SDCC '13: Description & Reactions To New GRAVITY Footage
New footage for Alfonso Cuarón's ("Children Of Men") new film, Gravity, debuted at Comic-Con, and the reactions were extremely positive. See what people though and a description of the footage.
The footage we saw starts with George Clooney and Sandra Bullock floating above the Earth, working on a connection to the International Space Station. Clooney is telling a funny story about a thing that happened to him at Mardi Gras. And then Houston suddenly cancels the mission and tells them to get out of there.
Time for an edge-of-your-seat scary glimpse of Cuarón's GravityExpand
We soon find out what's happened — the Russians have blown up one of their own satellites, probably a secret spy satellite that they were decommissioning, and there's been an unexpected wave of debris flying upwards at the speed of a bullet train — basically, there's tons of space shrapnel moving at supersonic speeds. Satellites are being trashed, and Clooney jokes that half of America just lost its Facebook.
Bullock is taking too long to disconnect from her Hubble systems, and Clooney keeps ordering her to leave immediately. But she's too late. And then they lose communication with Houston, and we see basically a bunch of hot knives coming up at them from low orbit.
Soon they have a "man down," as one of the other astronauts is knocked off by debris.
And then we see Sandra Bullock's astronaut on a tilt-a-whirl in space as she gets flung every which way on the piece of ISS that she's strapped to. She's trying to disconnect herself from her harness, as Clooney urges, but it's hard. And when she finally disconnects, she's flung, somersaulting, off into the distance.
At one points she's spinning so fast and so disorientingly that you pretty much get vertigo just watching. And she can't breathe. She tries to grab a hold of Clooney but loses it.
And then there's one shot where Bullock is holding on to a satellite by one hand, as it collides with another satellite, and bits of satellite are flying in all directions. And a third satellite is coming up in the background. It's like demolition derby in space.
Basically, insane danger, hundreds of miles away from any kind of help. This is the closest we've felt in a long time to the real intensity of being in outer space.
Plot Summary: Dr. Ryan Stone (Sandra Bullock) is a brilliant medical engineer on her first shuttle mission, with veteran astronaut Matt Kowalsky (George Clooney) in command of his last flight before retiring. But on a seemingly routine spacewalk, disaster strikes. The shuttle is destroyed, leaving Stone and Kowalsky completely alone--tethered to nothing but each other and spiraling out into the blackness. The deafening silence tells them they have lost any link to Earth...and any chance for rescue. As fear turns to panic, every gulp of air eats away at what little oxygen is left. But the only way home may be to go further out into the terrifying expanse of space.
GRAVITY was directed By Alfonso Cuarón ("Children Of Men") and the screenplay was written by him, Jonas Cuarón and Rodrigo García. The cast includes: Sandra Bullock as Ryan Stone, George Clooney as Matt Kowalsky and Basher Savage as space station captain. Coming out later this year!