Episode Transcript
[00:00:11] Speaker A: On this week's episode, we follow up on our Princess and the Goblin listener polls and preview project. Hail Mary.
Hello and welcome back to another prequel episode of this film is lit, the podcast where we talk about movies that are based on books.
[00:00:27] Speaker B: Books.
[00:00:27] Speaker A: We're going to start, as we always do, with our patron shout outs. I put up with you because your father and mother were our finest patrons. That's why. No new patrons this week. But we do have our Academy Award winning patrons and they are. Amanda Nicole Goble. Harpo Rat. Nathan. Mathilde Cottonwood. Steve. Ben Wilcox, Teresa Schwartz. Ian from Wine Country, Kelly Napier.
Gretch.
Just Gretch. Shelby says the new Spidey movie is great enrichment for my enclosure. And that darn skag. Thank you all very much for your continued support. Katie, let's see what people had to say about the Princess and the Goblin.
Yeah, well, you know, that's just like your opinion.
[00:01:13] Speaker B: Man. On Patreon, we had five votes for the book and zero for the movie.
[00:01:19] Speaker A: Nobody going to bat for the movie?
[00:01:21] Speaker B: No. Well, somebody did.
[00:01:23] Speaker A: Sorry here.
[00:01:24] Speaker B: But not. Not here. On Patreon, we had one comment from Kelly Napier who said, I listened to the audiobook where the narrator did pronounce it, like how it's pronounced in the movie.
[00:01:35] Speaker A: Okay.
[00:01:36] Speaker B: So maybe it's actually intended to be that way.
[00:01:39] Speaker A: Interesting.
[00:01:40] Speaker B: More on that later. Oh, in another comment.
[00:01:42] Speaker A: Sweet.
[00:01:43] Speaker B: I voted for the book because the movie just didn't capture my attention the way the book did. I found myself chuckling at parts that weren't meant to be funny, like Curtie surfing down the rocks.
It was close though, because Turnip was amazing. Turnip forever.
[00:01:59] Speaker A: Yeah. I mean, it's definitely one of those. If it's your first time watching as an adult, it's not gonna. It's not gonna catch you.
[00:02:04] Speaker B: It's not gonna land the way that it does when you watch it as like a five year old.
[00:02:08] Speaker A: Yes.
[00:02:09] Speaker B: Over on Facebook, we had zero votes for the book and one for the movie.
And a comment from Sarah who said, I chose the movie over the book. I loved this movie as a child. I used to also play pretend it.
Last year I attempted to read the book to my kids. Unfortunately, we did not finish it. The writing of the book is so old Englishy that it was hard to read aloud to my kids and have them understand it. They lost interest easily.
We haven't watched the movie together yet, but I am excited to share it with them eventually.
[00:02:43] Speaker A: I guess. You did read an excerpt, but I don't know if I caught that. Would you say? Now, obviously it's not old English, but is the style that it's written, you know, more archaic than something like the Hobbit? Or is it similar maybe to the Hobbit?
[00:02:57] Speaker B: I wouldn't call it. It's an older style than the Hobbit.
[00:03:02] Speaker A: Yeah. I mean, clearly it was written 100 years earlier or whatever.
[00:03:05] Speaker B: But I mean, in my opinion, at least it's closer, I think, to like, an Alice in Wonderland or maybe even the Oz books, which are a lot closer to the time period. But I can also see, like. Like I mentioned in the episode, like, where C.S. lewis, like, pretty obviously took some stylistic notes from it. I don't think it's as old fashioned as maybe you would think it is just from hearing the publication date.
[00:03:35] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:03:36] Speaker B: But if you're not used to that type of language and narrative style, I think it could definitely be a little bit of a challenge.
[00:03:45] Speaker A: Yeah. If you've only exclusively read or. And you know, and specific read to children that have only kind of exclusively been exposed to, or at least primarily been exposed to modern writing styles of children's book, it could be. It's a noticeable difference. Yeah.
I was also interested. This is your friend Sarah, right?
[00:04:03] Speaker B: Yes, this is my friend Sarah.
[00:04:04] Speaker A: Did you know that she used to.
[00:04:06] Speaker B: I actually didn't. I don't think we ever talked about it.
[00:04:08] Speaker A: I thought it was interesting. I was wondering if you guys were aware that each other, like, liked this and.
[00:04:13] Speaker B: We met in the first grade.
[00:04:15] Speaker A: Yeah. You guys have been friends forever.
[00:04:17] Speaker B: Yeah. So I don't remember ever talking about it, but I don't know. All right.
Over on Instagram, we had no comments, but we did get two votes for the book, one for the movie, and one listener who couldn't decide.
[00:04:30] Speaker A: Okay.
[00:04:31] Speaker B: And on Goodreads, we had one vote for the book and zero for the movie. And we have a comment from Mo, ever reliable Mo, who said the story was interesting enough. I would have guessed it to be way more recent than it actually was, which I think that's interesting because it kind of feels like the opposite of what Sarah said.
[00:04:53] Speaker A: Well, now, to be fair, he probably was reading it or maybe. I don't know. I say that I don't want to say he was reading it. Not in English, but he may have been reading it maybe.
[00:04:59] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:04:59] Speaker A: Which I don't know how that, you know, like an older writing style, assuming he was reading it in whatever his native language, which I cannot recall now for the life of me what it is. Something in Europe.
But I do wonder. You know, were it translated and maybe he did read it in English. I actually don't know, but just thinking if it was reading it in his native language, translated from English, I wonder how much of that style would be noticed. I assume it would. That's so interesting. I never really thought about that.
[00:05:24] Speaker B: Yeah. Anyways, the changes the film made were understandable, but they also introduced plenty of silly things like the 100 foot fall onto rocks, plus the Goblin King's wheezing and frog lips wet lisp were getting on my nerves.
The animation. Yeah, the animation quality is what it is. But that water in the end looked great, even in low quality.
[00:05:45] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah.
It's like I said in the episode, it's a mixed bag of really interesting kind of neat animation. And like, also like, it's not as polished.
[00:05:56] Speaker B: Right. Not up to the level of like what Disney was doing in the same time period. But there are still like some cool, interesting things.
[00:06:02] Speaker A: There's unique flourishes that differentiate it and do some. There's some fun moments that you're like, oh, I've never seen that in a Disney movie done that way. That looks cool. But as a whole, it's not quite as across the board beautiful as like a Disney film from this era.
[00:06:18] Speaker B: The book is better.
It looks like the three syllable pronunciation of Irene is the classical one that has been nearly totally supplanted by the two syllable one. Okay, so this is a quote from a book called what's in a Name? By Susan Osborne.
In England, Irene was pronounced closer to the Greek pronunciation with three syllables.
Some sources believe that this pronunciation proves that the early use of the name in England was by parents from the upper classes because they were the ones most likely to have received a classical education which included the study of Greek.
[00:06:56] Speaker A: Okay.
[00:06:57] Speaker B: Some historians speculate that because Irene was from the start pronounced in the United States with two syllables, it may have entered through literary and intellectual sources rather than on the immigrants family rosters.
[00:07:10] Speaker A: Interesting.
[00:07:10] Speaker B: So apparently the Irene predates Irene, which makes sense. Yeah, I guess, I guess. Yeah.
[00:07:18] Speaker A: As I think about it, relating it to other names similar to that, I can't think of an example off the top of my head, but yeah, that does.
[00:07:27] Speaker B: It is interesting because that movie is literally the only place I have ever heard that pronunciation of it.
[00:07:33] Speaker A: Well, you know, to be fair, I don't know if I've ever. I can think of another character named Irene in like a Big Prom, especially an older story where I'm like, yeah, but at least not off the top of my head. Sure. It exists.
[00:07:45] Speaker B: But all right, so our winner this week was the book with eight votes to the movies, two, plus our one undecided listener.
[00:07:54] Speaker A: Book crushed it this week. All right, speaking of books, what a great. I'm a master of Segways.
We're going to learn a little bit about this week's book project Hail Mary.
[00:08:05] Speaker B: Please state your name.
[00:08:06] Speaker A: Ron and Grace. I just woke up from a coma.
I'm several light years from my apartment.
And I'm not an astronaut.
I'm not an astronaut.
I'm not an astronaut.
[00:08:21] Speaker B: If you don't go, you die.
We're the rest of us.
Project Hail Mary is a 2021 hard science fiction novel by American writer Andy Weird, also known for the Martian and Artemis.
In a 2021 interview with the New York Times, Weir stated that after completing the Martian, which we have also covered on this show, very, very early in our run. But after completing the Martian, he started working on a multi volume space opera called Zek.
[00:08:56] Speaker A: Interesting.
[00:08:57] Speaker B: Z H E K. I'm assuming it's pronounced.
[00:09:00] Speaker A: Yeah, something like that.
[00:09:01] Speaker B: Something like that. But it was about a substance that could absorb electromagnetic radiation and be used as a fuel for interstellar travel. Okay. However, after writing around 75,000 words, he abandoned that project and pivoted to his 2017 novel Artemis, which I have read.
[00:09:20] Speaker A: I've read both the. Both the Martian and Artemis, but several
[00:09:24] Speaker B: elements from Zec were brought over to Project Hail Mary, including, according to Wikipedia, a ruthless bureaucrat character.
[00:09:32] Speaker A: And Strat. Yeah.
[00:09:34] Speaker B: And an energy absorbing substance used as starship fuel.
[00:09:39] Speaker A: And that would be the astrophasia.
[00:09:40] Speaker B: Yeah. In a 2026 interview with Science Friday, Weir said that the idea for Astrophage, Wrote, Wrote, arose out of his desire to have humans discover a fuel that converted matter into energy.
[00:09:55] Speaker A: I mean, that's all fuel, but I get.
He means within itself. Yeah, I get what I think it was going for. But like, that's what fuel is. Is you take matter and it turns into energy. Like that's.
Unless I'm misunderstanding what fuel is. That is fuel. But I get what the point of that is. Is that a thing that. Because in this it's an actual organism that turns matter into energy within itself in a way that can be used for propulsion.
[00:10:25] Speaker B: The novel won the Dragon Award for best Science fiction Novel and a goodreads Choice Award for best Science fiction novel and was also a Hugo Award finalist. Did not win. But it was a finalist.
It also won a Seyoun Award for best translated long work. And the AudioBook actually won two audio one for best science fiction and one for audiobook of the year.
[00:10:50] Speaker A: Okay.
[00:10:51] Speaker B: The novel debuted at number three on the New York Times bestseller list, where it remained for nine weeks. It then returned to the number two spot in July of 2025, leading up to the release of the film adaptation.
And Bill Gates and Barack Obama both added this list to their respective 2021 book recommendation.
[00:11:12] Speaker A: Least surprising thing I've ever heard. And that is as backhanded as it sounds.
I. I enjoy the book so far. I'm about halfway through. But that it's the most like capitalist lib coded book.
Like, it's hard to describe. I like it and I. But it has not eccentricities. It has elements that, yes, this is the kind of thing that Bill Gates would be. And Barack Obama, you know, it's the very classic like, yeah, techno optimist lib coded.
[00:11:48] Speaker B: Like, gotcha.
No spoilers for the main episode. No.
[00:11:52] Speaker A: Yeah, you've seen the movie. So you. I mean, yeah, I'm halfway through the book. Spoilers. They're like identical so far, but
[00:12:01] Speaker B: getting into some reviews. Writing for the New York Times, sci fi author Elek Navalila Lee wrote, quote, for readers who can forgive its shortcomings, the result is an engaging space odyssey.
[00:12:14] Speaker A: Yeah, no, I would agree that that fits my experience so far. If you can get over some of the shortcomings, it's.
[00:12:20] Speaker B: Kirkus Reviews gave the book a starred review, which they don't do for every book.
[00:12:25] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:12:26] Speaker B: And they described it as, quote, an unforgettable story of survival and the power of friendship. Nothing short of a science fiction masterwork.
[00:12:36] Speaker A: I'm not. Okay, we'll save it for the episode. Science fiction masterwork is a stretch, in my opinion. It's a very fun book, but I'll leave it there for now and tease that as we get to the actual episode.
[00:12:51] Speaker B: A reviewer for Locus magazine wrote, quote, project Hail Mary isn't a simple rehash of the Martian. Instead, it's a celebration of Weir's voice. Weir's jaunty blend of science fiction.
Weir's jaunty blend of science and fiction in Project Hail Mary is a return to the work that got him where he is. I suspect this reviewer did not like Artemis.
[00:13:15] Speaker A: Artemis is pretty famously considered his worst book, mainly because it suffers from a lot of men writing. The main character of that's a woman.
I read it. I remember very little of my feelings about it. It didn't make a big impact, I'll say that. Especially compared to the Martian. I liked the Martian quite a bit when I read it. Which I read it right after it came out. I read Pyroject, Artemis. I don't know, five, six years, maybe more than that now.
And it suffers from, yeah, some, some flaws in a dude writing a young female protagonist, among other things.
[00:13:48] Speaker B: But.
And finally, a reviewer for the Boston Globe wrote, quote, project Hail Mary is still a suspenseful space yarn that zigs and zags, sometimes literally in ingenious directions.
[00:14:04] Speaker A: That's a great way to describe it that a hundred percent sign off on. Anyways. All right, cool. That was a little bit about Project Hail Mary the book. Let's learn now a little bit about Project Hail Mary the film.
[00:14:17] Speaker B: This is Project Hail Mary. The sun is not the only star dying. Every star was infected by its neighbor except one. Why? We don't know, which is why we built a ship to go there and find out.
[00:14:30] Speaker A: It's 11.9 light years away. The astronauts die in space.
[00:14:34] Speaker B: It's what you American as we'll call a lung shot.
[00:14:37] Speaker A: Hail Mary.
[00:14:38] Speaker B: I get it.
[00:14:38] Speaker A: Who on earth is going to sign up for this?
Project Hail Mary is a 2026 film directed by Phil Lord and Christopher Miller, known as nom de plume. As a director duo, Lord and Miller, most people will hear them referred to as they are known for The Lego Movie 21 and 22 Drump Street Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs, did a couple episodes of Brooklyn Nine Nine.
And they were also writers and producers on the Spider Verse movies. They did not direct those films, but they were writers and producers on it. Kind of big creative forces behind the Spider Verse films, among other things, but those are some of their biggest ones. And the film was written by Drew Goddard, who is known for the Martian Cabin in the Woods, Bad Times at the El Royale, Rode On Lost, Daredevil Cloverfield, Alias angel and Buffy, was in the Whedon sphere forever and then moved on into the J.J. abrams sphere for a while, then went over to the Marvel Netflix sphere for a while and now is doing whatever he wants, I guess at this point. But yeah, he adapted the Martian.
The film stars Ryan Gosling, Sandra Huller, James Ortiz, Lionel Boyce, Kin Lung, Milana Van Troob, Priya Kensara, Malachi Kirby, Liz Kingsman, Mia Sotiero, Orion Lee and Michelle Greenidge.
The film has a 95% on Rotten Tomatoes, a 77% on Metacritic, and an 8.2 out of 10 on IMDb. Currently sits at number 155 on IMDb's top film list. It made 684 million against a budget of 248 million and it came out this year, so it hasn't been. We haven't hit awards season yet. So I imagine it will get nominated for a bunch of technical awards for sure. And I wouldn't be surprised if it gets nominated for like best picture and some other stuff as like one of the big kind of crowd pleaser, you know, that gets. And it's a good movie. We'll get into that when we get to it because spoilers, we have both seen this.
In March 2020, MGM bought the rights to Andy Weir's upcoming novel wasn't published at the time for $3 million. And right from the jump, Ryan Gosling was set to star in the film. He was a big fan of the book and wanted to be involved. In May of 2020, Lord Miller were hired to produce and direct, but at the time they could not write the film due to commitments as they were working on across the Spider ver time. So Drew Goddard was brought on to adapt the screenplay, which makes sense. He did the Martian. He understands this very well. Martian was a good adaptation. Everybody liked it, so might as well bring it back.
Why would you mess with it? Makes perfect sense.
In May 2024, Sandra Huller and Milana Van Troob joined the cast. Vayntrub. I actually don't know how to pronounce her name. She's the AT&T or the one of the cell phone.
She's in the cell phone commercials. A bunch of them people. Milana Vaintre. I can't. She's a comedian and stuff. But AT&T might be AT&T. She's in like all the AT&T commercials. She's like their spokesperson.
You'll recognize her. She's barely in the movie because of the plot, but along with Greg Fraser or Greig Fraser. I actually still don't know how to pronounce that guy his name. Who joined as a cinematographer. Greig Fraser is known for Dune 1 and 2, the creator the Batman, Rogue One and as we mentioned before, Snow White and the Huntsman, which we did recently on a bonus episode.
[00:17:57] Speaker B: The Batman is the.
[00:17:58] Speaker A: Robert.
[00:17:59] Speaker B: Okay, yeah.
[00:18:01] Speaker A: Very, very talented cinematographer.
Although he's not doing Dune 3. And boy, Dune 3 looks even better than Dune 1 and 2, which Dune 1 and 2 look great. Dune 3 looks incredible so far from the shots that we've seen. So that's interesting. So getting into some random trivia or not. This is not IMDb trivia. This is just some production notes here in an interview with The Hollywood Reporter.
Christopher. Is it Christopher? I can never remember which one's Phil and which one's Christopher because I always just refer to him as Lord and Miller. Yeah, Christopher Miller mentioned that no chroma keying was used in the film with the entire set being shot practically.
That's also a lie, kind of. It's not a lie. There was no chroma keying being used. But as this quote will go on to explain, it's not entirely accurate to say that there's no what that implies in people's mind. Similar to the all of Wicked was recorded live thing. What that infers and people infer from that when hearing that means a different thing than what actually happened in the film. So Miller said that no chroma keying was used in the film with the entire set being shot practically.
Greg Fraser had previously collaborated with visual effects supervisor Paul Lambert on the Dune films, and their disdain for green and blue screens, which impacts lighting and visuals through color spill, led them to use blackouts and gray screens on the film instead.
So they still did digital set expansion and stuff like that. They just literally didn't use green and blue, obviously. Well, and they're not even talking about, like the space shots. They're talking about in the spaceship itself anyways. It's complicated, but yeah, they just used a different type of whatever. It's fine.
Miller had previously stated that VFX were used to depict the spaceship from the outside, while shots of Gosling in space were shot against a black or varying color backdrop. Again, yes, there are obviously tons of visual effects shots in the movie. It takes place in space, but most of the actual set of the spaceship that you see him in is practical, if not like basically all of it. Essentially. There are some really great videos. Adam Sapp Savage from Mythbusters on his Tested YouTube channel went and toured a bunch of the sets and got to see behind the scenes and how they filmed it and see all the sets. Really cool stuff. You can go check that out if you're interested in that kind of thing.
The visual or whoop. Nope, skipped over there. NASA did provide support on the film through the input of scientific experts and sent along astronaut. I don't know how to pronounce this person's name. Kajal Gel. Kjel Kajell Lindgren, who visited during filming to share insights on human spaceflight and kind of just be like a science advisor on the film.
The visual effects for the film were developed by Framestore, who also worked on the Martian ilm, Sony Picture Image Works Buff and Wiley co also worked on the film in the special effects department. Again, lots of visual effects in this movie. That is one of the things. It's a very stunning movie from my memory when we watched it the one time.
So talking about Rocky, this is interesting. The puppeteer on the film and I can't now. Where did it go?
He's in the cast. Let me find it. James Ortiz, that was his first name puppeteer for Rocky or one of the puppeteers was named James Ortiz. And he actually voiced Rocky during filming of the film like he was the person on set doing the lines against Ryan Gosling. And it was initially thought that they would replace him in post with a more high kind of high profile actor because this guy's like a puppeteer, he's not really a voice actor. However, Lord and Miller felt that his performance couldn't be improved upon during early screenings of the film and essentially or eventually they decided to leave him as the voice actor in the film. Lord praised the collaboration between both practical and visual effects in the creation of the character of Rocky's performance, saying, quote, rocky was built and designed by the legendary Neil Scanlon and his creature shop and is performed by puppeteering legend James Ortiz and his team who are on set with Ryan in every scene. Rocky's performance is a beautiful collaboration between James and the other Rocky Tears.
It's a great nickname. It's what they called the puppeteers for Rocky. Rocky Tears on set. And the wonderful animators at frame store led by the funny, soulful Arslan of Elver Miller has stated that roughly 50% of those shots of Rocky are VFX and 50% are puppets.
Remember that for when we get into IMDb trivia here in a minute because this is evidence of why you cannot trust any of the shit on IMDb trivia.
People just be saying stuff.
Which is why I always caveat that before we get to the IMDb trivia part because I think it's fun to read. But you have to keep in mind that half of this stuff is probably BS that you're reading on the IMDb trivia.
So getting to IMDb trivia. Oh, last note before IMDb trivia. Daniel Pemberton, who composed for the Spider Verse movies, composed the score from the film IMDb trivia. When Grace first meets the team of astronauts Yao and Strat have a brief exchange in Chinese and this exchange roughly translates to because it's not. There aren't captions in the film for this. Yao says, why does he talk like we are all Children. And Strat replies, it doesn't matter. You get used to it. I just wanted to include that because it's. As you watch the movie, you can then have context for what they're saying in that brief moment.
It's also just a reference to him being a teacher, which is why he talks to them like they're children.
Ryan Gosling's daughters, Esmeralda and Amada.
Pretty names. I didn't know. I didn't even know he had kids, I don't think.
[00:23:16] Speaker B: Yeah, I didn't either, I don't think.
[00:23:18] Speaker A: Because I don't know anything about Ryan Gosling. But they occasionally spoke for his alien co star, Rocky, who obviously was voiced by Ortiz in the film, through an earpiece on set. Speaking of their help, Gosling said, quote, there are some moments in the movie where I'm laughing or I'm just so charmed by Rocky, which is like. It's actually my kids talking to me in that moment and helping me out.
So some of the scenes that. Yeah, to get a kind of more realistic reaction on certain things. It's him. Just him being talked to by his kids.
I thought this was fun. Artemis 2 launched. What was that? I don't know. A couple months ago.
They watched the film in quarantine before they launched for their mission to the moon.
They were sitting in quarantine. They got to see the film.
This is actress Sandra Huller's first American film and her first primarily English language film where she actually speaks English.
Again, I'm just trusting IMDb trivia here. Don't actually know if that's true or not because as we'll get to in a second, this next one, Rocky isn't cgi. It took five puppeteers to bring him to life, with the head being.
The head puppeteer being Rocky's voice. That part's true. Rocky isn't CGI sometimes, but is CGI plenty of other times. So that's why you cannot trust IMDb trivia, because it will just say things like, Rocky isn't cgi. It's like, well, kind of.
Kind of.
This also.
I feel like this next thing cannot be true. I haven't gotten to this part of the book yet. We'll see. But another IMDb trivia fact. Grace trying to run from Strat outside the school was not originally in the script. Ryan Gosling and Sandra Holler wanted to race each other to the bike rack. And the footage was used in the final film. I do not. I'll have to remember what this moment is in.
[00:25:02] Speaker B: I don't. Yeah, I don't remember what.
[00:25:04] Speaker A: Cause there's obviously one big moment in the film where he runs, but that's. I don't know if it's referring to that or a different thing. I'll have to go. When we rewatch the film, it'll be more clear.
And I haven't gotten to this point in the book yet, so I don't know anyways. Or maybe I have and this scene isn't in the book. I don't know. I was like, I don't know what that means. I'm interested to see upon rewatching it because my mind initially went to a different moment where I'm like, well, that had to be scripted. It's like a huge plot point. Like it's, it's like a part of the movie. It's not like a thing where they were goofing around and then they worked it into the movie. It doesn't make any sense. Unless this is a different moment. I'm just not remembering. Potentially. I don't know. Getting to some Reviews G. Allen Johnson, writing for the San Francisco Chronicle, deemed the film, quote, a masterpiece of a family popcorn movie with eye popping, handcrafted production design and outstanding creature design and puppetry work. Writing for the Mercury News, Randy Myers gave it three and a half out of four stars, writing, quote While you can't help but marvel at the visuals and applaud the commitment of Gosling's endearing performance, what also makes Project Hail Mary so gosh darn lovable is that it imbues us with childlike wonder from scenes that pay homage to such classics as E.T. flight of the Navigator and, yes, Rocky.
Robbie Collin for the Telegraph concluded in his review, does it have many original ideas of its own? Perhaps not, but its greatest hits mixtape of Other People's has been compiled with such flair as well as a sound comprehension of why they worked so well the first time, that it's hard not to be swept up regardless, end quote. Barry Hertz for the Globe and Mail shared a similar opinion, saying, quote at almost every turn, Project Hail Mary attempts to convince you that it's groundbreaking, innovative filmmaking, but in actuality, the movie lands as a grand act of cinematic recycling, the fusing together of familiar, comforting bits and pieces into something determined to please crowds and warmed warm hearts, end quote.
Not to spoil my opinion, but I broadly agree with that. Amy Nicholson, writing for the LA Times wrote, quote while Stanley Kubrick's unsentimental 2001 A Space Odyssey inspired the iPad Lord and Miller Want to inspire a better version of us? End quote. Brian Truitt, USA Today gave the film four out of four stars, writing, project Hail Mary is one of those old school popcorn movies with big ideas. The kind of film that Steven Spielberg and George Lucas would have made back in the day and kids of all ages would have obsessed over and bought the toys, end quote.
For the American prospect. Ryan Cooper wrote that the film portrayed, quote, a shockingly realistic view of heroism and was one of the rare films that is quite a bit better than the book, end quote.
We're halfway there.
[00:27:35] Speaker B: We'll figure that one out.
[00:27:36] Speaker A: I'll be the judge of that. Peter Bradshaw of the Guardian wrote, quote, goling is an effortlessly charming screenplayer and he keeps it watchable, though the film itself has moments of dullness and a sort of puppyish silliness. Perhaps refreshingly, the film doesn't aim for the stunned awe and rapture of, say, Christopher Nolan's Interstellar or even John Spade's underrated Passengers.
Underrated, okay, but it does. I actually, I say that I haven't seen the film, but. But from what I've heard, Passengers is not underrated, but I don't know, I haven't seen it. I can't argue. This is an interesting opinion. I've never heard somebody call that movie underrated, but it does have the classic sci fi spacecraft tropes, the huge mysterious architecture with its vertiginous tunnels in which legacy pop music is played to soothe the inhabitants. End quote.
[00:28:20] Speaker B: Hard agree with Peter Bradshaw's opinion of Ryan Gosling.
Effortlessly charming screenplayer.
[00:28:27] Speaker A: Yes.
[00:28:27] Speaker B: Keeping it watchable. Yeah, he does charming so well.
[00:28:31] Speaker A: He really does, yeah.
GVSU anthropology professor Deanna L. Weibel praised Grace's intellectual humility in the film, which I thought was interesting. I don't know why it's included here, but that was funny. Which is. That's a huge part of the book and that's a huge part of all of Weir's writing. He's a big science nerd, so being humble in the face of science and knowing what you don't know is a few throughout his work. It's kind of like the core thematic element of a lot of what he writes, although he thinks themes are for losers, so we'll get to that. To hold. Weir's a weird guy. He. He has said some dumb and he's kind of chud coated at times. That's a whole different thing. He wishes Star Trek would be less political. He's one. He's we. He's a. He's a weird guy. I don't. I've seen a handful of interviews with him and I'm like, how are you? Right? Because like, anyways, it's a whole. We'll get into it. In the episode, Nicholas Barber of the BBC declared it one of the best films of 2026, saying quote Project Hail Mary is an unusual science fiction blockbuster in that it's mostly about people using their brains to solve problems. Does that approach sound a bit dry and academic? If so, rest assured that Project Hail Mary is touching and inspiring and surprisingly fun. It's directed by Phil Lord and Christopher Miller, who take a complicated, potentially bleak narrative and make it as fast paced and cheerful as their animated hit the Lego Movie. Meanwhile, Ryan Gosling brings all his goo ball charm to the role of an of an amnesiac biologist who is trying to save the world. End quote. Then finally a negative review. Owen Gliberman for Variety called it, quote not a very good movie and added, quote it's baggy and incredibly derivative of movies you've seen before. More crucially, everything to do with the onboard alien is far too cute and formulaic. End quote. I'll leave my opinions on that for the episode because, okay, we'll get to I don't want to spoil everything.
As always, you can do us a favor by heading over to Facebook, Threads, Blue Sky, Goodreads, Whatever did I say them all? Instagram, any of those places. Interact. We'd love to hear what you have to say about the stuff we talk about. You could help us out by heading over to Apple, Podcasts, Spotify or wherever you listen to us. Write us a five star review. Write us a nice little you know, blurb about why you like the show and at patreon.com thisfilmisit you can support us there, get access to bonus content and priority recommendations. Katie where can people watch Project Hail Mary?
[00:30:50] Speaker B: As always, you can check with your local library. I think there's a pretty good chance they will have a copy of this.
Or if you still have a local video rental store you should go ahead and support them.
Otherwise you can stream this with a subscription to Prime Video. Fubo Philo I'm just making sounds in this segment. Fuba, Philo, Philo and MGM Plus.
Or you can rent it for around six bucks from Apple TV, Fandango Stream or YouTube.
[00:31:23] Speaker A: I wonder if the Prime Video subscription requires you to have an MGM plus add on it. May I would be interested to see
[00:31:30] Speaker B: it didn't look oh it didn't look like.
[00:31:32] Speaker A: Okay then maybe not. Maybe Not. Maybe it might just be on Prime Video. Because sometimes when it's on MGM plus you have to like have the add on on prime video to watch it. But we'll find out anyway. Anyways.
[00:31:41] Speaker B: Well, we can always rent it on Fubo or Philo or whatever. Fandango or.
[00:31:47] Speaker A: Yeah. Anyways, I'm excited to. Like I said we did watch this in theaters because I didn't want to wait. So we were originally going to do it when it came out in theaters, but then between really, it was just a matter of like. I forgot how obnoxious it is to take notes in a theater.
[00:32:03] Speaker B: We have done that a handful of times. We've not done that for a really long time.
[00:32:08] Speaker A: Because it sucks.
[00:32:08] Speaker B: Because it sucks. It's really hard to do.
[00:32:11] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah. It's basically impossible unless we are able to get to a showing where there's nobody else there and we can like bring a laptop in. And even then it's still a pain. It's just not. It's just easier to do it when we can watch it at home. But I really wanted to see it in theaters because I was excited for the movie and I'd have been hearing great things and I wanted to see it. So we did go see it. We've both seen it once and now I am reading the book. Like I said, I'm about halfway through it, but I'm excited to revisit it.
I guess I'll spoil this. My first viewing of the film was that I liked it. I didn't love it, love it, love it. I just liked it and thought it was good. But it had some issues that I was not a huge fan of that actually, some of those reviewers kind of touched on quite a bit. I found it saccharine at times in a way that grated on me. But I'm very interested to revisit it having read the book and see if. How much I prefer. If I prefer them, you know, Obviously, Yeah. I'm just explaining the concept of our show currently.
[00:33:06] Speaker B: Yeah, I'm. I'm interested to see how I feel about it this time around. I really liked it when we saw it in the theaters. You know, it wasn't like, oh, my God, that's my new favorite movie. But I. I liked it more than you did. I was not bothered by the things that you were bothered by. So, yeah.
[00:33:21] Speaker A: Yeah, we'll see. Maybe it won't. Maybe on a second viewing it won't. I won't find some of those elements as kind of annoying as I did the first time, but I don't know again, even the stuff I dislike, I still would give it. I still liked the movie. It was not like it ruined it or anything, but we'll talk more about that in the actual episode. Until that time, God's gals, not binary pals and everybody else keep reading books, keep watching movies and keep being awesome.
Sam.
