"Project Hail Mary" Didn’t Take Off
With a quirky outline, Project Hail Mary stays within the bounds of human language and imperial fantasy.

Not long after World War I and the devastating “Spanish Flu” pandemic, Charlie Chaplin wrote a hit tune that is now largely forgotten but provides an upbeat message still relevant in 2020. “The while you sing a song, your troubles fade away,” it goes, urging us to “just smile and swing along”. It is one of the songs featured in Peter Polycarpou’s new musical revue, Falling Stars, which mines the vast American and British (and sometimes French) songbook of the 1920s and 1930s. Originally due to be staged at London’s Union Theatre in November, it has been filmed for streaming online to help us through the dark days of lockdown.
With a quirky outline, Project Hail Mary stays within the bounds of human language and imperial fantasy.
Written and directed by Rian Johnson (Looper, Star Wars Episode VIII: The Last Jedi), Knives Out was one of the most clever and intricately crafted films of 2019.
After years of mediocrity, Thunderbolts* is the welcome change MCU fans were waiting for.
Nick Rowland’s She Rides Shotgun is a blistering, blood-soaked road thriller that doubles as a bruised love story between a haunted ex-con (a career-best Taron Egerton) and the daughter he barely knows (astonishing newcomer Ana Sophia Heger). Fueled by white-knuckle chases, razor-tense shootouts, and quiet moments of aching tenderness, the film captures both the terror and fragile beauty of survival. It’s gritty, heartbreaking, and unforgettable—a father-daughter odyssey destined to leave audiences shaken.
The 1950s lesbian romance is stunning, emotional, restrained, and, simply put, one of the best movies I’ve ever seen depicting a woman-loving-woman (WLW) relationship.
A man invents the internet with the help of an otherworldly force. But he soon learns that not all is what it seems. A delightful sequence of images for a delightful fictional story about what lies behind.