The newest collaboration between creative partners Adam Sandler and Netflix, sadly Spaceman is no Uncut Gems and Hustle with this newest "serious" Sandler effort a muddled attempt at doing something different, making it a valiant exercise that fails to capitalise on a decent idea.
Partnering with HBO's Chernobyl breakout director Johan Renck, there was hope amongst film fans that the talented filmmaker could strike gold with his work with Sandler who over the last few years has had some of the best periods of his career but despite the two talented men and support from the likes of co-stars Carey Mulligan and Paul Dano, Spaceman is a film that quickly loses steam across its 100 minute runtime to produce a messy collection of half-explored ideas that lead to an unsatisfactory conclusion.
Throwing its audience straight into the years long journey of Sandler's Czech solo space explorer Jakub Prochazka as he ventures to worlds unknown at the edge of our solar system, Spaceman delves into the fracturing mental space of a man who is for all attempts the most loneliest human alive, battling his separation from his long-term partner Lenka (an underutilised Carey Mulligan) and a bizarre friendship with Paul Dano's "space spider" Hanus who has made himself at home in Jakub's spacecraft and who may be real or a figment of Jakub's imagination.
It's an undeniably quirky set-up for a sci-fi adventure, one that unfortunately forgets the adventure part of things as it zones in on the human elements of this narrative, flashbacking between Jakub's life back home with Lenka and mostly confined to the craft he shares with Hanus but Spaceman never maximises the potential that was within its reach as the film's initial hopeful flames are blown out and we get trapped on a repetitive and unrewarding experience that will disappear from many viewers memory within days of watching.
Finding success in more serious minded projects in the past such as Punch Drunk Love, Reign Over Me and the previously mentioned Uncut Gems, Spaceman must also be regarded as one of Sandler's most notable mature project failures with the likable everyman persona he has perfected over decades lost here on the uninteresting and mostly unlikeable Jakub.
Considering we spend most of our screen time as a fly on the wall to Jakub's space expedition it's a shame we never connect to him much on a higher level and despite some great voice work from the always committed Dano, neither Jakub or Hanus have the connection the film needed to elevate its other weaker elements and while well-intentioned, the familiar messages at the heart of Spaceman and the inability to make things exciting and powerful ensure this is a high-concept Netflix original that never threatened to take off.
Final Say -
While always nice to see Sandler get outside of his comfort zone and deliver something out of the ordinary, Spaceman is a failed attempt to create an original Sci-Fi experience with a human focus that can't come to grips with its various elements or its hairy multi-eyed co-star.
2 space spiders out of 5.
Jordan and Eddie (The Movie Guys)
Partnering with HBO's Chernobyl breakout director Johan Renck, there was hope amongst film fans that the talented filmmaker could strike gold with his work with Sandler who over the last few years has had some of the best periods of his career but despite the two talented men and support from the likes of co-stars Carey Mulligan and Paul Dano, Spaceman is a film that quickly loses steam across its 100 minute runtime to produce a messy collection of half-explored ideas that lead to an unsatisfactory conclusion.
Throwing its audience straight into the years long journey of Sandler's Czech solo space explorer Jakub Prochazka as he ventures to worlds unknown at the edge of our solar system, Spaceman delves into the fracturing mental space of a man who is for all attempts the most loneliest human alive, battling his separation from his long-term partner Lenka (an underutilised Carey Mulligan) and a bizarre friendship with Paul Dano's "space spider" Hanus who has made himself at home in Jakub's spacecraft and who may be real or a figment of Jakub's imagination.
It's an undeniably quirky set-up for a sci-fi adventure, one that unfortunately forgets the adventure part of things as it zones in on the human elements of this narrative, flashbacking between Jakub's life back home with Lenka and mostly confined to the craft he shares with Hanus but Spaceman never maximises the potential that was within its reach as the film's initial hopeful flames are blown out and we get trapped on a repetitive and unrewarding experience that will disappear from many viewers memory within days of watching.
Finding success in more serious minded projects in the past such as Punch Drunk Love, Reign Over Me and the previously mentioned Uncut Gems, Spaceman must also be regarded as one of Sandler's most notable mature project failures with the likable everyman persona he has perfected over decades lost here on the uninteresting and mostly unlikeable Jakub.
Considering we spend most of our screen time as a fly on the wall to Jakub's space expedition it's a shame we never connect to him much on a higher level and despite some great voice work from the always committed Dano, neither Jakub or Hanus have the connection the film needed to elevate its other weaker elements and while well-intentioned, the familiar messages at the heart of Spaceman and the inability to make things exciting and powerful ensure this is a high-concept Netflix original that never threatened to take off.
Final Say -
While always nice to see Sandler get outside of his comfort zone and deliver something out of the ordinary, Spaceman is a failed attempt to create an original Sci-Fi experience with a human focus that can't come to grips with its various elements or its hairy multi-eyed co-star.
2 space spiders out of 5.
Jordan and Eddie (The Movie Guys)