Spaceman

 What a weird little film Spaceman is. A slow-paced, meditative drama in science fiction drag with the heart of a crowd pleaser, full of weird imagery and concepts used to paper over hoary script contrivances.

 Jakub Procházka (Adam Sandler) is a cosmonaut six months into a year-long Czech one-man mission to explore a giant purple cloud that appeared near Jupiter. He's doing all right; I mean, he looks depressed, but one gets the sense that that's how he looks all of the time. As the film starts he's having trouble sleeping because of a noisy toilet malfunction, and getting a bit concerned as his wife Lenka (Carey Mulligan) hasn't called him in a couple of days.

 Unbeknownst to him, his very pregnant wife has just left him - with some time alone to reflect on their relationship, she's (justifiably) decided that their one-sided relationship is not working; so she sends him a message and moves away to a resort for single mothers somewhere in the countryside.

 Her message is intercepted by Mission Control, though, where Jakub's liaison (Kunal Nayyar) and his CO (Isabella Rossellini) hold it back, worried of the psychological impact it'll have on him.

 So Jakub proceeds with the mission, getting a little more concerned over Mission Control's evasive answers about his wife. And then he runs into an alien: A cuddly giant telepathic spider, with great big adorable eyes and the voice of Paul Dano, who entreats him not to fear it, that it's a friend.

 The spider had been studying humanity and became fascinated by Jakub; their relationship develops over the movie, as the spider pokes into Jakub's mind and unspools his relationship with Lenka in a series of achronological flashbacks.

This looks like a still from the best soap opera ever: "I swear, Glormax, it's not what it looks like"

  The feel of the film brings to mind the science fiction of Stanislaw Lem - it's got a sort of post-eastern bloc sensibility where everything is utilitarian, but with absurdist touches like Jakub being forced to recite the slogan for the insecticide company that sponsors the ship's sterilization mechanism before he can activate it. The ship is a beautifully designed space (production design: Jan Houllevigue), very lived in and full of hacks like laptops strapped onto the walls and retro-futurist elements like big chunky handsets.
 What's distinctly not like Lem's work is that the alien - which Jakub dubs Hanus - can not only be communicated with, it basically thinks and feels like a human; Other than its arachnid shape, it'd be near indistinguishable from one, in fact; One of the most annoying bad science fiction tropes out there. It was shit when Andy Weir used it in Project: Hail Mary (a book that might have some trouble getting adapted now that this exists!), it's even worse here stripped of all plausibility and where the alien's only function is to help Jakub work out his relationship troubles.

 Yes, that's basically all the alien does. That, and providing some new-agey bullshit about the purple cloud. "You never asked me about myself", Hanus says accusingly to Jakub, late into the movie; It makes thematic sense, because that's the gist of Jakub's issues with Lenka as well. But... come on, you luck into a friendly first contact scenario and you're happy to just use him as your counselor? Not even the least curiosity about a fucking alien culture? How was this guy ever astronaut material?

 I'd love to see the debriefing for all this. Sorry guys, we just chatted about my feelings.

 In any case, the movie's not any better, and it's more than happy just using the alien to teach one sad sack human that he's been mistreating his lady. File away the counseling space spider in the roster of lazy-ass romantic script devices, right next to the magical negroes and manic pixie dream-girls.

 It's an oddly unimaginative way to arrange an intriguing set of elements. The whole thing is played dispiritingly straight, and the initially promising setup becomes more mundane as it goes along instead of more awe-inspiring as it clearly aspires to.

 Once you get over the fact that this is more of a magical realist romantic fable with an astronaut in it than anything with any sort of intellectual rigor, it's all right. The relationship drama at its core is solid and affecting, if unoriginal, and the spider *is* pretty cute. Sandler is solid, even though his performance is much more one-note than his other serious roles (seriously, if you haven't seen Punch-Drunk Love, seek it out immediately), and the rest of the cast are all pretty good even if they don't get a lot to do.

 Once you get over its patent flaws, the script by Colby Day is all right, providing the actors with some good lines and cinematographer Jakob Ihre and director Johan Renck (of Chernobyl fame) with a few cool hooks to hang some intriguing imagery on. Plus one lovely allusion to Rusalka.

 The effects are a mixed bag, but look good for a mid-budget Netflix release, I guess. 

 Spaceman is strange and earnest enough to avoid the derogative #content comment so many of these streaming exclusives richly deserve, but it's also not that good. It's a cute movie - just be aware that as science fiction, it fucking reeks.