What would you do if you knew there was a chance that life on Earth was about to end? If you were Leonardo DiCaprio, you might have a panic attack in the bathroom. Or, if you were Jennifer Lawrence, you would perhaps order two more glasses of wine at lunch. At least, those are the strategies their characters take in the first trailer for director Adam McKay’s Netflix original film Don’t Look Up. And to be fair, they have a pretty good reason for doing so, as they’re playing two people who’ve discovered that a life threatening asteroid is headed straight for Earth.
But unlike most other “killer rock” movies, like say Deep Impact or Armageddon, the world of Don’t Look Up just doesn’t feel that concerned. And it’s a pretty star studded universe, with Mark Rylance, Jonah Hill, Ariana Grande, and Meryl Streep playing some of the figures we’ll see navigating this particular crisis. But as you can see in this short first look at Don’t Look Up, the only problem bigger than the asteroid hurtling through space is the species that needs to act in the name of its self-preservation.
From the moment they discover this gigantic threat to life as we know it, Leonardo DiCaprio and Jennifer Lawrence’s Don’t Look Up protagonists are sent on a wild ride. Visits to the White House, andspots on cable news with anchors played by Cate Blanchett and Tyler Perry ensue, all with the goal of getting the world to care about impending disaster. But of course, how harsh could this reality be when you’ve got Ron Perlman playing an astronaut, who looks like he’s ready to blow up this scourge of humanity? Clearly, that’s a solution that's bound to work, right?
Co-writing and directing his first fiction narrative since 2010’s The Other Guys, Adam McKay looks like he’s made a return to the world of dark comedy in a way that crossbreeds films such as that with his more recent output. The man behind politically charged films like The Big Short and Vice, you can tell that McKay is still very interested in commenting on modern society. Only this time, the comedy is based somewhere outside of our reality.
If you were to take Deep Impact, and replace scenes of Morgan Freeman sternly meeting his advisers with Meryl Streep and Jonah Hill declaring the apocalypse as “boring,” you’d basically have Don’t Look Up. And from the looks of things in this first teaser, that’s a concept that could work like a charm. Especially when Leonardo DiCaprio and Jennifer Lawrence are our guides through a very familiar, yet totally exaggerated, world.
Don’t Look Up collides with a limited release in theaters on December 10th, with Christmas Eve marking the day Netflix subscribers can enjoy the film on the streaming platform. While you might not want to look up for the time being, you can definitely look at the 2021 Netflix movie schedule, which shows what other delights are headed to that streaming library in the months to come. Though if you want to see Timothée Challamet or Chris Evans on the big screen a little sooner, the 2021 release schedule is the key to planning your next dreamy night out at the movies.
