I have already seen “Interstellar” twice and the more I analyse and over-analyse it, the more mind bending it appears to be. What looked like an unusually straight-forward story by Nolan’s standards is actually turning out to be a complex multi-layered narrative, closer to his style of story-telling.
While I can go on and on with the space-time concepts, gravitational time dilation and their role in the plot complexities which already have their fair share of discussions on various internet forums, I surprisingly saw virtually no discussion regarding a very subtle, what seem to be intentional parallels between 'Interstellar' and the Superman mythos as presented in 'Man of Steel (2013)', which again is a Nolan produced movie. The similarities are hidden in plain sight. Let’s have a look:
The Prologue:
The basic premise of the story: a dying planet and the need to colonize other worlds. Even the dialogues in both movies are subtly similar. Sample this:
The Prologue:
The basic premise of the story: a dying planet and the need to colonize other worlds. Even the dialogues in both movies are subtly similar. Sample this:
Cooper: We used to look up at the sky and wonder at our place in the stars, now we just look down and worry about our place in the dirt.
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Cooper: We've always defined ourselves by the ability to overcome the impossible. And we count these moments. These moments when we dare to aim higher, to break barriers, to reach for the stars, to make the unknown known. We count these moments as our proudest achievements. But we lost all that. Or perhaps we've just forgotten that we are still pioneers. And we've barely begun. And that our greatest accomplishments cannot be behind us, because our destiny lies above us.
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Lor-Em: Our energy reserves were exhausted. What would you have us do, El?
Jor-El: Look to the stars, like our ancestors did, for habitable worlds within reach. We can begin by using the old outposts.
Ro-Zar: Are you seriously suggesting that we evacuate the entire planet?
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Dr. Brand: We must confront the reality that nothing in our solar system can help us.
Cooper: Now you need to tell me what your plan is to save the world.
Dr. Brand: We're not meant to save the world. We're meant to leave it, and this is the mission you were trained for.
The Holy Trinity: Father, Son and the Holy Ghost:
Man of Steel had strong religious undertones to it and Superman was presented as a Jesus-like figure. There was allusion to the Holy Trinity in the form of Jor-El (Father), Kal-El/Superman (Son), and the consciousness of Jor-El as a hologram (The Holy Ghost). Jor-El even refers to his son as being a God to humans before putting him in the ship along with Codex.
Interstellar, on the other hand had Cooper (Father), Murph (Son) and the ghost in the bookshelf, again being Cooper himself (The Holy Ghost) completing the Trinity. While you might say that this set hardly qualifies since Murph is a female character, it would be interesting to know that in the original screenplay, Murph was a boy. Christopher changed the character to daughter to bring in that additional intensity to the emotional connection between the father and the daughter. Nevertheless, the way Murph's character has panned out during the course of the movie, she is no less than a son.
Murph saves humanity by building the huge spaceships using gravity, much like Superman saves the world by thwarting General Zod and destroying the gravity powered world engine.
Codex and Fertilized Embryos:
Baby Kal is sent to earth through the wormhole after infusing his cells with a genetic codex of the entire Kryptonian race, with the hope that those genes maybe used to recreate bloodlines in a new planet.
Similarly, fertilized embryos are placed on Endurance to be taken to the habitable planets with the aim of kick-starting human population on them, in case earth cannot be salvaged.
While the farmhouse and the farm in Interstellar immediately reminds you of the one from Signs, it has an obvious connection with Man of Steel again.
Jonathan Kent, Superman's adoptive father is a farmer by profession who has a farm just outside Smallville. In Man of Steel, there are many scenes on this farm which seems to have acres and acres of Corn being cultivated, much like Cooper's farm in Interstellar.
In fact production design used the experience from Man of Steel for all cornfield scenes in Interstellar.
Saturn and its rings:
While the choice of showing Saturn in Interstellar has been peculiar (more on that below), it is the most obvious thing to do these days as Saturn is the most aesthetically pleasing planet with its rings and makes for a nice CGI shot.
Baby Kal-El's spacecraft carrying him from Krypton emerges from a wormhole near Saturn in Man of Steel. While this has no significance in the plot as such, this has a striking similarity with Interstellar, where a wormhole has been created artificially by higher beings near Saturn, to enable humans to travel to habitable worlds. It has been explained by Kip Thorne that the wormhole had been placed sufficiently away from earth to avoid its gravitational effects taking any toll on earth's orbit. But then they could have placed it near Jupiter as well.
And one more similarity: Murph uses red blanket, an obvious nod to Superman's cape.
Footnote:
Why Saturn? To me, the answer seems to be more rooted in history than anything else. In Roman mythology, Saturn is the God of agriculture, founder of civilizations and of social order, and conformity - obvious references to the plight of Earth and the only solution.
Not just that. Greek equivalent of Saturn is Cronus. For a brief period in classical mythology, Cronus was occasionally interpreted as Chronos, the personification of time - one of the important themes in Interstellar.
Saturn also provides visual symmetry on Earth side of the wormhole, to the Gargantua on the other side.
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Lor-Em: Our energy reserves were exhausted. What would you have us do, El?
Jor-El: Look to the stars, like our ancestors did, for habitable worlds within reach. We can begin by using the old outposts.
Ro-Zar: Are you seriously suggesting that we evacuate the entire planet?
--------
Dr. Brand: We must confront the reality that nothing in our solar system can help us.
Cooper: Now you need to tell me what your plan is to save the world.
Dr. Brand: We're not meant to save the world. We're meant to leave it, and this is the mission you were trained for.
The Holy Trinity: Father, Son and the Holy Ghost:
Man of Steel had strong religious undertones to it and Superman was presented as a Jesus-like figure. There was allusion to the Holy Trinity in the form of Jor-El (Father), Kal-El/Superman (Son), and the consciousness of Jor-El as a hologram (The Holy Ghost). Jor-El even refers to his son as being a God to humans before putting him in the ship along with Codex.
Interstellar, on the other hand had Cooper (Father), Murph (Son) and the ghost in the bookshelf, again being Cooper himself (The Holy Ghost) completing the Trinity. While you might say that this set hardly qualifies since Murph is a female character, it would be interesting to know that in the original screenplay, Murph was a boy. Christopher changed the character to daughter to bring in that additional intensity to the emotional connection between the father and the daughter. Nevertheless, the way Murph's character has panned out during the course of the movie, she is no less than a son.
Murph saves humanity by building the huge spaceships using gravity, much like Superman saves the world by thwarting General Zod and destroying the gravity powered world engine.
Codex and Fertilized Embryos:
Baby Kal is sent to earth through the wormhole after infusing his cells with a genetic codex of the entire Kryptonian race, with the hope that those genes maybe used to recreate bloodlines in a new planet.
Similarly, fertilized embryos are placed on Endurance to be taken to the habitable planets with the aim of kick-starting human population on them, in case earth cannot be salvaged.
Corn fields:
While the farmhouse and the farm in Interstellar immediately reminds you of the one from Signs, it has an obvious connection with Man of Steel again.
Jonathan Kent, Superman's adoptive father is a farmer by profession who has a farm just outside Smallville. In Man of Steel, there are many scenes on this farm which seems to have acres and acres of Corn being cultivated, much like Cooper's farm in Interstellar.
In fact production design used the experience from Man of Steel for all cornfield scenes in Interstellar.
Saturn and its rings:
While the choice of showing Saturn in Interstellar has been peculiar (more on that below), it is the most obvious thing to do these days as Saturn is the most aesthetically pleasing planet with its rings and makes for a nice CGI shot.
Baby Kal-El's spacecraft carrying him from Krypton emerges from a wormhole near Saturn in Man of Steel. While this has no significance in the plot as such, this has a striking similarity with Interstellar, where a wormhole has been created artificially by higher beings near Saturn, to enable humans to travel to habitable worlds. It has been explained by Kip Thorne that the wormhole had been placed sufficiently away from earth to avoid its gravitational effects taking any toll on earth's orbit. But then they could have placed it near Jupiter as well.
And one more similarity: Murph uses red blanket, an obvious nod to Superman's cape.
Footnote:
Why Saturn? To me, the answer seems to be more rooted in history than anything else. In Roman mythology, Saturn is the God of agriculture, founder of civilizations and of social order, and conformity - obvious references to the plight of Earth and the only solution.
Not just that. Greek equivalent of Saturn is Cronus. For a brief period in classical mythology, Cronus was occasionally interpreted as Chronos, the personification of time - one of the important themes in Interstellar.
Saturn also provides visual symmetry on Earth side of the wormhole, to the Gargantua on the other side.
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