IF YOU SEE DON’T LOOK UP, YOU MAY LAUGH OR JUST BE DISGUSTED
Don’t Look Up, directed by Adam McKay, is supposed to be a satire of life in the United States from the humblest to the mightiest. During the Obama Administration, a mission to explore an asteroid was launched, though plans did not come to fruition until recently. That might have been the impetus for the film’s plot, one might imagine. But McKay confesses that the film is supposed to be an allegory about how the climate crisis is being mishandled by the United States. He believes that the coming disaster for the earth receives minor coverage from the media and little action by government. He therefore tries to satirize both. However, his actors appear to satirize his satire, such that filmviewers are less likely to be impressed by his desired message and more likely to enjoy efforts to make fun of everyone.
Don’t Look Up begins in Michigan State University, where astronomy graduate student Kate Dibiasky (played by Jennifer Lawrence) has just viewed that an asteroid that appears headed to destroy the earth. Her academic adviser, Professor Randall Mindy (Leonardo DiCaprio), validates her judgment mathematically. Accordingly, they feel compelled to issue a warning. After encountering some disdain at the White House, they finally present their findings to President Orlean (Meryl Streep, presumably standing in for a sloppy Hillary Clinton), and the head of NASA, Dr. Teddy Oglethorpe (Rob Morgan), agrees. But the president acts rather childishly, is pleased that her smoking habit has raised her poll numbers by 3 percent, wants validation from elite Ivy League academics, indicates that she will deal with the matter in due course, and finally tells the Michiganders that she is taking the prediction seriously. Frustrated, the Michiganders (who do not speak with a Michigan accent) decide to share their prediction on television. The program features two playful MCs who give priority to a movie star who recently broke with a lover, and they arrange unexpectedly to have the lover appear virtually, and he proposes to her. In short, a celebrity scandal is given priority to “political news,” which the hosts treat as disinformation (propaganda). Finally comes the interview with the two Michiganders. Professor Mindy tries to explain their findings academically, but he is interrupted with playful remarks by the co-hosts, prompting his grad student to explode with anger and profanity, insisting that their message about the coming disaster of the planet should be taken seriously. A lot of nonsense then follows, including a successful effort by one of the TV cohosts to go to bed with Dr. Mindy. Next, President Orlean announces a plan: A White House aide will go into space and change the path of the comet by firing at the rock. The plan, however, fails. Soon, Peter Isherwell (Mark Rylance, a mixture of Elon Musk and Mark Zetterberg) convinces President Orlean that he can arrange missiles to break the comet apart into small pieces, each of which will contain valuable minerals that will be used to manufacture enough cellphones to end world poverty, and the United States will presumably capture the pieces in the ocean—that is, until China, India, and Russia claim their shares of the bounty. When Professor Mindy asks Isherwell whether his plan has been peer reviewed, Isherwell tells him who he is in accordance with social media algorithms and dismisses the question. Social media tweets appear throughout the film, some claiming that news about the comet is fake news, and about 1/3 of the public agrees. President Orlean even holds a “Don’t Look Up” rally, though an even larger rally features a pop star singer, indicating that the public is more interested in spectacular music events than the possibility of global extinction. Isherwell’s plan fails, and the Michiganders return home for a last meal as the comet is increasingly visible in the sky. The president, who now watches as the comet is only hours away from hitting earth, suddenly hears the call of Mother Nature as does Isherwell. The last scene unveils a secret plan of President Orlean and Isherwell: A rocket ship with billionaires aboard lands on another planet, and they step out into the new Garden of Eden fully naked. Reviewers are not supposed to reveal the end of a film, so the fate of President Orlean on the new planet constitutes whatever suspense is left in one of the sloppiest films ever made while belittling climate change as a public issue. MH