Don’t Look Up Review

by Allie Vasserman

Reviews

February 25, 2022

Don’t Look Up (2021) is a satirical comedy movie starring Leonardo DiCaprio as Dr. Randall Mindy, Jennifer Lawrence as Kate Dibiasky, Meryl Streep as United States President Janie Orlean, Jonah Hill as Jason Orlean, Cate Blanchet as Brie Evantee, Rob Morgan as Dr. Teddy Oglethorpe, and Ariana Grande as Riley Bina. It is directed, written, and produced by Adam Mckay.

The movie starts off with PhD candidate Kate Dibiasky discovering a comet about five to ten kilometers wide. She shows it to her professor, Dr. Randall Mindy, and they calculate that the comet will hit Earth in six months and fourteen days. Upon impact, it will wipe out all life on the planet. Kate and Dr. Mindy call Dr. Teddy Oglethorpe and request a meeting with President Orlean to discuss the situation. After talking to the president, who does not take their concerns seriously, Kate, Dr. Mindy, and Dr. Oglethorpe decide to leak the information about the comet to the media and the public themselves. 

Usually, end-of-the-world disaster action movies have a few incredibly likable main characters who face obstacles throughout the movie and save the world at the end. This movie, since it is more of a satirical comedy, does not necessarily have such a happy ending. Most of the characters are pretty unlikable and behave in selfish ways. Leonardo DiCaprio’s Dr. Mindy lets fame and power go to his head and makes poor decisions with his work and with his family. Meryl Streep, as the president of the United States, does not take the threat of the comet seriously and only takes action when she thinks she can make a profit from it. She cuts corners on every single plan and chance to save humanity, and it is revealed that her only real intention is to save her own life. Jonah Hill plays Jason, the President’s idiotic son who is incompetent and obnoxious and has power only because his mother is the president. I instantly disliked his character and President Orlean, which shows what good actors Jonah Hill and Meryl Streep are. This movie portrays most of the government officials as selfish people who only want to gain money and power and do not care about serving the public. I liked Jennifer Lawrence’s character the best, because to me, she was the most realistic of all the characters. Her reaction to the comet and the way in which she processed that she was going to die seemed very understandable to me. While watching this movie, I kept hoping that if such a world-ending disaster were to actually happen, governments would handle it better. 

Overall, I found this movie pretty entertaining and I definitely recommend watching it. One tip: if you want to see Meryl Streep interact with aliens, or Jonah Hill’s character get what he deserves after his despicable behavior throughout most of the movie, make sure to stick around for the post-credits scenes.