A critically-acclaimed sci-fi blockbuster that boasts one of Hollywood’s biggest stars in the lead role, secured an impressive 83 percent approval rating on Rotten Tomatoes, and scored an Academy Award nomination doesn’t sound like the type of movie that would be disowned by its creator, but director James Gray does not care for Ad Astra in the slightest.
The filmmaker made it perfectly clear that the production had been taken out of his hands at some point down the line, stating that “it’s not my cut of the movie, and I find it a very painful experience to have people tell me things they hated about the movie that I had nothing to do with,” which is about as definitive as it gets.
Ad Astra did end up flopping at the box office after topping out at $135 million in ticket sales, but Gray’s disdain for the end product is arguably its longest-lasting legacy, because it’s not often you hear the brains behind a genuinely well-received feature wash their hands of the whole thing in such a public way.
Netflix subscribers do at least seem to be in a forgiving mood, though, after it was revealed by FlixPatrol that the filmmaker’s bastard child he wants absolutely nothing to do with didn’t just crack the streaming service’s worldwide watch-list, but even snaffled the number one spot in the United Kingdom.
Some people are enjoying it, then, even if Gray would probably bristle if you told him Ad Astra had embarked upon a new lease of life on a platform that boasts hundreds of millions of subscribers worldwide.
Published: May 12, 2023 01:41 am