When you’ve directed as many movies as Ridley Scott has, a few misses were inevitable, which makes The Dog Stars something of a surprise. It’s not a masterpiece, but it’s a step up from a lot of his recent work. The cast does a good job, though the lead performance falls a bit flat, and Scott’s confident direction here is a real strength. The biggest highlight is how the movie’s first half puts a fresh spin on the slightly exhausted post-apocalyptic genre. It doesn’t quite stick the landing by the time the credits roll, but for a mid-tier Ridley Scott movie, it’s a solid watch, even if it might not be especially memorable or something you’ll ever revisit.

Set in 2035, years after a devastating pandemic has wiped out most of humanity. The movie follows Hig (Jacob Elordi), a grieving mechanic and pilot living at an abandoned airfield in Erie, Colorado, with his loyal dog, Jasper, and a tough ex-Marine named Bangley (Josh Brolin). They’ve created a routine that helps them survive. Bangley guards the airfield while Hig flies supply runs in and out of Denver, where the city's ruins keep pulling him back to memories of what used to be. It’s a way to live, but for Hig, just surviving isn’t enough. While Bangley sees danger lurking around every corner, Hig can’t shake the hope that some part of civilization is still out there somewhere. One day, when a mysterious radio transmission crackles over his plane’s radio, he finally has the reason he’s been waiting for to go searching.

The first half of the movie works so well because Scott takes his time, letting us feel the quiet unease of this world. We see the supply runs and the constant worry that a stranger could ruin everything Hig and Bangley have built. Instead of relying on typical end-of-the-world spectacle, Scott focuses on people who’ve learned to adapt to their situation. The landscapes and imagery captured here are stunning, but it’s the small, human routines that really draw you in.

Hig’s search eventually brings him to a remote valley home, where Pops (Guy Pearce) and his daughter, Cima (Margaret Qualley), live. At first, they’re cautious around him, but these scenes where Hig slowly earns their trust are the movie’s strongest moments and hint at the richer, more compelling movie The Dog Stars could have been. Pearce is great as the grumpy, wary Pops, while Qualley gives Cima real, natural warmth. The script relies a bit too much on convenience: both Hig and Cima have lost their spouses, but Qualley’s performance makes Cima feel like a whole person and not just someone there to help Hig heal.

Elordi, unfortunately, is the movie’s weak link. He’s a talented actor, but you wouldn’t guess it based on his performance here. He underplays Hig so much that the character becomes a total blank. Part of the problem is the writing, but Elordi never finds a way to make Hig’s quietness interesting. For most of the movie, he seems wrong for the part, and he’s even less convincing later on when the story suddenly wants him to be an action hero. For a story built entirely around one man’s search for hope, Hig is surprisingly hard to root for.

Luckily, Brolin picks up the slack. His untrusting, gruff Bangley could have easily been just another survivalist with a gun cliché, but Brolin lets us see the heart beneath the hard exterior. He does a lot with very little, and the movie feels more lively whenever he’s onscreen. Between him, Pearce, and Qualley, Hig is surrounded by people who feel more real and alive than he does.

Once the second half kicks in, the quiet human drama gets tossed aside, and the movie starts checking off familiar post-apocalyptic boxes. Hig, Cima, and Pops scramble to escape scavengers at their home, while Bangley defends the airfield against a siege by a small band of raiders. And eventually the search for hope leads Hig, Cima, and Pops to an airport in Grand Junction for a wildly out-of-place climax featuring a scenery-chewing Allison Janney as a pseudo-warlord. While Janney is fun and campy, she feels like she wandered in from a completely different movie. After all that chaos, Scott tries to pivot back to a calm, peaceful epilogue, but the sudden shift leaves the ending feeling flat and oddly anticlimactic.

Ultimately, The Dog Stars deserves a lot of credit for aiming to be a slower and more thoughtful post-apocalyptic movie. Its best moments prove that the approach could have worked. But the movie’s split personality trades away its quiet strengths for generic action beats, then can’t bring either half to a satisfying ending. Still, Scott’s world-building is impressive, and the strong supporting cast makes it worth watching. There’s a great movie hiding somewhere in these post-apocalyptic ruins; it’s just a shame that the filmmakers didn’t dig deep enough to unearth it.

The Dog Stars is currently playing in select theaters.

REVIEW: “The Dog Stars”

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