Rating: 5/5

Three-Word Summary: Intergalactic space epic

Earth is dying. Blight is destroying crops, slowly starving the human race. Humanity has regressed to a Dust Bowl-era agrarian society.

A former test pilot, Cooper (Matthew McConaughey) is an over-qualified farmer, trying to raise corn and his two children.

A mysterious force leads Cooper and his daughter Murphy to a secret base where NASA is attempting to save the species by colonizing another planet. Cooper leaves his family behind in order to pilot the mission through a wormhole and into a new galaxy.

Much like director Christopher Nolan’s previous works, Interstellar is complex of plot with breath-taking cinematography. This space epic sweeps across a vast range of emotions as the astronauts hurl through open space.

But even as they leave the world and its people behind, the brave pioneers never leave behind their humanity. It’s what makes the film so relatable in contrast to it’s incomprehensible scale.

There is a touch of unbelieveable mysticism to the resolution, but it is nevertheless touching and undeniably personal. Nolan finds a way to reconcile the massive emptiness of space with the love shared between people.

Besides, nothing makes you sound more deep and intellectual than continually repeating lines from a famous Dylan Thomas poem. “Do not go gentle into that good night. Rage, rage against the dying of the light.”

McConaughey leads an all-star cast that also includes Anne Hathaway, Michael Caine, John Lithgow and Matt Damon. None is better than McConaughey as he convincingly portrays a man trying to save the human race while racing to get back to his family.

Interstellar is on par with Nolan’s already-robust body of work and helps to further establish him as one of the greatest active filmmakers.