There is a part of Adam Sandler and the genius which is reflected in his latest film, Spaceman and many are for sure left shocked. From the great funny era of The grown ups and the nostalgia of Happy Gilmore, one thing with certainty we have come to know about Adam Sandler is he is really funny. His clothes were internet memes and his witty dialogues in all those high-budget romantic comedies he stars in were no less. Sandler cuts across generations of moviegoers and so even now as his career is still going on, he is, without any doubt, an acting legend. For this reason, it was a great honor for me to go for the private showing of Spaceman which took place in one of the Dubai’s most luxurious venue, the Egyptian Theatre. What was not tactful and useful, however, is my interest to find out all about the plot first. I knew two things: 1) Ms. Sandler would be appearing onscreen and 2) The movie was a space-based theme. Excited, I looked forward to Mr. Sandler’s address comments hoping to see some bizarre stuff like basketball shorts in a formal setting such as the event before the movie.
But when Johan Renck and Adam Sandler were presented, the audience was informed by the two well-suited men that Spaceman “was not a comedy.” To tell the truth, this completely shattered my spirit and I felt negatively throughout the rest of the movie, but I have to say for the record, my views on Renck’s Spaceman should not be construed as because of the film being unfunny.
The film Spaceman is inspired by the book Spaceman of Bohemia written by Jaroslav Kalfař. The movie features Jakub Procházka who is played by Adam Sandler, a Czech American who is on a mission to explore an interstellar cloud that resides around the planet Jupiter. All alone on his space ship, Jakub, engaged in a space race with South Korea, finds himself to be in excruciating solitude for the entire year. His wife Lenka, who’s pregnant and is played by Carey Mulligan, does not speak to Jakub via Czech Connect which was the system of communication Jakub usually relies on. Because of Jakub’s abusive emotional and physical negligence, oblivious and vulnerable perspective directed toward him by Lenka was painfully overwhelming which only steeled the core of separation between the two characters and made space travel for Jakub even more difficult.
The audience witnesses Jakub plunging into the most extreme state of solitude a state that, in turn, brings about the appearance of an arachnoid extraterrestrial (Dano’s voice). The enormous spider is somehow able to negotiate and converse in English, but stranger still, it embodies the controversies that seem to dance around Jakub’s head from the past and even the present. From the dark turmoil in his youth, to his wife’s nagging, Paul Dano’s spider has been the safe place for oppressive depression and feelings of estrangement. As we see more of Jakub’s past and his culpable behavior towards his wife, Spaceman wants to present a certain deep emotional story. Plagiarism of Interstellar by the makers of the movie Spaceman managed to make it even worse than in all previous films in fact, the movie turned out to be a dreary joke.
While Spaceman did not elicit as much disgust from me as Madame Web did, it was also not a pleasant experience. At least from the point of view of my sight. There were two mechanical issues for me. The first one is about the film not having the Czech language despite there being a Czech theme as well as a Czech writer and story. Sandler and Mulligan (to an extent) spoke English with Eastern European accents, which is acceptable, but they also spoke English in the scenes from the Czech Republic, which was odd. There are always unduly high expectations of the audience, and more often than not, they are disappointed, such as I was with this one. Actors inhabited the plot and history, which added to the film’s inability to connect with the story. I had higher expectations when it came to the accents, and I was equally disappointed by Spaceman’s dialogue. Yes, Paul Dano played a spider who yelled “Skinny Human” on repeat, which could be taken as comedic relief in the film, but that was not the case.
Instead, viewers stared in shock as Sandler’s character confesses his basic level fears and vulnerabilities to a spinning arachnid who repeatedly called him a “skinny human” and offered the same generic advice. What Renck presumably envisioned as an engaging drama with a spider as a therapist ended up being quite dull and boring. I remember straining my eyes and ears occasionally to keep them focused. Even more, the film attempted to generate some feeling of sympathy from the audience towards Sandler’s character, who was in fact, the most unlikable character. For the second time, Jakub had abandoned his pregnant wife on the Earth and gone for another space mission not a good husband and a father to be image in my view. If the intention of the movie was to show the avoidant attachment issues of an astronaut, how was it possible to have empathy for the character after such vile behavior? In fact, humors premise had all the chances to be the strongest facet of the movie combining depictions of an isolated astronaut and his spider pet would have contributed enormously to Sandler’ growing comedic portfolio.
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