Picturehouse Blog

Who better to tackle a thrillingly layered, post-apocalyptic sci-fi yarn like this than the master of cinema himself, Sir Ridley Scott? Scott's celebrated career, now entering its sixth decade, is a revelation for any movie fan – with each decade featuring some of the most ground-breaking cinema we have ever seen on screen. From Alien to Blade Runner, Thelma & Louise to Gladiator, Black Hawk Down to Prometheus, Scott's Academy Award- winning output continues to astound. It criss-crosses multiple genres, with sci-fi always up front in the man's eye. At age 88, he also happily shows no signs of slowing down. 

Here, translating a timeless novel to the big screen (in this case, Peter Heller's hugely popular tome about life after the apocalypse) is all in a day's work for the South Shields-born, Royal College of Art-educated movie-making giant. Working with a sensational cast, led by Australian superstar Jacob Elordi (Saltburn, Frankenstein, for which he earned a Best Supporting Actor nomination, and Wuthering Heights) as civilian pilot Hig, Scott knows how to get the best out of his actors. There's a quiet menace about Bangley (an ex-Marine and Hig's unlikely companion, played by the always brilliant Josh Brolin) and Pops (Guy Pearce), father to Cima (Margaret Qualley, The Substance), the girl who catches Hig's eye. It is the perfect cast for such an intensely rich experience. 

Set in the aftermath of a flu pandemic that has all but wiped out humanity, this motley crew of survivors must navigate their way through and around an array of obstacles – including a seriously scary Mad Max-like mob attacking our heroes' plane searching for a way out, for a better life, far beyond their new reality.

Audiences consistently love movies that dive deep into post-apocalyptic worlds, showing the decay of the everyday, the familiar being torn to shreds. Here we get the sight of cities reduced to eerie ghost towns as disease takes hold, leaving little in its wake. 

The film looks and sounds stunning, and with good reason. It has the celebrated cinematographer Erik Messerschmidt (David Fincher's collaborator on Mank and The Killer) behind the lens, and Scott's regular maestro, Harry Gregson-Williams (The Martian, House Of Gucci, Gladiator II) providing a typically big, cinematic score to awe the senses and push the story along. 

Like the very best of Scott's work, this is a film that combines intimate character work with action and spectacle designed to be seen on the biggest screen possible. What more could we possibly ask for?  Ed Gibbs

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