One of the most anticipated premieres of the last trimester of 2020 was Netflix's release of George Clooney's The Midnight Sky apocalyptic tale. Not only is he the leading actor but he is also the director of this piece, a work that has received controversial feedback from audiences.
Even though there has been an Oscar talk emanating from certain critical circles, the movie has also been given low ratings in others. But one thing is true: The Midnight Sky has left fans questioning a series of details and story connections that don't seem either shown or explained in the film. Viewers got an insight into the end of the world caused by Earth's destruction, but they might have missed details that either help explaining important story moments or raise further questions.
10 A New Habitable Moon Close To Jupiter
During the movie, the audience learns that a so-called "moon K-23" is discovered as not only habitable but the next living spot for the remaining two characters, Sully and Commander Adewole, who are traveling inside the Aether spaceship.
However, there's been controversy around this moon considering that is it so close to planet Jupiter and seemed a bit unrealistic that, by now, its existence wouldn't be a known fact. Considering that Jupiter is not that far away from Earth, the location of this moon is a detail that should have been better explored as a far-away satellite somewhere really distant from us in our solar system.
9 A Swim In The Artic Freezing Waters
Movies about space, what might be beyond what we already know as earthlings, and especially theories about a collective dystopian future - these are all topics that are worthy of thoughtful treatment and tend to grab viewers' attention like a few others.
It's easy to understand that audiences get hooked on the many possibilities of where our species could be headed when facing potential extinction. Still, there are people on the web saying that the movie shows details that call attention to scientific errors, like Augustine's (Clooney's character name) survival while swimming in the glacial waters at such a low temperature. This would have been highly unlikely to have happened in real life.
8 Playing Chess For Two
A moving picture adapted from Lily Brooks-Dalton's 2016 novel Good Morning, Midnight, this film follows the last living days/weeks of an astrophysicist whose final mission is to warn a group of astronauts on how unsafe it is to return home. In the first few scenes, fans see a bored, terminally-ill Augustine who seems to not be doing much at the remote facility he's in, except self-medicating with alcohol, pills, and blood transfusions.
At some point, though, his dissatisfaction is such that he finds himself playing chess alone. This moment is an important detail to highlight this character's loneliness.
7 An Analogy While Playing Cards
This is a movie that happens in the midst of a global cataclysm in the year 2049. The Midnight Sky is filled with both visual and narrative analogies that connect some storylines. One of them is the scene where Sully and Adewole are playing cards in a leisure moment, inside their spacecraft.
While this couple has developed a romantic relationship during their mission, their closeness was probably solidified during some of these one-on-one card games. The same thing happens with Augustine and the little talented girl, Iris, as their familial bond grows while playing classic games to pass the time.
6 The Crew Singing Nostalgic Upbeat Songs
The Midnight Sky likely won't earn a cult following but it has received amazing reviews from some critics. There's a scene in particular where the crew spontaneously starts singing Neil Diamond‘s charming “Sweet Caroline.”
Here, fans enjoy a lighter moment that is emotionally contrasted with the preceding tragedy of losing one crew member, called Maya, played by actress Tiffany Boone. In a comms repair spacewalk gone wrong, the astronauts' singing act is a poetic episode amidst the dramatic and hopeless vibe that the audience feels from the first minute of this film.
5 A Hint In Iris' Shoes
While it is not until almost the end of the movie that fans learn who the little girl really is, a small detail that only the most attentive viewers may have noticed gives a hint on her identity. In a flashback scene, as Jean (Iris' mother) scoots her child into the car, the girl's clothes, face, and hair are all concealed.
However, the camera shows her shoes and they are identical to the ones worn by Iris when Augustine discovers her hiding in the observatory kitchen. By taking a second look at the shoes, this match clearly suggests what's to come long before the final reveal.
4 Cold From The Inside Out
Written by Mark L. Smith, who previously wrote The Revenant, this movie's story also centers around how much regret Augustine has over his choices in life — particularly about his abandoned daughter. In a symbolic sense, as the plot takes place while the main lead is in the Artic facing cold, frozen temperatures so is his heart.
He is "cold" from the inside out as viewers watch a very detached young man, later on, feel the remorse of the decisions he made for himself. It's as if the frosting environment that he's in is constantly reminding the character of his own "internal coldness" when it came to choosing to be an absent father while his daughter was growing up.
3 The Deepest Question
In this post-apocalyptic story that covers George Clooney's most transformative role yet, fans empathize with this dying lonely scientist who is racing against time to stop Sully (his forgotten daughter) and her ship crew from returning to Earth.
When Augustine decides to hike, alongside the imagined Iris, to another antenna to try to make contact with spacecraft Aether, there is a moment when he is caught off guard with the question "Did you love her?" This happens while in a dream he's having and as soon as Iris asks it, Augustine abruptly awakens.
But the interesting detail is in what this question could represent. Who was Iris referring to when she mentioned "her?" Her mother Jean? Or herself? In the end, it is obvious that this is another Augie's self-talk moment where he asks himself this profound question.
2 A Spin On The History Of Adam And Eve
By the end of the movie, it is clear that Iris, the child that Augustine Lofthouse has supposedly encountered, is nothing but a ghost of a memory from his past - that came in the form of a hallucination.
Soon after the audience discovers this fact (even though many viewers had their suspicions early on in the film), there's a final conversation between Lofthouse and Sully/Iris where he convinces her and Adewole to head back to K-23. As the continuation of the human race seems to rest upon this couple's shoulders, it is likely that this is a symbolic reference about the oldest religious history of mankind.
1 An Environmental Disaster During A Global Pandemic
Conceptually speaking, this movie has a fantastic premise and perhaps this is one of those cases that viewers who disliked the picture could feel more poignant during a second watch. But while most people would agree that its cinematography is astounding as it brings the audience into the coldness and loneliness caused by "The Event," many people have wondered why Clooney decided to create an environmental disaster film in 2020?
The Midnight Sky was released at the end of 2020 and this detail might not be just a coincidence. In an interview with US Today, Clooney did say that the premises was created with the thoughts of humanity's impact on the environment. However, among the pandemic, the movie did make him think about "the inability to be with the people you love [...] or communicate with."
Perhaps this was meant to reinforce a relatable scenario where fans could feel touched watching this film. Yet, no matter the efforts, many say that they couldn't help but feel emotionally detached from its main characters/storylines.
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