Don’t Look Up

By Joanna Langfield

Adam McKay’s alleged comedy about the end of the world should be ambitious. But, somehow, it sure doesn’t feel that way.

I’m not saying I didn’t laugh once or twice as we watch a rather dandy Leonardo DiCaprio and Jennifer Lawrence try and tell the masses about the comet they discovered which is on its way to destroy the earth. But a lot of these hahas feel like inside jokes, snickers at government officials who brush off the panicking astronomers until it might be politically advantageous to take a meeting. And the slicker than a snake morning tv hostess, while slitheringly played by Cate Blanchett, feels as much of a one note as does the President, featuring a Meryl Streep who appears to have been left on her own as to do something because, after all, she is Meryl Streep.

And basically, that’s the real problem here. DiCaprio stretches, to puff himself out as a midwestern professor, which is fun, but then what. And Lawrence, making a much appreciated return to the screen, is the hip chick who has to keep repeating the same dumb joke as the world, we are told, is coming to an end. And while they are surrounded by a boatload of equally talented supporting players, everything seems disjointed, as if actors showed up for a few days, appeared in something they hoped would be a smart satire about global warming and then flew the coop.

And that’ the good part. The end of this comedy (their word, not mine) does for broke, insisting we look at the coming last hours as helplessly as do the hoards who were told not to look up in the sky for the oncoming killer. It’s heartbreaking stuff. And anything but the fun promised. Which is what it should be. Because maybe we shouldn’t be laughing, however snidely, at our own demise.