--- title: "Don't Look Up" year: 2021 kind: "film" canonical: "https://film.one/film/dont-look-up" fi1m_score: 52 critics_score: 53 critics_reviews: 28 published: "2026-09-16T23:00:12.137419+00:00" updated: "2026-09-16T23:00:12.592593+00:00" region: "US" licence: "© Fi1m Ltd. Written by AI under a human editor; checked against sources before publication. Quote with attribution and a link to the canonical URL." --- # Don't Look Up (2021) Directed by Adam McKay · 2h 18m · MPA R · Comedy, Science Fiction, Drama **Fi1m score: 52** · Critics 53 from 28 reviews *In a sentence:* Two astronomers try to warn the world and the film keeps interrupting them to make its point > Adam McKay’s comet-as-climate-change satire has a first-rate cast, a handful of real laughs and a good last twenty minutes, and it spends most of its 138 minutes shouting at people who are not listening. Admire the actors; do not expect to be persuaded. ## Synopsis Kate Dibiasky (Jennifer Lawrence), a graduate student, discovers a comet, and her professor Dr. Randall Mindy (Leonardo DiCaprio) works out that it is on course to hit the Earth. With Dr. Teddy Oglethorpe (Rob Morgan) they take the news to the White House, where President Orlean (Meryl Streep) and her son Jason (Jonah Hill) have other things on their minds and keep them waiting. Sent to make the case in public instead, they end up on a breakfast chat show hosted by Brie Evantee (Cate Blanchett) and Jack Bremmer (Tyler Perry), where the end of the world has to compete with a pop star’s love life. Randall finds he is good on television. Kate finds she is not. ## Review Adam McKay has written and directed a comedy about the end of the world in which a comet stands in for climate change. For 138 minutes two astronomers try to tell the United States that everything will be dead within the year, and the United States checks its phone. It is a good premise and McKay has the cast to play it. What he does not have is the patience to let a joke sit before he explains what it means. The first act is the best of it. Kate Dibiasky (Jennifer Lawrence) finds the comet on an ordinary night at the telescope, and Dr. Randall Mindy (Leonardo DiCaprio) does the sums and goes quiet. The flight to Washington with Dr. Teddy Oglethorpe (Rob Morgan), the hours in a White House corridor while President Orlean (Meryl Streep) deals with something she considers more pressing: this is well-timed comedy, and we laughed, properly, at least twice. Lawrence plays Kate as someone whose fury arrives before her sentences do, and she is the person on screen we believed. DiCaprio, in a bad haircut and a worse anorak, has a panic attack in a bathroom that is the truest minute in the film. Then the film goes on television and stays there. Brie Evantee (Cate Blanchett) and Jack Bremmer (Tyler Perry) host a breakfast show on which nothing is allowed to be bad news for longer than a segment, and Clayton Hartley’s set for it, all curved glass and sunrise orange, is the right room for slotting the end of the world between a pop star’s break-up and the weather. Blanchett is a pleasure, brittle and bright and bored. But the joke is that the media is shallow, and McKay makes it, then makes it again, then makes it in a different room. Hank Corwin cuts the film with inserts of insects, surf, a hand on a phone, a dog. The method can build an argument; here it reads as impatience. The film cannot stay on an actor for a minute without cutting to a caterpillar to remind us what is at stake. Nicholas Britell’s score does the opposite and does it better: big-band brass, a choir for the comet, and a slinky lounge tune under the White House that is funnier than most of the lines it accompanies. Mark Rylance and Jonah Hill give the two supporting turns worth an argument. Rylance’s Peter Isherwell, a tech billionaire who speaks in a small breathy voice and never finishes a thought, is the one figure McKay seems curious about rather than furious with, and Susan Matheson dresses him in the soft, colourless knitwear of a man who has never had to raise his voice. Hill’s Jason Orlean is a bully with a laptop, and Hill makes his stupidity specific. Streep is the weakest of the three; she plays a president assembled from recent headlines and never finds a second note. Linus Sandgren shoots the observatory in cold blues and Washington in a hard, flat brightness, so the film looks like two different countries, which works. What does not work is the hour in the middle, when the plot has been set and the film has nothing to do but tell us that people are stupid. Past halfway we were bored, and then we were cross about being bored, because the actors were plainly having a good time and we were being lectured over their heads. The second half takes a turn we will not describe. What we can say is that the last twenty minutes quieten down, sit at a table, and let the cast be sad rather than silly, and it moved us more than the preceding two hours had earned. *Dr. Strangelove* is the picture McKay is standing next to, and the difference is simple: Kubrick never once explains the joke. The reviews split almost down the middle, and we can see both halves. Worth an evening if you want to watch a first-rate cast be angry on your behalf and do not mind being told what to think while they do it. *Fi1m score 52, published 16 September 2026.* ## What the critics say The reviews lean negative, with more critics against the film than for it. Where there is praise, it clusters on the cast: Jennifer Lawrence is singled out again and again as the grounded centre of the chaos, and Streep, Rylance, Blanchett and DiCaprio draw admiring notices even from critics who dislike the film around them. Those who like it call it a broad, funny satire that turns anger over climate inaction into rollicking comedy, and several note that the final stretch carries more feeling than the preceding two hours suggest it will. The reservations are about the satire itself. Close to half the critics find it smug, obvious and heavy-handed, going after easy targets and lecturing the audience rather than persuading it, and many also fault the pacing, saying the best material is spent early. The spread is wide, from four-star notices at The Times and NME to a failing grade from Collider, and the split does not follow national lines. ### Reviews we read (28) - **Evening Standard**, Charlotte O'Sullivan (80/100, inferred): The critic praises the starry cast and McKay’s updating of classic satires like Dr. Strangelove, highlighting strong turns from Streep, Rylance, Blanchett and Chalamet in a film that ultimately makes a deep impact despite a slow start. [Read](https://www.standard.co.uk/culture/film/dont-look-up-movie-review-leonardo-dicaprio-jennifer-lawrence-timothee-chalamet-b970507.html) - **The Times**, Kevin Maher (4/5): DiCaprio and Lawrence shine in this rollicking political satire that draws attention to fake news and objective truths, with the final fable-like turn providing genuine power despite running out of steam. [Read](https://www.thetimes.com/culture/film/article/dont-look-up-review-dicaprio-and-lawrence-shine-in-this-doomsday-delight-with-a-cynical-edge-dtbqgf59n) - **Total Film** (80/100, inferred): The critic describes a broad, brash satire that channels fury at inaction on climate change into rollicking comedy, praising the performances and McKay’s processing of political absurdities while noting it remains entertaining throughout. [Read](https://www.gamesradar.com/dont-look-up-review-netflix/) - **Empire**, Ian Freer (75/100, inferred): The critic calls it a frequently funny, ambitious satire that skewers modern life, politics and media with a stacked cast, noting it bites off more than it can chew but lands enough to be a sharp, bold treat. [Read](https://www.empireonline.com/movies/reviews/dont-look-up/) - **Sight and Sound** (70/100, inferred): The critic describes the film as a broad, crass, scattergun comedy that works by reflecting the age of distraction and the grim reality of impending climate catastrophe through its celebrity-stuffed satire. [Read](https://www.bfi.org.uk/sight-and-sound/reviews/dont-look-crass-scattergun-comedy-that-somehow-works) - **The AV Club**, Jesse Hassenger (C+): The film is a despairing, blunt satire that feels very much of the pandemic moment but is exhausting and overly angry, blunting its own impact with heavy-handed jabs. While some performances and moments land, it is ultimately too weary and hectoring to consistently entertain or persuade. [Read](https://www.avclub.com/leonardo-dicaprio-and-jennifer-lawrence-cope-with-disas-1848171832) - **The Independent** (2.5/4): The critic finds McKay’s star-studded satire exceedingly watchable and funny as a comet stands in for climate change and political dysfunction, but notes chaotic tonal shifts and a script that underuses its cast. [Read](https://www.independent.co.uk/news/leonardo-dicaprio-adam-mckay-mark-rylance-earth-vice-b1972562.html) - **Little White Lies**, Hannah Strong (2/3/3): The critic views it as an uneven, star-studded dramedy that captures the lunacy of recent times and political divides but feels toothless overall, offering no easy answers on the climate crisis. [Read](https://lwlies.com/reviews/dont-look-up) - **Radio Times**, Emma Simmonds (3/5): The critic finds the apocalypse allegory amusing and enjoyable thanks to game performances from the starry cast, but notes it is heavy-handed and overly broad in its satire. [Read](https://www.radiotimes.com/movies/dont-look-up-review/) - **Slant Magazine** (2/4): The satire too often uses broad strokes and castigation rather than nuance, feeling bland, bloated, and self-satisfied like McKay's prior work. Lawrence stands out as compelling amid the film's granular comedy, but overall it lacks the incisiveness to truly take on the status quo. [Read](https://www.slantmagazine.com/film/dont-look-up-review-adam-mckay-leonardo-dicaprio/) - **The Guardian**, Peter Bradshaw (2/5): The critic finds Adam McKay’s satire laboured, self-conscious and unrelaxed, likening it to an extended SNL sketch that fails to deliver on comedy or seriousness. The opening act’s spectacle and some sharp political points are singled out as effective. [Read](https://www.theguardian.com/film/2021/dec/08/dont-look-up-review-slapstick-apocalypse-according-to-dicaprio-and-lawrence) - **The Telegraph** (40/100, inferred): The star-studded satire plays its best cards early but then drags, with the critic often wishing the comet would arrive sooner amid its hit-and-miss showcase of actors and basic thesis. [Read](https://www.telegraph.co.uk/films/0/dont-look-review-wish-killer-comet-would-get-move/) - **Variety**, Peter Debruge (40/100, inferred): The critic finds the satire smug and self-righteous in its easy-target political jabs, though it succeeds in spotlighting apathy and self-interest around a global threat. The film is faulted for spastic pacing and an unwieldy mix of acting styles. [Read](https://variety.com/2021/film/reviews/dont-look-up-review-leonardo-dicaprio-jennifer-lawrence-1235127627/) - **Screen Daily** (30/100, inferred): The critic calls it a toothless satire that fails to explore its premise deeply, going after easy targets like science-deniers rather than delivering a chilling or insightful parable on climate change and media inaction. [Read](https://www.screendaily.com/reviews/dont-look-up-review/5165377.article) - **The Hollywood Reporter**, David Rooney (30/100, inferred): The critic finds the star-studded satire cynical and smug, trivializing the climate crisis it aims to address rather than offering depth or nuance. McKay's approach is seen as self-satisfied and overly broad, with the bottom line urging viewers to 'just look away.' [Read](https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/movies/movie-reviews/dont-look-up-leonardo-dicaprio-jennifer-lawrence-1235057450/) - **Vulture** (30/100, inferred): McKay's rage at climate inaction results in a misanthropic harangue that hates entertaining its audience and fails to engage meaningfully with the issues beyond declaring humanity sucks. The film improves slightly in its final act by allowing some tenderness but remains an arrogant, U.S.-centric metaphor that misses the mark. [Read](https://www.vulture.com/article/movie-review-netflix-and-adam-mckays-dont-look-up.html) - **The New Yorker**, Richard Brody (25/100, inferred): The film is called clever but short on wit, functioning as crude demagogy that adds to the media blight it depicts while offering a cynically apolitical view of politics. It is praised for some sharp asides and riffs on the mediasphere but criticized for its simplistic anger and omissions. [Read](https://www.newyorker.com/culture/the-front-row/the-crude-demagogy-of-dont-look-up) - **Deadline**, Pete Hammond (85/100, inferred): McKay's climate satire is hilarious and frighteningly plausible, with an inspired comet metaphor and strong performances from the all-star cast, especially DiCaprio, Streep, and Hill. [Read](https://deadline.com/video/dont-look-up-review-leonardo-dicaprio-jennifer-lawrence-adam-mckay-netflix/) - **Den of Geek**, Rosie Fletcher (4/5): The critic finds McKay's end-of-days satire sharp and funny with a talented cast, but notes it may be the most depressing comedy ever due to its bleak portrayal of society's inaction and self-interest in the face of catastrophe. [Read](https://www.denofgeek.com/movies/dont-look-up-review/) - **HeyUGuys**, Sarah Cook (4/5): The film is smart and brilliant satire with a stacked cast and excellent performances, particularly from Jennifer Lawrence as the grounded voice of reason amid the chaos. [Read](https://www.heyuguys.com/dont-look-up-review/) - **NME**, Nick Levine (4/5): The critic calls it a sharp, thought-provoking black comedy that succeeds as both raucous entertainment and a grim cautionary tale, praising the all-star cast's performances while noting it loses some momentum near the end. [Read](https://www.nme.com/reviews/film-reviews/dont-look-up-review-netflix-3113097) - **Film Stories**, Simon Brew (50/100, inferred): The critic finds the satire straightforward but not particularly ambitious, with some good jokes and a strong cast but ultimately frustrating and safe rather than impactful. [Read](https://filmstories.co.uk/news/dont-look-up-review-netflixs-star-studded-end-of-the-year-saga/) - **The Playlist** (D+): The satire is smug and glib, exhausting and ineffective, undercutting its cast with a sneering script that fails as both comedy and commentary. [Read](https://theplaylist.net/wp-json/wp/v2/posts/430225) - **/Film**, Chris Evangelista (3/10): The film is a smug, shrill, obvious satire that has nothing new to say beyond pointing out humanity's flaws, wasting its talented cast and premise. [Read](https://www.slashfilm.com/679771/dont-look-up-review-this-smug-shrill-disaster-movie-satire-is-just-a-disaster/) - **Paste**, Brianna Zigler (4.5): The critic says the film works better as a doomsday story with a poignant third act than as political satire, but faults it for being boring, overly long, and filled with unfunny jabs. [Read](https://www.pastemagazine.com/movies/netflix/dont-look-up-review) - **Polygon**, Joshua Rivera (30/100, inferred): The critic calls the satire hellishly unfunny and exhausting, repeating familiar media and political discourse without new insight or effective jokes while wasting a strong cast. [Read](https://www.polygon.com/reviews/22850873/dont-look-up-netflix-review/) - **The Wrap** (25/100, inferred): The satire is toothless and plodding despite its timely message about climate change, with cartoonish characters, little humor beyond one running gag, and an all-star cast wasted in a lumbering two-and-a-half-hour slog. [Read](https://www.thewrap.com/dont-look-up-film-review-leonardo-di-caprio-meryl-streep-netflix/) - **Collider**, Matt Goldberg (F): The critic finds the satire lazy and obvious, lecturing the audience on known issues without new insights or humor. It complains about the film's condescension, smugness, and lack of empathy or laughs. [Read](https://collider.com/dont-look-up-review-netflix-leonardo-dicaprio-jennifer-lawrence/) ## Details - **Director:** Adam McKay - **Director:** Adam McKay - **Screenplay:** Adam McKay - **Story:** Adam McKay, David Sirota - **Cinematography:** Linus Sandgren - **Editor:** Hank Corwin - **Music:** Nicholas Britell - **Production design:** Clayton Hartley - **Costume design:** Susan Matheson - **Producer:** Adam McKay, Kevin J. Messick - **Cast:** Leonardo DiCaprio as Dr. Randall Mindy; Jennifer Lawrence as Kate Dibiasky; Meryl Streep as President Orlean; Cate Blanchett as Brie Evantee; Rob Morgan as Dr. Teddy Oglethorpe; Jonah Hill as Jason Orlean; Mark Rylance as Peter Isherwell; Tyler Perry as Jack Bremmer - **Runtime:** 2h 18m - **Certificate (MPA):** R - **Release (the US):** 10 December 2021 - **Genres:** Comedy, Science Fiction, Drama - **Budget:** $75 million - **Box office:** $791,863 - **Trailer:** https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RbIxYm3mKzI ## Where to watch in the US - Netflix: streaming *Checked 2026-09-16.* Also available in: AE, AR, AT, AU, AZ, BE, BG, BR, CA, CH, CL, CO, CZ, DE, DK, EC, EE, ES, FI, FR, GB, GR, HK, HR, HU, ID, IE, IL, IN, IS, IT, JP, KR, LT, MX, MY, NL, NO, NZ, PA, PE, PH, PL, PT, RO, RS, SE, SG, SI, SK, TH, TR, UA, US, VN, ZA. Add `?region=XX` to this URL for another country. ## Awards - Academy Awards 2022: Best Film Editing (nominated); Best Original Score (nominated); Best Picture (nominated); Best Writing, Original Screenplay (nominated) - Golden Globes 2022: Best Actress – Television Series Musical or Comedy (nominated); Best Motion Picture – Musical or Comedy (nominated); Best Screenplay (nominated) - American Film Institute Awards 2021: American Film Institute Awards (won) - Detroit Film Critics Society Award for Best Screenplay 2021: Detroit Film Critics Society Award for Best Screenplay (won) - National Board of Review: Top Ten Films 2021: National Board of Review: Top Ten Films (won) ## If you liked this - *Dr. Strangelove* (1964), Fi1m 93: The end of the world played for laughs by people who never explain the joke. — [Fi1m page](https://film.one/film/dr-strangelove-or-how-i-learned-to-stop-worrying-and-love-the-bomb.md) - *Network* (1976), Fi1m 86: Television eats a man alive on air; angrier than McKay and far more precise. — [Fi1m page](https://film.one/film/network.md) - *Melancholia* (2011), Fi1m 80: A planet approaches and a wedding falls apart; the same catastrophe, without a single lecture. — [Fi1m page](https://film.one/film/melancholia.md) - *The Death of Stalin* (2017): Idiots in charge of a dying empire, and every line lands where it is aimed. - *Last Night* (1998): Toronto’s final evening on Earth, small and kind, with no comet in shot. --- © Fi1m Ltd. 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