Ad AstraAd Astra

In the near future, a series of mysterious lightning storms put Earth in critical danger. Roy McBride, called upon by U.S. Space Command, is informed that the source of the storms is related to ‘Lima Project’ led by his father Cliff McBride who has been missing while searching for extraterrestrial life. To conduct further investigation and find a solution, Roy heads to outer space. ‘Border’ is a keyword that is critical in understanding the world of the New York born, Russian-Jewish director, James Gray. In his films including The Immigrant, a film about a Polish woman who flees to New York after the outbreak of World War I, and The Lost City of Z, a film of a British explorer who heads to the Amazon in search of an unknown civilized city Z, various characters are seen crossing borders. Similarly, Ad Astra sets up a spatial border between Earth and Space, along with a psychological border between father and son, which provides an additional point of enjoyment for the audience. This is the reason that even though Ad Astra is a film which takes place in outer space, it seems more like a family movie about the father-son relationship than a Sci-Fi movie. (LEE Jong-chan)