Have you ever experienced a film with beautiful shots and wonderful visuals? If yes, this film will top your list. If not, then you must add this to your list.
Gravity is a 2013 science fiction film directed by Alfonso Cuarón, starring Sandra Bullock and George Clooney as the main leads. This movie is considered as the best film of the year 2013. Out of 93 critic lists, 22 of them named it as the best movie of the year. It took 86th Academy Awards by storm, by winning 7 Oscars out of 10 nominations in Best original score, Best sound mixing, Best Director, Best Cinematography, Best visual effects, Best sound editing and Best film editing.
Storyline:
About a group of astronauts working on Hubble space station commanded by veteran astronaut Matt Kowalski. Dr Ryan Stone is one of the crew members who perform hardware upgrades on Hubble and this was her first space mission. During the spacewalk, the crew is warned about space debris and is ordered to return to Earth immediately and the rest of the picture is about the survival of Ryan Stone in space and her journey back to Earth. Director Alfonso referred to this film as a “Drama of a woman in space”.
Cinematography/Editing:
The magic of the film was beautifully shot by Oscar-winning cinematographer, Emmanuel Lubezki. It took him months to design and years to capture the authenticity in the movie’s shots. The editing of the film can easily pull you into the movie. There are some key themes captured extraordinarily in the film like Dr Stone taking rest in an embryonic position surrounded by ropes resembling initial stages of life and in the climax, she walks out of the water with her body slightly curved to walking erect, depicting evolution in one quick shot.
Soundtrack:
What makes this film, even more, a gripping experience? It is the soundtrack of the film by music director Steven Price. Though there are soundtracks in the film by various other artists, Steven Price made the audience experience the sound of silence in the film and that’s the beauty of his composition. He won Oscar for Best Original Score.
Visual effects:
The visual effects are the backbone of the film as 80 per cent of the film consists of CGI. Tim Webber supervised the visual effects team at British VFX company Framestore. This company spent more than three years spending most of the time on the film’s visual effects. Tim Webber won an Oscar for Best Visual effects.
Direction:
Alfonso Cuarón is not only the director of the film but also co-wrote, co-edited and produced the film. He wrote the screenplay with his son Jonas whose idea was to take the film in space. According to Cuarón, the main theme of the film is adversity. He won an Oscar for Best Director for giving a visual treat for the audience.
Acting Performance:
Sandra Bullock did a tremendous job as Dr Ryan Stone and was nominated for Best Actor. Bullock spent hours in isolation for her role in the best possible way and George Clooney completely justified his role as Matt Kowalski, a veteran astronaut who loves cracking jokes with his crew members. Though the director’s first choice for Dr Ryan Stone was Angelina Jolie and for Matt Kowalski was Robert Downey Jr., Bullock and Clooney proved his first choice wrong by doing an exceptional job in the film.
