I'm willing to tolerate the "beyond the event horizon sequence" and the associated strangeness because the movie is, as a whole, something of a modernized rendition of 2001: A Space Odyssey, with the aforementioned sequence of scenes being an analogue to the infamous "beyond the infinite" sequence in 2001. Unlike 2001's cinematic rendition however, Interstellar at least makes an effort to explain its Gainax Ending, for better or worse.
The ending of this film, much like 2001, heavily depends on Clarke's Third Law: "Any Sufficiently Advanced Technology Is Indistinguishable From Magic."
This is a signature. There are many like it, but this one is mine.
There is one problem I have with Clarkes Third Law though. It get what he's saying that Suffiecently advanced technology can often do the same things as magic. But, It feels different when written properly.
^Hardly. Magic in stories is often better thought out and more logically consistent than some made-up technologies. You can't forbid them from using the same plot devices unless they're in a different coat of paint.
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A Trippy Mismash
SPOILERS!!!
Intersteller is a hard science fiction film that relied on renown theoretical physicist Kip Thorne to make it as scientifically accurate as possible.
The first two hours are overall a pretty good film. The Blight, wormhole coincidence, and higher dimensional aliens are acceptable extreme fiction to work with a drama taking a more realistic look at humanity facing extinction and asking what it means to be truly live instead of just surviving. The science aspects felt more like background, but worked with the story because they were not as fantasy as other sci-fi shows like Doctor Who or Star Trek.
Then the weird stuff started happening. Theoretical physics relies on mathematical models to try to guess and explain how the universe works. None of it has yet been tested and you can sometimes have competing, but equally valid theories or it could all be wrong. Many of the ideas of theories come across as alien to most human reason that it is no different from magic. And sadly that is what happens here.
The sudden introduction of a tesseract, time travel, humanity's future decedents, and love somehow being quantifiable and a basic part of the universe is jarring and pulls you out of the narrative. If feels like it moves out of the genre of hard science fiction to Science Fantasy. The ending itself felt rushed as if the director realized how long the film was becoming and needed to wrap things up quickly.
It is a welcome chance from the Science Fantasy films that are often found nowadays and is a good exploration of human drama in this setting. However, it could have done without the last twenty minutes or so that get into too much of a mind trip that it takes the viewer out of one genre and into another. This is no way a bad film, but out of recent realistic science films I liked Gravity better.
7/10