From the Earth to the moon, and beyond...
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Feature Rating: To put the aesthetic vision and tone of Nolan's ambitious, nearly-three-hour-long opus — rich with black holes, wormholes and giant sarcastic robots — into perspective, think Stanley Kubrick meets early M. Knight Shyamalan. Admittedly, it's not the most straightforward concept to wrap one's head around, which is why it's probably for the best that Nolan (who co-wrote the screenplay with his brother, Jonathan) chooses to launch the story in a more grounded manner: on Earth, where, in the not-too-distant future, a global food shortage threatens to extinguish the lives of every last man, woman and child on the planet. It's here — in a rural farmhouse constantly being battered by swirling dust storms — that we're introduced to Cooper (Matthew McConaughey), a widower and former pilot whose NASA career has crashed and burned. Nowadays, he does what he can to prolong the survival of the human race, which translates into growing corn (the only food that hasn't yet gone extinct) and caring for his two children, 10-year-old Murph (Mackenzie Foy), and her older brother, Tom (Timothée Chalamet). That is, until the day a series of unexplained gravitational anomalies leads him and his daughter straight to the front gates of a top secret NASA base, where a group of researchers — professor Brand (Michael Caine), his daughter, Amelia (Anne Hathaway), and scientists Rommily (David Gyasi) and Doyle (Wes Bentley) — have been working tirelessly on a possible solution to Earth's no-win scenario. Their idea? A manned expedition to another galaxy, to explore the viability of life on other worlds — and they want Cooper to fly their spaceship. With a storyline spanning multiple decades — with Jessica Chastain and Casey Affleck eventually taking over the roles of Cooper's children — Interstellar may have all the trappings of a typical Hollywood blockbuster, but what's truly wondrous about it is that it works on so many levels. It's a thought-provoking sci-fi treatise, a jaw-dropping visual tour de force and a moving piece of dramatic filmmaking, with an unexpected amount of humor to boot. In fact, its daunting running time can barely contain the scope of the movie's ambition, which is just as much about the power of the human heart as it is about the power of science.  As he did with the latter two installments of The Dark Knight trilogy, Nolan — this time working with cinematographer Hoyte Van Hoytema — chose to film portions of Interstellar in the IMAX format, a decision that's faithfully upheld by Paramount's Blu-ray presentation, which utilizes shifting aspect ratios to best approximate the theatrical viewing experience for home audiences. The 35mm footage boasts subtle film grain, while IMAX sequences appear slightly crisper and clearer. But either way, the results are full of breathtaking color and detail, whether it's a closeup shot of Cooper on the porch of his farmhouse or a panoramic view of him standing on the edge of an icy precipice on another planet. The impressive visuals are matched by an engrossing DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 soundtrack, which immerses viewers in the sounds of rumbling spaceship thrusters, vicious dust storms and massive tidal waves. The only caveat is that the blaring crescendos of composer Hans Zimmer's score sometimes overpowers the dialogue; but it's worth pointing out that this is an intentional aspect of Interstellar's sound design, and not a flaw in the audio encode.  Paramount's 3-disc Blu-ray release come fully-loaded with extras, including an authentic IMAX film cell, a DVD copy of the movie, an iTunes/UltraViolet digital copy, plus a second Blu-ray disc devoted entirely to the following bonus features:
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* Reviewer's note: Portions of this Blu-ray review were adapted from my original review of the theatrical release, published on November 5th, 2014.
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