether we're focused on the love story or the space story, none of the characters had enough chemistry. And while their performances were great, you don't believe their relationships as much as you need to.

Other than the acting, everything about the film is weak. The writing isn't as strong as it needs to be, and as a result everything else falls a bit flat.

You never really care about the characters, and again until the last 30 minutes you don't care about what's happening.

The last 30 minutes were really interesting and there was some great reveals, but the characters should have been developed a lot more to make us really care.

Overall, this was a really interesting idea but not executed in the best way.

5/10