The Fifth Dimension and the Alternative History of the Earth: Understanding the Idea of the Interstellar Movie. The Meaning Of The Film “Interstellar”: Actors, Explanation Of The Ending & Title, Plot Analysis.
Interstellar is high quality fantasy. This is not just a kaleidoscope of universal secrets, Einstein’s paradox, time loops, alien worlds and global cataclysms.
In the center of the picture is a man and his behavior in extreme circumstances. And the meaning of the movie “Interstellar” is as follows: love is attraction, and the force of love is gravity.
Actors and roles
The actors of “Interstellar” did not just play their roles – they lived them. The film stars Matthew McConaughey. The actor, who has previously played a lot of movie handsome men, and often flickering in the roles of romantic heroes, perfectly portrayed a strong image. His hero is a courageous, intelligent man who was not afraid to take part in the expedition, despite its complexity and strangeness.
Matthew McConaughey as Cooper. Frame from the film.
An excellent pair of McConaughey was Anne Hathaway. We can say that the eternal conflict between the “man of science” and the “man of faith” lies only in her: Dr. Brand is a scientist, but at one moment she understands that the most important thing in this world is love.
Anne Hathaway as Dr. Brand. Frame from the film.
The plot of the movie
Summary of the picture: the main character, former astronaut Cooper, who in the past faced an inexplicable gravitational anomaly, lives a quiet life and brings up two children.
According to the plot, the Earth is at the very epicenter of an ecological disaster. Massive contamination of cultivated plants with an unknown pathogen has led to a global famine. The world no longer needs astronauts: farmers are in trend.
But one day Cooper’s house is in the center of another gravitational anomaly, which is perceived by his daughter solely as a poltergeist. Cooper does not believe in otherworldly forces, but at the same time he goes to the found coordinates and finds a secret NASA base.
Here he learns two things: firstly, in 40 years, humanity will have to die, and secondly, 50 years ago, scientists discovered a wormhole (wormhole) near Saturn.
Cooper is told that 12 astronauts have already been sent through the wormhole in order to find a planet “on the other side” where humanity can move to permanent residence.
He is invited to take part in the expedition. The hero is faced with the first serious choice: save humanity and leave his children at the same time, or stay with his family, entrusting the salvation of humanity to someone who is hardly able to cope with this mission.
Frame from the film.
What does the name “Interstellar” mean?
The word “interstellar” consists of the prefix “inter” and the root “stellar”. The prefix “inter” means the same as the English word “between”. In Latin, the word “stellar” means “stars”. The title of the film literally translates as “Interstellar”.
But in English this name does not sound at all. That is why the film is also called “Interstellar” in the domestic box office.
When events happen
The film is likely set in the 21st century. But this is just a theory. It is only known for certain that the Nolans inspired the “Dust Pot” to create the painting: this was the name given to the powerful dust storms that swept across the American and Canadian prairies in the 30-40s of the 20th century.
Mythology
The world shown in this film has the structure of a classical myth. Here there is a timeless fifth dimension (includes highly developed beings and a tesseract, which is an intermediary between the temporal and the timeless) and historical being, which includes Society and Nature.
The hidden meaning is that everything in this universe carries its own idea: even the smallest event is part of something big.
Of particular importance in the film is the motive of time and eternity, heavenly and earthly. Time and Earth are sand, and are depicted in yellow-brown. Eternity is Heaven: it is symbolized by a bright blue hue.
To understand the idea of the film, one should observe the change in the wardrobe of the main characters. At the very beginning of the picture, Cooper refers to the Sky, and Murph refers to the Earth. As an adult, Murph wears a brown jacket. The explanation for this looks like this: she lost hope that the problem would be solved. But the solution is still found, and she takes off this jacket.
According to the mythology of the film, a powerful external force is love, which acts against our will. When a person falls in love, he seems to join some kind of “superpower”. The action of this amazing feeling spreads through time and space: in strength it becomes equal to gravity.
Frame from the film.
And the film also says that a person is not alone in this universe: there are some forces that look after him. But this is not even God in the generally recognized (traditional, religious – whatever) concept …
Murph in a black hole
Cooper manages to figure out that thanks to the library that leads to the room of his daughter, Murph, he will be able to influence all sorts of points in time and space. To do this, you will have to use gravity to move objects.
The hero realizes that with the help of gravity, he must send a message back in time. He also understands that the recipient of this message should be Murph, who will eventually play a major role in saving humanity.
Frame from the film.
Where does Cooper go from a black hole?
According to the plot, Cooper is brought into a wormhole. There he continues to make observations, and sends everything he sees to TARS. He waits for death, but still survives.
After that, it is transferred in an incomprehensible way to a multidimensional library. There, having the opportunity to look back on yesterday, he eventually understands the meaning of his mission.
What is a wormhole
For an explanation of this term, one should turn to Einstein. One day he wondered: what if massive bodies are able to bend time around them?
In 1976, NASA proved this by sending atomic clocks 10,000 km from Earth into space. At the same time, a radio signal was sent down to the Earth (to exactly the same clock). It has been found that on Earth, time flows 30 microseconds a day slower.
Einstein also suggested that massive bodies can bend around themselves not only time, but also space. And this was also proven after a while. The main question to which modern physics still cannot find an answer is: where does space curve?
As if in answer to this question, a wormhole (wormhole) was discovered. It is a gravitational anomaly with which astronauts can move from the solar system to some distant place.
The passage of time on different planets
1 hour on the planet Miller equals 7 Earth years. According to the heroes, time on the planet goes faster for the reason that it is located next to a black hole called “Gargantua”.
For an explanation, one should turn to Einstein’s theory of relativity. It has been proven that Gargantua is much more massive than the earth. For this reason, the curvature of time and space around her is much greater. That is why time on the planet Miller goes much faster.
The meaning of the ending
The ending provides an explanation as to who the enigmatic “they” are, who were believed to assist the heroes in their mission. In the end, it turns out that these are the people of the future, who managed to conquer five dimensions with the help of gravity.
The ghost that Murph was talking to was Cooper himself, who was trying to reach out not only to his daughter, but also to himself.
Conclusion: the meaning of the film
Interstellar was created on the basis of the theoretical works of an astrophysicist. According to the decoding of the data he received, if anything will save humanity from a possible end of the world, it will be high technology.
For this reason, the world shown at the beginning of the film, a world devoid of technology, is doomed to die. For the same reason, Cooper’s daughter dies at the end of the film, and TARS, to which he sincerely attaches himself, replaces his father-in-law on the porch of the recreated farm.
Cooper goes from a person who does not trust the robot that controls his ranger, to a person whose only close being is the robot.
Cooper’s main value was his daughter, whom he, despite the happy ending, could not save. But at the very end, his behavior demonstrates that the main value for him is the salvation of mankind with the help of acquired knowledge.
Astrophysicists liked the film very much. In their opinion, this film is a version of an alternative history: it is about what could be and what else can be.