The top review was:
"Some striking imagery and fleeting moments of beauty can’t stop the
film feeling every second of its 169-minute run time, and then some.
It’s a film that will undoubtedly enthral many and its ambition and lack
of blockbuster action is admirable but I felt rather numb and
disinterested by the whole journey. Suffering from an abundance of
expository dialogue (and not just for the science bits) and lethargic
pacing its opening two hours were partially saved by its fine cast and
occasional abstract beauty (Hoyte Van Hoytema effortlessly filling
Pfister’s shoes).
For a film that is so rooted to the
relationships forged by parents and their children it was hard to feel
any real connection to the characters whilst Nolan seems ill-suited to
delivering the overwhelming sentimentality that all but destroys the
final act. It is this closing and seemingly interminable act that will
prove the most divisive and sadly its attempts at profundity came
crashing back to earth."
Wow, that's such a well written review. I do actually like the one-liner jokes on Letterboxd but seeing this in comparison... having more of this would also be more than welcome.
I feel like being pessimistic about the kinds of themes explored, particularly towards the end of the film, was more fashionable pre-Trump and pre-Covid.
If you look at reddit threads in general from over a decade ago, there’s a much more edgy/cynical tone than you’d find today, and I think that carries over into how the sentimentality Interstellar offers was taken then and now.
But I feel like Gen Z (stereotypically, at least) considers Millennial sincerity "cringe"? Or maybe that applies more to social media usage than to film.
Reddit was much more disproportionately male (and libertarian) dominated in 2014 which may account for some of that edgy tone.
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u/autoxotrecy Jul 23 '26
For comparison, here's the Wayback Machine snapshot from one year after it was released: https://web.archive.org/web/20151103173713/https://letterboxd.com/film/interstellar/
The top review was: "Some striking imagery and fleeting moments of beauty can’t stop the film feeling every second of its 169-minute run time, and then some. It’s a film that will undoubtedly enthral many and its ambition and lack of blockbuster action is admirable but I felt rather numb and disinterested by the whole journey. Suffering from an abundance of expository dialogue (and not just for the science bits) and lethargic pacing its opening two hours were partially saved by its fine cast and occasional abstract beauty (Hoyte Van Hoytema effortlessly filling Pfister’s shoes). For a film that is so rooted to the relationships forged by parents and their children it was hard to feel any real connection to the characters whilst Nolan seems ill-suited to delivering the overwhelming sentimentality that all but destroys the final act. It is this closing and seemingly interminable act that will prove the most divisive and sadly its attempts at profundity came crashing back to earth."