Interstellar (2014)

Halfway through the most science-heavy blockbuster of its decade, Anne Hathaway stops to argue that love is basically a force of physics, and the movie expects you to nod along. That’s Interstellar in one scene: real wormhole math sitting next to feelings at full volume. Some of it is clunky. The farm dialogue gets buried under wind and that giant pipe organ, and the last act asks for a lot of faith. But Matthew McConaughey watching years of video messages from his kids is the scene that wrecks everybody, and he plays it with nothing but his face. TARS, a walking filing cabinet with jokes, is the MVP. The water planet wave is pure dread. It runs 169 minutes, made $782.9 million worldwide, and 2.62 million IMDb ratings average an 8.7. An 8.3 because when it hits, nothing else hits like it, and when it lectures, you feel every minute. $2,627 says you hear the ticking in the water planet scene and start counting how many years you just lost.

What works: McConaughey watching the video messages, the docking sequence, TARS, and a score that makes space feel enormous and lonely.

What doesn’t: Dialogue gets buried in the sound mix, and the love-as-physics speech and the third act ask the audience to take a lot on faith.

Who it’s for: Anyone who has ever cried at a sci-fi movie and blamed allergies, and space nerds who want the math with the feelings.