Project Hail Mary blasted off to a spectacular $80.6 million at the domestic box office, blowing past expectations to land the second-biggest opening for a non-franchise film in the past decade after Oppenheimer. Critics are likewise heaping praise on Christopher Miller and Phil Lord’s adaptation of Andy Weir’s novel, with a 95 percent positive score on Rotten Tomatoes. For once, moviegoers are in lockstep with the critics, with the film’s audience score at 96 percent.
In some respects, Project Hail Mary — about an astronaut (Ryan Gosling) who befriends an alien in an effort to save both their planets from a solar catastrophe — is a rather traditional, feel-good hero’s tale. The story’s concept and broad beats are not subversive or esoteric. And yet, there are several elements of the film that are — in their own quiet ways — daring in their retro simplicity that swim against the currents of tentpole moviemaking.
Here are four lessons studios could take from Project Hail Mary‘s success…
Assume Audiences Are Smart: Project Hail Mary is dumbed down compared to Weir’s novel. Still, for a major studio release, it leans heavily into science and doesn’t hold the audience’s hand nearly as much as one might expect. The storytelling is the exact opposite of Netflix‘s alleged tactic of restating a story’s plot repeatedly on the assumption audiences are too distracted to follow a story (Netflix executives have denied this, but anybody who endured the exposition-laden final season of Stranger Things suspects otherwise). It’s interesting that the other $80 million plus non-franchise opening weekend was Oppenheimer as Christopher Nolan’s film was also brainy and science-heavy. In fact, Nolan — who Hollywood seems to regard as some outlier hitmaker whose success cannot be replicated — repeatedly trusts his audience with challenging narratives. It’s always better to be a bit too smart than a bit too dumb.
Embrace Sincerity and Optimism: When you think of Hollywood, two words that probably don’t leap to mind are “sincerity” and “optimism.” And you can tell by the films and shows the industry puts out. What’s striking about Project Hail Mary protagonist Ryland Grace is his earnest “let’s figure it out!” attitude. It’s a deeply old-school American sentiment. There is also not a single character in Project Hail Mary who might be considered a villain, or even vaguely obstructionist. Everybody is presented as a good and capable person trying to do the right thing. We get a smart twist when the film reveals that Grace didn’t volunteer for the apparent suicide mission and was forced onto the ship, which makes him overcoming his cowardice all the more heroic. As has been widely pointed out, the film is a stealth 1980s-style family friendly “PG” movie, but without the smarmy, manic tone that infuse so many productions targeted at that audience.
Patience Can Be a Virtue: Nobody wants to be bored watching a film. But there’s something to be said about letting a film breathe rather than over-optimizing an edit. Project Hail Mary is two hours and 36 minutes. There are scenes in the film that are surprising in their inclusion that one imagines a studio (like, say, Disney) would typically insist on cutting — such as Grace giving a tender funeral for his crew mates who the audience hadn’t even met (at least, at that point), or project leader Eva Stratt (Sandra Hüller) singing “Sign of the Times” at karaoke (a scene that was Gosling’s idea). Neither of these scenes advance the plot. They do not contain action. They do not contain comedy (both are, in fact, a bit of bummer). But they make the film richer.
Use Practical Effects Whenever Possible: A Hollywood Reporter story picking up the directors’ comments about Project Hail Mary not having a single greenscreen shot went viral a couple of weeks before the film opened (the film does have digital effects, but used practical backgrounds and, for the alien Rocky, employed an animatronic puppet). “Not a single green or bluescreen was used,” Miller said. “The whole ship was built as a set from the inside. We had a huge section of the exterior of the ship on the outside that we built. [The alien character Rocky] was really with us at all times. And so, that’s what makes it feel real and makes it feel natural.”
It’s rare that any statement nowadays gets universal support online, but you’d be hard-pressed to find a moviegoer who doesn’t appreciate this idea. You see it in other franchises, too — the level of adoration fans had for the practical and on-location filming used by Andor over Disney+’s other Star Wars efforts, which typically shoot against an LED volume wall. Other recent examples: Actors flying in real fighter jets in Top Gun: Maverick, Denis Villeneuve building massive practical sets and shooting in a real desert for the Dune films, and Alien: Romulus returning to animatronics and actors in suits for its franchise revival.
The rise of “AI slop” online has, if anything, made moviegoers crave authenticity even more. Yet the industry is going full speed ahead the other direction to keep costs down, particularly as AI hybrid production (filming on a studio set and using AI to help with backgrounds and effects) takes off. But notice how Game of Thrones fans loved the tactile feeling of A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms — largely filmed outdoors in Northern Ireland — over the far bigger budget House of the Dragon, that heavily leans on Warner Bros. Studios in Leavesden. It’s easy to point to a CG effect and say, “Look, we added value.” But the feeling of real also has high value — and doesn’t always need to cost more — it’s just tougher to sell in a trailer. Real a vibe — less “know it when you see it,” but “know it when you feel it.”
