A condescending work driven by fear and cynicism, Don’t Look Up aims to satirize a media and political landscape oblivious to the world around them, but instead becomes a soap box from which director Adam McKay spews forth a temper tantrum.
Have you ever been in a situation where a cynical idealist has talked your ear off for an hour? Some of the points he/she made are sound, yet so dire and whiny and cynical was the diatribe that the result is not illumination but the need for a strong drink.
This is what watching Don’t Look Up feels like. Written and directed by Adam McKay (The Big Short), the film aims to skewer the current state of politics and media in post-Donald Trump America through an end-of-the-world story in which two scientists (Leonardo DiCaprio and Jennifer Lawrence) discover an “extinction level event” comet racing towards Earth, only to be met with non-difference from an over stimulated yet underwhelmed world.
In every frame of Don’t Look Up, McKay’s snarky cynicism engulfs the screen like a fog. It is clear that anger is what drives McKay, especially his hatred towards the pesky sheep public upon which he has developed a superiority complex towards. A condescending spirit is especially rife in scenes where actors scream down the barrel of the lens that “we are all going to die!” in at attempt at doomsday prophesising that many will hear, but can’t take seriously.
Then again that is the point of Don’t Look Up. McKay is clearly a passionate man with Don’t Look Up his plea on the issue of climate change and the supposed inaction in combating it. Yet his messaging is equivalent to that of a rampaging teenager: all emotion and no filter. The movie might as well have been called “blah blah blah!”
Performances are a mixed bag. DiCaprio surprises with his turn as a regular schlub scientist found in a chaotic situation, a bundle of nervous energy gobbled up by the celebrity machine. Lawrence in turn is underwhelming with a low energy turn that is memorable only for her punk-rock makeover.
Meryl Streep is all caricature and no bite as a President of the United States clearly inspired by Donald Trump yet lacking originality in her skewering of him. Jonah Hill is his usual nauseatingly nasty self, while Mark Rylance seems to be evoking Johnny Depp’s turn as Willy Wonka in his portrayal of a social media magnate. Then there is Cate Blanchett who plays the role of an ego-driven, boozed and sexed up news journalist. Hey McKay, Parks and Recreation want their sketch back.
That none of the jokes land speaks much to the lazy and temperamental nature of McKay’s preach. It is no surprise that the films best moment is when the characters take part in a moment of clarity, of contemplation, of faith and of reflection during a moment of prayer as the world crashes around them, the opposite of the noisy, angry huff and puff grandstanding that Don’t Look Up represents.
