Stowaway (A Review)
The shuttle isn’t the only thing with a few holes.
In an attempt to become a better writer I’ve decided to do reviews of everything I watch in the hope of improving my skills and better understand the little things that make writers succeed.
Last night after watching the Oscars I opted for Netflix’s latest space drama/thriller, Stowaway.
There is a lot here to enjoy. Fans of Gravity and Apollo 13 will no doubt draw comparisons to the plight of another space crew in jeopardy. Anna Kendrick, Toni Collette, Daniel Dae Kim and Shamier Anderson give wonderful performances.
However, my biggest issue with the film happens during the introduction of Michael (played by Shamier Anderson) the titular stowaway, and a Launch Support Engineer who, after being discovered by Toni Collette’s Commander character, attempts to explain how on earth (or on Mars) he managed to get trapped in an overhead panel and hooked onto the one tube that handles the removal of harmful CO2 gas from the ship.
While running routine checks on the ship’s numerous buttons and monitors, Collette notices drops of blood coming from an overhead panel. She then has to use a screwdriver to undo the screws and only then does the stowaway drop from the ceiling.
I know many people won’t have an issue with this. I get that suspension of disbelief is an important aspect of films of this genre, but personally I was immediately taken out of the story.
One of the biggest questions facing any film about a stowaway is that of,
‘How did the stowaway get stowed away?’
Particularly on a space shuttle destined for Mars. The film quickly glosses over the how when Michael, after being patched up by Anna Kendrick’s Yale-loving doctor character, explains that he was ‘arming the 2nd stage firing pins… I thought I was buckled in…’
I’m not a NASA or in this case Hyperion (the fictious SpaceX company that in the future will be sponsoring underfunded trips to Mars) Launch Support Engineer, but I find it hard to believe that the stage 2 firing pins which I assume help fire the rocket are located in the same overhead bin as the CO2 Emissions Control System.
For aspiring writers this has to be one of my biggest pet peeves especially when I receive rounds and rounds of notes from potential managers and studios and really anyone kind of enough to read my writing telling me that I need to be clear and concise in my story-telling. Things need to make sense. They need to add up.
Personally, I can accept suspending my disbelief for the purposes of believing that we will one day have routine flights to Mars. I can believe that somehow Anna Kendrick is more adept at scaling a tether than Daniel Dae Kim. Those things don’t cause me to typically call bullshit on a film.
But I couldn’t get over how a guy responsible for arming the firing pins, ended up trapped inside an overhead panel where he had no business being in the first place.
The creators moved quickly past the point and any attempt or opportunity to explain the why vanished soon after when they made the choice of only sharing Toni Collette’s half of her conversation with Mission Control.
The focus quickly shifted to how four people were going to survive on a shuttle that only was equipped to handle three. I actually found this section of the story to be really well done. The moral dilemma of what to do when someone accidentally gets stowed away on a mission to Mars seemed realistic. Again, the actors did a fine job of playing the reality.
Unfortunately, the fact that Michael ended up in this position by accident only increased my focus on that aspect of ‘How?’ ‘How did he get there?’
It would have made more sense if we had learned that he was put there on purpose for some nefarious reason, but the accidental nature of his being there demands that the accident appear plausible.
As I said, I’m relatively new to this and I welcome discussion on the points I’ve made. I’m in no way saying I could do it better. Just highlighting the things that I think would be done better considering the amount of time and money put into a production of this scale.
I’d love to hear your thoughts.
