Planetary

Despite all the globe-encircling eye candy, there’s a certain monotony of pacing imposed by the nonstop spoken input of various elders whose wisdoms seldom come in anything chewier than (at most) paragraph-length soundbytes.

The opening section, mixing shots of the Earth from outer space with recollections from astronauts about what it felt like to see it for real, is deeply moving and beautifully edited. However, once the film settles into a groove of guilt-tripping the viewer and trots out talking head after talking head...the experience grows numbingly monotonous and painfully sanctimonious.

Planetary’s message is repetitive without being enlightening, and the film and its assorted participants insist on hitting the same beats without pause, until the concept loses all meaning.