Don’t Look Up Review: Devastatingly Shallow

Adam Mckay’s cinematic call for climate change doesn’t meet its grand expectations.

Leonoardo Dicaprio, Jonah Hill, Jennifer Lawrence, and Meryl Streep star in Don’t Look Up.

Adam Mckay’s newest film Don’t Look Up has been as divisive as the apocalyptic event it depicts. It is ironic that the film has garnered such differing reviews, as its quality is just as inconsistent as the opinions that determine it. Mildly entertaining but disappointingly shallow, I cannot call Mckay’s latest outing either a complete failure or success.

The film boasts an all star cast that are all significantly underused. Opening on Leonardo Dicaprio’s Dr. Mindy and Jennifer Lawrences’s Kate Dibiasky, the action begins almost immediately with the discovery of a comet and its inevitable landing point. The two travel to the white house to meet with the president and her chief of staff, played by Meryl Streep and Jonah Hill respectively. The opening segments are fun, high energy, chaotic and a sign of good things that never come. What becomes apparent a mere half hour into the film is that very little actually happens. It is not until nearly half way through the hefty two and a half hour runtime that any sense of character development is displayed (only with Dr. Mindy) and something besides “people are bad” transpires. It is chock full of characters screaming at each other to pay attention to the existential dread knocking down their front door, but that becomes shockingly uninteresting the further the movie progresses.

It is this shallowness present in the first half that bears its roots and infects the entire film. Every character is underwritten to the point of being defined by a single adjective. The plot moves slowly and with great repetition with momentum only being created by the disorienting editing and cinematography. Speaking of, the camera work is consistently handheld for the “chaotic” look that was novel in the beginning, but an eyesore by the end. Even the dialogue is ankle deep, with any sense of nuance being lost through characters blatantly spouting themes and character development directly at the camera. However, perhaps the most glaring example of the films hollowness is the stock footage consistently placed between scenes that devolve humanity into nothing more than a few hummingbirds and vistas.

I believe this lack of substance is heavily induced by the films, at times, downright horrific editing. Cutting scenes in the middle of dialogue can be funny, but the film seems to mistime these cuts so it consistently feels awkward. Intercutting scenes are also poorly paced and often paired with different scores backing each one, making it feel choppy instead of comical. There are shots shorter than a second that induce confusion rather than intrigue, and even if that was the point, it became so distracting I couldn’t help but stare at my screen lost rather than immersed. The editing also detracts from the main point of the film due to the disconnect it creates. With scenes being so short resulting in little screen time for pivotal character moments and the world’s reactions being boiled down to vague crowds captured by drone shots and social media renders, I did not feel connected to this reality. I never felt present in this world, nor that it was an actual, united, setting. Everything felt vague and distant, and for a film that is pleading the viewer to recognize this world in relation to their own, that has to be a detriment to its core themes.

However, no matter how muddled this message may be in execution, that does not mean it is unimportant. If anything, this movie proves that a satire can be as deep as a puddle but still hold value. Although I find the movie to be average, I am not unaware of the message it is sending. In fact, I don’t believe anyone could be, but that is not necessarily a bad thing. It begs the question that if this movie was not so aggressive in its presentation, would it be understood by the very audience it is targeting? And perhaps the only way people would sit down to watch a movie with a premise as depressing as this one is to make it entertaining and somewhat shallow. It’s an easy watch, and despite its numerous flaws, I was entertained throughout. The comedy is usually little more than recognition, but that doesn’t mean I didn’t let out a few laughs. The cast, although poorly written and underutilized, is electric to watch when present. The themes, while blatant and no deeper than knowledge most people are already aware of, can be fun to see played out on screen. It’s an incredibly mixed bag with more bad apples than good ones.

All in all, I can’t say this movie is successful at being a nuanced satire that exceeded the heavy expectations it created, but I cannot be as out of touch to say Don’t Look Up is pointless and insignificant in our time. Entertaining yet shallow, Don’t Look Up is a tragic and disappointing look at our modern political climate that never reaches the heights it should have.