Project Hail Mary | Words of Encouragement
- Forgotten Cinema
- 1 day ago
- 2 min read
Now Showing: Project Hail Mary (2026)
Space movies live or die by their emotional core. The spectacle is easy enough to manufacture with floating debris, impossible distances, and the cold silence of the void. What's harder to manufacture is the feeling that you genuinely care about the person floating out there. Project Hail Mary, directed by Phil Lord and Christopher Miller, gets that part exactly right. And then some.
We'll just say it up front: we loved this movie.
What Makes Project Hail Mary So Good?
Ryan Gosling plays Dr. Ryland Grace, a middle school science teacher who wakes up alone on a spacecraft with no memory of how he got there, only to slowly piece together that he's light-years from Earth on a one-way mission to save the human race.
It's a high-concept setup that could easily feel cold or mechanical, but Gosling makes it warm, funny, and surprisingly moving. His performance carries the film the same way his character carries the mission: through sheer ingenuity and an irresistible likability that makes you want to follow him anywhere.
Butler's word of choice for this one was phenomenal, and he used it more than once.
Ryan Gosling and Rocky: The Best Duo of 2026?
The heart of the film is the relationship between Grace and Rocky, an alien he encounters whose planet, Erid, faces the same extinction-level threat as Earth. Rocky is a technical marvel, and the friendship that develops between these two very different beings is the film's greatest achievement.
It's funny, touching, and sneaks up on you in ways you don't expect. If you've ever wanted to watch a man and a talking rock become best friends while trying to save two worlds simultaneously, this is your film.
Does Project Hail Mary Have Any Weaknesses?
We'd be doing you a disservice if we pretended the film was flawless. Our main reservation is structural. The hero's journey framework occasionally makes the pacing feel a little too smooth for its own good, and a major development near the end would have landed with considerably more emotional weight had it come just a bit earlier. These are minor quibbles for a film that keeps you genuinely engaged for its entire runtime, but they're worth noting.
Should You See Project Hail Mary in Theaters?
Absolutely and without hesitation. This is a film that celebrates curiosity, friendship, and what people, and apparently some aliens, are capable of when they decide to work together. It's smart without being cold, emotional without being manipulative, and uplifting in a way that feels genuinely earned. If you're looking for a film that sends you out of the theater feeling good about the universe, Project Hail Mary is it.
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