When I watched the trailer for Don’t Look Up, I was thought it was comical in a way that you’d do that through-the-nose exhaled laugh at something mildly amusing. But I couldn’t help but notice that the ensemble cast, featuring an array of Oscar, Golden Globe, and Writers Guild Award winners, was attempting satire at the expense of a very serious climate crisis without the means to do anything about it. They were taking the mick out of themselves for profit and my friendCass summed it up in her Letterboxd review. Here are the opening lines:
I’m mad at everyone who told me to watch this movie.
Even if the cast DO understand they’re the butt of the joke, which I think a lot of them do, they just walk away with a pay check. And they carry on with their Hollywood liberal fake-caring bullshit, and the sheeple argument lingers. And fundamentally nothing changes. Those people just got another bundle of cash instead of doing something. As usual.
It was giving me Deep Impact vibes but replacing Hollywood sanctimony with Hollywood liberal humour.