There is a common refrain that people have in relationships: “If you love someone, let them go.” This isn’t to suggest a swift divorce or to excise them entirely from your life. Instead, it’s a message of trust, to believe that like a boomerang it will return. It’s okay to be attached to a person, but it’s also important to not hold them back, allowing them to live their lives and grow. If love is really there, they will return stronger than ever before, and everything will course correct. While there’s a tragic undertone to this, it’s mostly used as a way of revealing some deeper truths about how two people feel about each other in that void.
Proxima (2020) is a new French drama that explores this through the narrative of a European astronaut facility. The protagonist, Sarah Loreau (Eva Green) has dreamed about going to space, visiting the world beyond their orbits. As the promise to potentially visit Mars becomes more of a reality, she must train for an uncertain future. It’s endless days of testing technology, going on long hikes, and trying to control one’s heart rate. Everything needs to be perfect to make this work. By the end of the story, the uncertainty still lays ahead. What director Alice Winocour cares about is not what lies beyond the stars, but what is being sacrificed at home.
This is especially true of Sarah’s daughter Stella (Zélie Boulant), whom she prepares for life without her. This comes with putting her in a good school, making sure that she has the right care. She struggles with math and has trouble making friends. It’s the typical problems that a child has, and yet they feel elevated because Sarah’s days are numbered. She will be leaving one of these days and must capture as many fond memories as she can, realizing that she’s about to miss some formative moments in her life. Father Thomas (Lars Eidinger) promises to raise her respectfully, even buying her a telescope to view the stars from the back patio.
But why would Sarah do this? When she has so much to be grateful for on Earth, why would she give up this happiness for a journey into a very isolating experience? Nothing about the training feels human, finding constant struggles with technology, finding days where the human body doesn’t have the will to endure. Why does she want to do this? It’s because she has been dreaming about this opportunity her whole life, to visit space and improve mankind’s understanding of the world.
Not only that but for as much as this moment will drive them apart quite literally, there is something encouraging about it. The long hours of meetings find Sarah babysitting Stella, wandering around boardrooms and seeing her hounded by media. As Sarah trains, there is this bright smile that appears from time to time, realizing that Stella is proud of her, watching the day approach slowly. Even as they have personal moments with each other, it’s a story about how they try to form a deeper bond, finding their own independence in these small moments.
What makes this story powerful is how encouraging it is. Whereas most space dramas center around the desire to visit the stars, this one is asking questions about the relationships that are being left behind. They’re not being done out of vindictiveness, but a drive to follow their own dreams. It’s easy to believe that Sarah has dedicated a large portion of her life to this moment. She’s a nerd, knowing how every gadget works. She begins watching movies upside down, reading books end to the beginning. She wants to know what the world of zero gravity is like, and it becomes this meditative psychological drama that becomes one of mortality.
In-between the training, she has meetings and forms a deeper bond with her crewmates, doing everything to find a friendship that will last when the world disappears. For what it’s worth, Mike Shannon (Matt Dillon) may a bit of a braggart, but he has his heart in the right place. He is likely suffering his own battle of insecurity, but he uses humor to escape any pain. He enjoys seeing Sarah happy, even making a big deal about how their faces are now on magnets. They have become mini-celebrities, and he revels in it. They’re all professionals, but each provides something a little different. Sarah is still reserved and timid. She needs someone who is obnoxious like Mike to keep her sane, even if it sometimes leads to fights over her ability to raise Stella.
Another recent drama that explores the struggles of astronauts and their families comes in First Man (2018). While Proxima has some basis in truth, First Man focuses on the exploits of real-life NASA astronaut Neil Armstrong (Ryan Gosling). It isn’t the first time that he has been brought to the big screen, though it’s a significant biopic for what it’s really saying. Again, this isn’t about how great outer space is. While the third act will feature a dazzling spectacle of Armstrong walking around the moon, it’s only emphasized by the aching loneliness that Armstrong has faced throughout this entire story. It’s the culmination of a journey.
Because before that, First Man has been lobbied with a less ideal question: is going to the moon worth the sacrifice? From the opening chapters, Armstrong is faced with death, including his own child. It’s the kind of sorrow that weighs heavy on him as he tries to go about life. He still dreams of the moon, but the world around him is asking why. NASA has various experiments that range from small mishaps to a horrifying training simulation that ends with astronauts burning alive in a shuttle. Like Armstrong, nothing deters NASA from moving forward, wanting to experience something new and exciting.
What’s interesting about Armstrong, especially when compared to Sarah, is how he treats those close to him. Both characters have rich family lives and yet have a distance, but Armstrong feels less likely to have a rich, passionate encounter with his wife Janet (Claire Foy). There is a love there, but mentally he began his journey to the moon months ago, finding the start and stop of the mission only repressing his emotions all the more. In some ways, the reality that everyone around him is dying only makes him feel more encouraged, realizing that his sacrifice wouldn’t be singular. It would be part of a greater mission.
Sarah, by comparison, feels compassionate and likely to help her daughter with homework while on a teleconference. She cares about the future of her life, and even as her body grows weary, suffering injuries and exhaustion, she keeps moving forward. Her inner monologue, presented in voice-over, constantly fills her with the struggle to be a great mother and a quality astronaut. It’s a pressure that she shares with her coworkers, reflecting how this is a mission she cannot achieve on her own.
While Armstrong is able to do similar, he’s more reserved. There is an ambiguous world inside of his head, and Gosling brings a quiet, observant performance. He can sit in his backyard, staring in the sky above, and it feels like director Damien Chazelle is allowing the viewer to give into the ambiguity. Is Armstrong supposed to be sympathetic or stubborn? Maybe he’s both. Whatever the case, he remains impenetrable to the world around him, focused on a fear that stilts him from outside forces. He wants to be out there at all costs, and the years of training is the only thing that he really has a passion for.
The scores also have a different impact on the film. For First Man, the music by Justin Hurwitz is more melancholic, reflecting the void inside of Armstrong. It’s abrupt and beautiful in how it performs a ballet. Meanwhile, Proxima’s Ryuichi Sakamoto is less pronounced, managing to only accentuate moments of true happiness. As a result, it’s less memorable than Hurwitz’s. There is a build in the third act of First Man, finding the journey from launch to the final moonwalking sequence becoming its own powerful composition of tension and peace, clashing as the dream is finally being achieved. Sakamoto is able to make the third act shine with swelling emotion as well, though again their end goals are very different.
For First Man, it’s a quiet journey into space which feels like a greater symbolism for Armstrong’s interior loneliness. The landscape of the moon is impressive, managing to convey an expansive emptiness. While there’s still the scene of the astronauts returning, this is the moment that everything has been building to. With a gentle throw, Armstrong pays tribute to his deceased child by throwing a precious heirloom into a crater, making them a permanent resident on the moon. It brings finality and catharsis to the pain inside of him, creating closure. After all, the child was one of those who believed in him most, and there is that regret that she’s not alive to experience this moment.
Meanwhile, the relationship between Sarah and Stella is more directly optimistic. It may be a tale that is bittersweet at times, but it ends with this ambiguous sense of hope. Stella watches her mother begin to fly into the sky, wondering what lies beyond. The audience doesn’t actually see it, and yet there is a swirling amount of emotion. Both Sarah and Stella have achieved their personal acceptance with each other. For Sarah, it’s packing her whole life into a shoebox, serving as the only memories she will have to pull from.
What are those days going to be like in space? There is uncertainty, and many may come away feeling disappointed that this ends without a single shot of Mars. This is a story about unity among two women, about acceptance among a family who will be separated for a series of time. Even as there’s the suggestion that the hardest part of the trip is returning since you realize everyone’s lives have moved on, there is this wonder if this will be a tale of joy or sadness. Was the final shot going to be their final moments together, or will they meet again in a few years?
What makes Proxima far more effective as a character drama is that it’s easier to imagine the world that Sarah and Stella will live in. First Man has created a finite view of loneliness in death that is poetic. In the final shot where Armstrong, from quarantine, reaches out behind glass for human contact, it’s clear that he still feels removed. Sarah meanwhile feels like she has taken better precautions. She is aware of her mental health and is doing everything to prepare for the days when she feels most like giving up. The audience has seen her be vulnerable, and it’s empowering to see her overcome it. Armstrong meanwhile prides himself on not showing any sign of weakness.
Of course, one is more directly fiction than the other. First Man has to compare itself to history, using accuracy that limits interpretation. Proxima meanwhile is allowed to be more abstract and playful. Even if one can argue that there’s some truth in the process, it’s still a fictional story about a mother-daughter relationship that is beautiful. It conveys so much about the sacrifices everyone makes and allows insecurity to inform brash decisions. A bad day doesn’t make either of them a bad person. It’s just a moment to give a pep talk and attempt to rally each other to be their best selves.
Whatever Proxima lacks in historical truth, it more than makes up for with outright compassion. It’s a story that understands the complexity that comes with loving someone. It’s an accepting story that suggests that life doesn’t end at motherhood and that in some ways strengthens the respect between both. First Man may have a sympathetic look at the family, but it’s one of mourning and constant fear. Even as Armstrong achieves his dream, it doesn’t feel like it was enough. These are two sides of great astronaut dramas, ranging from giant spectacle to intimate humanity. Both feel important to understanding their struggles, and the secret key to either’s success is the people in their lives. Having someone you love goes a long way towards making even a small change to one’s outlook.
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