Interstellar (film)  

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Interstellar is a 2014 science fiction film directed by Christopher Nolan. Starring Matthew McConaughey, Anne Hathaway, Jessica Chastain, Mackenzie Foy, John Lithgow and Michael Caine, the film features a team of astronauts who travel through a wormhole in search of a new home for humanity. Brothers Christopher and Jonathan Nolan wrote the film, merging a script Jonathan developed in 2007 with Christopher's ideas. Christopher Nolan produced the film with his wife, Emma Thomas, and Lynda Obst. Theoretical physicist Kip Thorne, whose work inspired the film, acted as scientific consultant and executive producer.

Warner Bros., Paramount Pictures, and Legendary Pictures co-financed the film, while Syncopy and Lynda Obst Productions served as production companies. Nolan hired cinematographer Hoyte van Hoytema and shot the film on anamorphic 35 mm and IMAX 70 mm photography. Filming commenced in late 2013 in Alberta, Canada; Iceland; and Los Angeles. The film features an extensive use of practical and miniature effects, while Double Negative created additional visual effects digitally.

Interstellar premiered on October 26, 2014, in Los Angeles and received wide release worldwide. In North America, it was released in film stock to theaters still equipped to project the format, before expanding to venues using digital projectors. It has been a box office success and has received generally positive reviews from critics, who gave particular attention to the film's scientific accuracy, storyline, Hans Zimmer's musical score, Nolan's direction, visual effects, and performances, particularly from McConaughey, Foy, Hathaway, Irwin, and Chastain. It also received a positive reaction from viewers.

Plot

In the future, crop blight has caused civilization to regress into a failing agrarian society. Former NASA pilot Cooper runs a farm with his father-in-law, his teenage son, and his 10-year-old daughter Murphy. Murphy believes her room is haunted by a ghost trying to communicate with her. She and Cooper discover the "ghost" is an unknown intelligence sending coded messages using gravitational waves, leaving binary coordinates in the dust that direct them to a secret NASA installation led by Professor John Brand. Brand reveals that a wormhole, created by an alien intelligence, leads to new planets that may offer hope for survival. NASA's "Lazarus missions" have identified three potentially habitable worlds orbiting the black hole Gargantua: Miller, Edmunds, and Mann, named after the astronauts who surveyed them. Brand recruits Cooper to pilot the spacecraft Endurance to recover the astronauts' data; if one of the planets is habitable, humanity will follow on space stations. Cooper's departure devastates Murphy, and they part on bad terms.

On Endurance, Cooper joins Brand's daughter, biologist Amelia; scientists Romilly and Doyle; and robots TARS and CASE. They enter the wormhole and head to Miller, but discover the planet is so close to Gargantua that it experiences severe gravitational time dilation: each hour on the surface is seven years on Earth. They descend to the planet, which proves inhospitable as it is covered by a shallow ocean roiled by enormous tidal waves. As Amelia attempts to recover Miller's data, a wave hits, killing Doyle and delaying the shuttle's departure. When Cooper and Amelia return to Endurance, 23 years have passed.

On Earth, the adult Murphy is now a NASA scientist assisting Brand with the equation that will enable NASA to launch its massive space stations via gravity. On his deathbed, Brand admits he already solved the problem and determined the project is impossible; he covered up his findings and put his faith in a "Plan B": using fertilized embryos to start humanity anew. However, Murphy concludes that Brand's equation could work with additional data from a black hole's singularity.

Low on fuel, Endurance can only visit one more planet before returning to Earth. After a tense vote, the team selects Mann's planet, as Mann is still transmitting. However, they find it to be icy and inhospitable; Mann always knew Plan B was the mission's true goal, and faked data about his planet's viability so Endurance would rescue him. Mann breaks Cooper's spacesuit visor and leaves him to die, and flees to Endurance on a shuttle; Romilly is killed by a bomb Mann set to protect his secret. Amelia rescues Cooper on the other shuttle, and they arrive at Endurance in time to witness Mann docking improperly. The airlock explodes, killing Mann and causing serious damage, but Cooper uses the shuttle to get Endurance under control.

Nearly out of fuel, Cooper and Amelia plan to slingshot Endurance around Gargantua on a course toward Edmunds. TARS and Cooper detach into the black hole, sacrificing themselves to collect data on the singularity and to propel Amelia by dropping the ship's mass. They emerge in an extra-dimensional "tesseract", where time appears as a spatial dimension and portals show glimpses of Murphy's childhood bedroom at various times. Cooper realizes the alien beings have constructed this space so he can communicate with Murphy and save humanity. Using gravitational waves, Cooper encodes TARS's data on the singularity into the adult Murphy's watch, allowing her to solve Brand's equation and evacuate Earth. Cooper awakens years later aboard a NASA space station and reunites with the now elderly Murphy, who has led humanity's exodus. Murphy advises Cooper and TARS to search for Amelia, who has begun preparations on Edmunds's planet.

Cast

Astronaut crew

• Matthew McConaughey as Cooper, a widowed astronaut
• Anne Hathaway as Amelia Brand, the daughter of Professor Brand
• David Gyasi as Romilly
• Wes Bentley as Doyle
• Bill Irwin as the voice of TARS (Robot)
• Josh Stewart as the voice of CASE (Robot)

• Matt Damon as Dr. Mann, a researcher on a desolate planet long believed to be dead

On Earth

• Jessica Chastain as Murphy "Murph" Cooper, Cooper's daughter

• Mackenzie Foy as young Murphy
• Ellen Burstyn as elderly Murphy

• Michael Caine as Professor John Brand, a NASA scientist and Amelia's father
• Casey Affleck as Tom Cooper, Cooper's son

• Timothée Chalamet as Young Tom

• John Lithgow as Donald, Cooper's father-in-law
• Leah Cairns as Lois Cooper, Tom's wife
• Topher Grace as Getty, Murph's colleague
• David Oyelowo as the principal of Murph's elementary school
• William Devane as Williams
• Elyes Gabel as the Administrator
• Collette Wolfe as Ms. Hanley

Production

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• Christopher Nolan – director, producer, writer
• Jonathan Nolan – writer
• Emma Thomas – producer
• Lynda Obst – producer
• Hoyte van Hoytema – cinematographer
• Nathan Crowley – production designer
• Mary Zophres – costume designer
• Lee Smith – editor
• Hans Zimmer – music composer
• Paul Franklin – visual effects supervisor
• Kip Thorne – consultant, executive producer

See also

• Black holes in fiction
• Bootstrap paradox
• Interstellar spacecraft
• List of films featuring space stations
• List of films shot in Iceland
• List of time travel science fiction
• O'Neill cylinder
• Theory of everything
• Wormholes in fiction