When I first saw Christopher Nolan’s Interstellar, I was a little non-plussed. It’s certainly a gorgeous film, a true space opera beautifully shot in the grand tradition.
But with its themes of five dimensional beings and alternate realities, of how the power of the universe is mystically connected to the power of personal feelings, it was all a little beyond my grasp.
But then this weekend I found the key. I came upon a cultural artifact from more than forty years ago, a long lost gem, a beacon of clarity interred (perhaps by design) deep within the vastness of YouTube.
I realized that this video which spoke to me — quite literally — must be a message, sent by wise and incomprehensibly advanced five dimensional creatures from our distant future, and planted into the recent past of our own time line, to elegantly underscore the connections between spaceflight, alternate realities, and personal alienation that were to later find their way into Interstellar.
I speak, of course, of this.