“Don’t Look Up” is the third film I’ve reviewed in Netflix’s growing catalog of big-budget films with loaded casts and very prominent names and talent behind the camera, and it’s perhaps the most complicated. Filmmaker Adam McKay– known by most for his “Anchorman” films, “Step Brothers,” “Talladega Nights: The Ballad of Ricky Bobby,” and “The Other Guys,” and celebrated by many for his politically/socially relevant films “Vice” and “The Big Short”– along with an inconceivable cast composed of Leonardo DiCaprio, Jennifer Lawrence, Meryl Streep, Cate Blanchett, Jonah Hill, Rob Morgan, Mark Rylance, Tyler Perry, Timothée Chalamet, Ron Perlman, Ariana Grande, and Kid Cudi, among others, lead this endeavor. Most of the time when a Netflix-produced film comes out, there’s general consensus on whether it’s good, bad, or simply meh, with the occasional advocates pining for the film either way. “Don’t Look Up” has the honor of being not only one of the most divisive Netflix films of the year, but one of the most divisive films of the year, period.

The plot is deceptively simple– three scientists try to convince the world that it’s facing extinction from a massive comet hurtling on a direct path with Earth. They come to this conclusion using science, numbers, and logic, and have even determined the exact timeframe in which everyone has to operate and mobilize to try and save the human race. Where the density, much of the comedy, and point of the film materializes is how these scientists go about convincing people of the disaster and the various things that happen as a result. It’s marketed largely as a comedy, but the humor is not abjectly funny in the traditional sense of comedy, with much of it coming at the expense of human nature and the world. It’s derived from blunt satire and commentary, which may be, and certainly has been, a turnoff for many people. 

It’s a film that, despite being fairly straightforward and linear, has a lot happening. It attempts to hit every group, every destructive, misconstrued, or otherwise harmful facet of mankind and culture in its tirade to exhibit our inability to handle and process bad news, especially when that bad news is exacerbated by or is the result of our own actions. Our response to and against accountability is the cog that keeps the story moving and is the principle that the script is primarily focused on. 

Everything from resource depletion, news media, politics, social and cultural issues, capitalism, consumerism and mostly any relevant aspect of modern society is skewered. The comet is ultimately relative, more of a symbolic ignition to all of mankind’s worst, but insanely human, tendencies than a tangible focus. That’s not to say its impacts, both literally and figuratively, aren’t real– as the end of the movie harshly reminds us– but that our destruction will be just as much our own fault as it is any cosmic or otherworldly event that is out of our control. 

Though I think the film is brilliant, it’s by no means perfect. The story is predicated on satirizing as much of human nature, society and culture as it possibly can, which means there is very little in the way of narrative structure other than the constant propulsion forward by the looming comet. This means that some segments are far more effective and funnier than others, and some are duds.To the point of the critics, much of the narrative exists in a vacuum and as a way to set up these gags and commentary. That is, the film exists primarily to reflect and examine the pitfalls of human nature, social structure, and cultural response rather than tell a cohesive or explicitly moral story.  

“Don’t Look Up”’s nearly two and a half hour runtime drags at many points  especially towards the latter half of the film wherein things at least seem slightly more optimistic and the various characters go on their own paths without much direction. The issue is that much of the paths and subplots simply don’t add much other than a cameo here or there, and there is virtually no character development. The exception is Leonardo Dicaprio’s character, who is still involved with the main narrative during this period, but we see very little in the way of meaningful commentary, which is, again, what sustains the integrity and momentum of the film. 

However, the film, even in its most arbitrary moments, consistently offers striking imagery complemented with fantastic editing, and there are some fun needle-drops spliced throughout. The cast chemistry is ludicrous– there’s not a moment where they aren’t giving their all to the script and commentary– and everyone fully buys into their characters with consistently subversive, funny and infuriating results. Nearly every film with Leonardo DiCaprio in it also has a “Leo” moment– a moment wherein his raw acting abilities are put on astonishing display– and this movie has possibly one of my favorite “Leo” moments, especially given the nature of the moment in context to his character. For as bleak as they are, the last moments of the film are also genuinely gorgeous and haunting, handled with great finesse by Adam McKay and the entire film crew. 

The fundamental issue with “Don’t Look Up” – at least from the perspective of a target demographic enjoying what the film has to offer– is that it is a dramedy and an existential disaster film, but it is not wholly any of those things. This results in an odd and frequently nihilistic mix, with it’s drama being too outlandish to feel grounded, it’s comedy too bleak to feel “funny”, and it’s pacing too slow to feel exciting or tense. The divisive nature of the film is likely the result of it not having a broad enough appeal for general audiences to understand or enjoy what it’s trying to achieve, and more refined audiences may feel undersold on its rather surface level assumptions about human existence. It’s not supposed to be understood by any of what it’s marketed as– it’s supposed to be objectively blunt about humanity, and, in a way, its lack of depth is in itself a critique on the limitations of human thought and action. 

The thing about truth and reality is that movies act as a way for many people to escape those things. “Don’t Look Up” forces audiences to confront them. Ironically, it’s nominated for a Best Picture Oscar while holding a 56% on Rotten Tomatoes, though when society reaches unsustainable levels and we face extinction, I’m sure the film will be looked back upon with cult-classic status. Several critics have accused the film of being too cynical for any actual enjoyment, and while it’s a valid critique– the weight of the comedy and context for it can be overbearingly close-to-home for many– that’s kind of the whole point of the film. That critics are criticizing the cynicism at play seems to be a painful example of exactly what the film is prodding at.

So, in summary, “Don’t Look Up” is a frequently exhausting, occasionally boring, but ultimately timely and painfully honest film with a lot of creative filmmaking, large aspirations, and some truly funny dark-comedy. There’s very little narrative arc and the character development mostly occurs through caricatures of whatever the film is trying to satirize, aside from Jennifer Lawrence and primarily Leonardo DiCaprio, but the performances from it’s all-star cast are unanimously fantastic, terrifying, and hilarious, and the comedy hits the nail on the head far more than it misses. 

It’s the type of film where you either love or hate it, or fall somewhere in between not truly understanding who or what it is for. I highly recommend it– especially if you feel hopeless and frustrated with the world around you and need affirmation that we are, indeed, not living in some kind of simulation and that other people feel the same way– but it is an acquired taste that doesn’t offer much in the way of hope or resolution.