Project Hail Mary, the new space adventure starring Ryan Gosling, evokes a cinematic sense of wonder largely missing in mainstream movies today.
Content Warning: This piece discusses key themes and plot points of Project Hail Mary.
There’s a scene near the halfway point of Project Hail Mary, where Ryan Gosling’s American astronaut, on an important mission to save mankind, finally makes first contact with the film’s second lead—a puppet alien later called “Rocky.” As they communicate for the first time, Ryland Grace (simply referred to as “Grace”), whose characterization is that of a brilliant but cheeky scientist, playfully hums the three iconic notes of John Williams’s score to Close Encounters of the Third Kind. And while this referential, pop culture-obsessed moment may seem a little corny on paper, in the hands of a skilled and charismatic actor like Gosling, and filmmakers Phil Lord and Chris Miller, the moment becomes perfectly executed cinema, a thing of wonder: beautiful, fantastical, and filled with the type of awe missing in many mainstream movies today.
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Building Wonder
The modern age has brought all sorts of worlds to our theater screens and into our living rooms. It isn’t unusual anymore to see superheroes destroying cities as they fight armies of aliens, or for a lonely housewife to discover she has interdimensional powers and easily jump from one universe to the next. These are, of course, great at times—challenging filmmakers to be creative and sparking our collective imagination. But with so much available to us as an audience, we have, in a way, lost a sense of awe and magic at the movies.
Nothing surprises us anymore. Nothing brings us that Spielberg-esque sense of wonder and discovery, the way the filmmaker once did for children and adults alike during his blockbuster heyday in films such as Jaws, E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial, and the previously mentioned Close Encounters of the Third Kind. This is what Project Hail Mary does incredibly well as a film released at a time when subpar streaming action movies, too many Marvel Studios superhero films, and run-of-the-mill sci-fi pictures are populating our cineplex screens. Adapted from the 2021 novel of the same name by Andy Weir, it’s an earnest, compelling story about an ordinary man on an extraordinary space mission to save the Earth—one that, along the way, leads him to something incredible.
Directors Phil Lord and Chris Miller, who built their careers on IP-driven projects targeted at children, bring that sense of childlike wonder to their first truly adult film, and it works incredibly well. They place that wonder into Grace, who—unlike Tony Stark, for whom space travel is just a regular Tuesday morning—experiences it as something breathtaking, emotional, and quite frankly, magical, radiating off the screen and into the hearts of viewers watching his journey.
Lord and Miller also take great lengths to create a stunning, believable world for Grace. The ship known as the Hail Mary— which brings our lead character to a distant, dying star to research what’s killing the Sun in our solar system—is realistic and sleek, complete with rooms designed to mimic Earth’s natural environments (the Mental Health Break Room, as I like to call it), living quarters that feel cold and claustrophobic, and a control center that looks as if it came straight out of 2001: A Space Odyssey.
On the other hand, the production design of more fantastical elements are visual feasts unafraid of the color, texture, and wonder that many movies today lack. Take the alien’s ship, for instance: a crystalline, geometric hallway that reflects and refracts, which becomes the frequent meeting point of Grace and his extraterrestrial friend. It’s a refreshing change compared to the very neutral color palettes of other recent space adventures like Dune. Ironically, Project Hail Mary was photographed by Greig Fraser, the cinematographer who won an Oscar for shooting the first Dune film; he does exceptional work here.
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Hail Project Hail Mary
The filmmaking duo’s brilliant craftsmanship isn’t wasted, thanks to the brilliance of the leading man they’ve cast. Gosling provides an undeniable movie-star turn as Ryland Grace, in a gift-of-a-role that showcases all his strengths as an actor: charisma and charm, an indisputable talent for comedy, and a deep well of emotion that he easily communicates through his eyes and expressive face. Grace is an everyman. He’s not traditionally brave, nor does he particularly like his mission, but he does it anyway—executing science with believable fervor while hitting the emotional beats required of him, both in louder and more subtle moments.
In La La Land, Gosling showed us his musical talent and charm as a leading man in a romantic comedy. In Half Nelson, he starred as a discontent schoolteacher addicted to drugs and thoroughly demonstrated his capabilities as a dramatic talent. Project Hail Mary feels like a combination of both: Gosling has been given a range of situations that allow him to showcase a full spectrum of emotions. As Grace, he’s unsatisfied with his place in the mission, often feels incapable of succeeding, and isn’t always very brave. Yet his character is built to be cheeky and optimistic, giving him the chance to show us the fun-loving, charming side we’ve enjoyed in many of his past comedies. Honestly, it’s an Oscar-worthy performance; if Project Hail Mary carries its campaign well next year, Gosling may not get lost in the shuffle, and he could very well find himself nominated for Best Actor.
And what do we think about Gosling’s co-star? No, not German actress Sandra Hüller, who’s serviceable as the lead of the Project Hail Mary mission back on Earth, but ultimately appears in a role too small to discuss at length. I’m talking about the puppet Miller and Lord’s team created to portray Rocky, the alien who ends up aiding Grace on his mission.
Not since the 1980s—when revolutionary artists like Jim Henson and Frank Oz used puppetry to create memorable film characters that still stand the test of time against bad CGI—has a puppet felt this alive on the silver screen. Rocky feels so unbelievably real in form and function that, during the viewing, I honestly didn’t know how they did it. It didn’t have that fake CGI sheen, and I was surprised to learn after leaving the theater that it was, in fact, accomplished through puppetry.
This is truly a testament to the artistry of the directors, who’ve been pushing the boundaries of animation with their pristine work on the Spider-Verse franchise and the first Lego Movie, making them an unexpected but ultimately fitting choice to adapt Andy Weir’s 2021 novel into a dynamic, visually appealing, and touching piece of art worthy of moviegoers’ time and money. It is, without a doubt, the best film of 2026 so far; the question is, how long will that last? If Project Hail Mary is any indication of what the year has in store, then we’re in for a real cinematic treat.
“Project Hail Mary ” opens in cinemas on March 18.
Photos courtesy of Columbia Pictures
