‘Project Hail Mary’ Review: Ryan Gosling Goes Full ‘Martian,’ and Thank the Heavens for That

When he wakes up on an empty spaceship hurtling away from the sun (and thus Earth and everyone and everything he knows), temporarily amnesiac Dr. Ryland Grace (Ryan Gosling) has such little handle on his situation and his place within it that he takes to a dry-erase board to sort his thoughts and questions. “WHO AM I?” is top of the list. (Later, he will note that he is “OK with cilantro.”)

Those three words could just as easily function as the overall theme of Phil Lord and Chris Miller’s marvelously entertaining and deep-feeling “Project Hail Mary.” And, before you balk at the ol’ important-questions-on-a-dry-erase-board gambit (sorry to “A Quiet Place,” we love you, but that dry-erase board has got to go), know this: The film earns such a heady question. It even answers it.

Based on Andy Weir’s novel of the same name, the film’s comparisons to Ridley Scott’s own Weir adaptation “The Martian” are certainly fitting, but Lord and Miller’s first directorial outing in more than a decade also weaves in shades of everything from “Cast Away” to “E.T.” and just about every (good) film about unlikely friendship you could possibly name.

Picking up in media res on Grace’s journey (he is never called Ryland, and only briefly “Dr. Grace”) is a smart way to get audiences immediately invested in whatever the hell our hero has gotten himself into, though the choice ultimately dilutes some of the film’s lasting power. Who was Dr. Ryland Grace? What was his life like on Earth? And why does it feel like such a distant memory? Small quibbles, really, because what we do see and learn over the course of the film is so instantly compelling.

As a bearded and baffled Grace attempts to figure out not only who he is, but why he is on a spaceship, what he’s meant to do on it, and much more, Gosling’s natural charm and affability shine through. His amnesia is only temporary, and smaller answers tend to make themselves known in unexpected ways. “Am I smart?” Gosling hollers at no one (everyone) when he quickly solves a math problem, even as he’s mostly unable to dress himself or walk upright (well, gravity and all that). But he’s surely capable and emotional, as we see when he sets about giving space funerals to the two fellow astronauts who died during the journey, and that Grace, despite all his best attempts, just can’t remember.

Don’t worry. Answers are coming. “Project Hail Mary” is adapted for the screen by Drew Goddard, who previously scripted Ridley Scott’s film version of “The Martian,” so he’s phenomenally well-suited to the material. Flashbacks and memories are seamlessly integrated into the film as Grace recalls them, and the audience grows eager to unpack the mysteries of the film and the mission at its center.

‘Project Hail Mary’©MGM/Courtesy Everett Collection

A few years before Grace’s solo magical mystery tour to the outer reaches of the universe, a strange phenomenon was discovered: a thin, dim line of infrared radiation between Venus and the sun. That alone would be disconcerting, but that the line (dubbed the Petrova Line, after the scientist who discovered it) seems to be linked to a new, gradual dimming of the sun? That’s catastrophic. Or, it’s sure as hell about to be.

Flashback Grace is a middle school teacher, one who really seems to love sharing his love of science with his kiddos, even though he clams up about the Line and the so-called “Dots” that make it up. This Grace? He knows too much, and he’s not about to freak out his young charges. After all, he was once a molecular biologist, one who managed to get himself kicked out of the scientific community due to some of his more out-there beliefs.

The main one? Oxygen, kind of a scam! Or, more precisely, that oxygen is not key to all life, a concept that’s really not that wild, but one that bends toward a specific kind of non-Earth-bound way of thinking that his fellow wonks really did not like. So when Eva Stratt (a delightfully composed Sandra Hüller, who later makes off with the most heartbreaking karaoke scene I’ve ever seen) shows up at his school to talk to him about the Line and what the world’s governments plan to do about it, he’s naturally resistant. Stratt, however, does not take no for an answer, and Grace is soon drafted into working on what will eventually be called Project Hail Mary: a plan to not only understand the Dots (their fancier name, “astrophage,” which means “sun eater,” explains why they’re so nefarious), but to off them for good.

Grace has some early success with his experiments — hilariously and fittingly, he has to conduct them on his own, though he does eventually draft help from the g-man overseeing him (a very funny Lionel Boyce) — and discovers plenty about the astrophage. Yup, they’re consuming the sun, and the energy they get from that helps power them to the next sun or planet or whatever they are going to chow down on (they “toot to scoot,” as he puts it). (The film, like Weir’s books, is chock-a-block with heady scientific chatter, terminology, methodology, and theories; much like “The Martian,” Goddard does stellar work making it all understandable, digestible, and even fun.)

Of course, Grace is hardly the only scientist that Stratt has on this damn thing, but he does emerge as an early contender for unlikely MVP. Up in space, he’s about to meet another MVP.

Grace is also not the only scientist or the only unlikely space traveler drafted to save his world from the astrophage (how he came to be on the ship is a spoiler for much later in the film). Flashbacks and his own work have finally clued Grace into his mission: go to distant star Tau Ceti, which is swarmed with its own astrophage invasion and has not dimmed, and figure out what’s so damn special about the system (and what could be replicated on Earth).

When he arrives in the Tau Ceti system (as with all of the film’s many space shots, these sequences, especially in IMAX, are stunning), someone else is already there. And, there’s no getting around it, he’s adorable. If you wished that Matt Damon’s Dr. Mark Watney somehow managed to make pals with his potato plants in “The Martian,” have we got a film for you. But Grace’s new friend — an engineer from the star system 40 Eridani who looks a bit like a particularly flexible rock crossed with a jittery crab, and whom he names Rocky — isn’t just here for buddy humor. He also proves essential to all of Grace’s missions. Not just the “save Earth” one, but the “who am I?” one, too.

‘Project Hail Mary’

Lord and Miller’s film is already neck-deep in process porn before Rocky rolls onto the scene (yes, he does eventually roll, care of his own smart designs), but having a new partner for all his calculations and machinations and worries and wonders only amps up this particularly pleasurable element of the film. Come for them engaging in rudimentary puppetry, stay for them working out each other’s respective alphabets in real time (James Ortiz, who puppets Rocky and eventually voices him, is a star capable of nearly outshining Ryan Gosling).

The pair are well-matched on all fronts, particularly when it comes to their intellectual pursuits. For as advanced as Rocky’s civilization is, there are a few things he just doesn’t know about, like radiation (perhaps the Eridians just don’t need it, what an idea). Grace may have all that handled, but Rocky has a real knack for finding new ways to solve problems, and these two are about to have a lot of problems to solve. Space! Pretty scary! And, for anyone concerned that this all sounds a bit too chatty and fun, the final act of the film is crammed with the kind of space-set action sequences that will likely only further remind you why a Lord and Miller “Star Wars” would have been so great.

To write more about the pleasures and pains of “Project Hail Mary” would be (yes, over 1,300 words in) a disservice to what’s most entertaining and satisfying about the film: watching it unfold, enjoying the process, accepting the mission, asking the big questions. That’s about as much as you can ask from any blockbuster film these days.

Grade: A-

Amazon MGM Studios will release “Project Hail Mary” in theaters, including IMAX, on Friday, March 20.

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