Don’t Look Up (2021) Review

 

Don’t Look Up (2021)

Don’t Look Up follows scientists, Dr. Randall Mindy and Kate Dibiasky, who discover a giant astroid that will hit Earth in 6 months, destroying all life on the planet. There’s one problem though, no one will listen to them. 

Adam McKay, you crazy son of a bitch…you’ve done it again, and this time in the form of a very frightening look at our current social and political landscape that closely rivals the real world stupidity that Idiocracy has come to foretell in the years since it’s release. Firstly, this is very much a satire, that in a way, is meant as a response to how we’ve, as a country, handled the COVID pandemic, in a much grander scale however. In a time where we should listen to science (and aren’t), Don’t Look Up expands on our actions to craft an infuriatingly accurate look at how we would respond to the end all, be all—ignoring, memeing, and attempting to profit off of it until the very end. 

Now, don’t get me wrong, this is an extremely well made film, full of pressingly important messages, stellar editing and sound design, and some really great performances, but I hate it, I hate it deeply. And not because it’s bad (it’s not at all), more like it’s almost too real feeling and highlights everything wrong with our society, where just like now, the world is ending and we seem to not care. I literally could feel my blood pressure rising as I watched people, and the President, go from ignoring Dr. Mindy and Kate, to trying to profit off the comet, to whole movements started to deny the existence of such a world ending event, with it right above them. It was terrifying and that’s exactly why I’ll resent how accurate this film was pulled off. 

We get a dominant cast as well, starring Himesh Patel, Ariana Grande, Ron Perlman, Melanie Lynskey, Tyler Perry, Jonah Hill, Mark Rylance, Cate Blanchett, Rob Morgan, Meryl Streep, Timothée Chalamet, Jennifer Lawrence, and Leonardo DiCaprio. It’s so hard to narrow it down to just a few, as each performance was so well thought out, but what we got out of Lawrence and DiCaprio was just brilliant. You feel their anger, frustration, and utter stress from start to finish and the way they go about conveying a wide array of emotions and messages is just so well done. Chalamet is also given a small but detailed chance to play a very different character than his usual types and it ultimately adds such a beautiful resolution by film’s close. 

Don’t Look Up, directed by Adam McKay, asks the question, “If the world was ending, would you trust those in power to stop it?” And in this political satire, that rivals our own situation now, the answer is no because it will likely play out exactly like this, making this both an extremely well-made picture that is just as maddening in it’s honesty. 

9/10