Downsizing is a widely accepted solution to enjoying an affluent retired life. However, Paul Safranek has a unique solution to upgrade his barely middle-class life and live in a lap of luxury in the Downsizing movie released earlier in 2017.
Downsizing Movie Cast
Directed by Alexander Payne Downsizing movie takes us on an adventure and a world where humans get to live a luxurious life and also help Earth sustain the exploding population.
Downsizing (2018)
Directed By: Alexander Payne
Cast: Matt Damon, Christoph Waltz, Hong Chau, Kristen Wiig, Udo Kier
DVD, Blu-Ray Release: March 20 2018
Downsizing Movie Plot
A decade had passed since he watched Norwegian Scientist Dr. Jorgen Asbjørnsen (Rolf Lassgård) and his team wowed the world with a solution to its biggest problem – overpopulation. The solution? Cellular miniaturization better known as downsizing. The goal? Convince six percent of the world’s population to voluntarily shrink themselves to 5-inches in 200 years and minimize the possibility of human extinction.
Paul Safranek (Matt Damon) settled for a smaller version of himself a long time ago.
Barely making ends meet on his salary as an Omaha Steaks occupational therapist, he had failed to deliver on wife Audrey’s (Kristen Wiig) oversized dreams and forfeited his own to meet others’ expectations.
Paul and Audrey discover the possibilities of a better life via downsizing when they run into their friend Dave (Jason Sudeikis) at a school reunion. Paul couldn’t believe his eyes: Dave and wife Carol, now 5-inches tall, had the perfect life living luxuriously in the flawless planned Leisureland community for the small. The Safraneks had to see this for themselves.
The Leisureland tour proved to be jaw dropping. The best of the big world scaled down proportionately to small. The upside? Their $100,000 in assets that bought next to nothing in the big world would retrofit into a cool $12.5 million in the small world. They could have it all for a lifetime.
The downside? They would have to shrink to .0364-percent of their current body mass and volume. Downsizing was irreversible.
A year later, taking the leap had not paid off. Paul was divorced and alone, working as a sales rep and living in an apartment as fate intervened. Paul’s Serbian playboy neighbor Dusan Mirkovic (Christoph Waltz) and his business partner Konrad (Udo Kier) intruded on his mundane existence and introduced him to their lucrative party life. It is there he meets dissident Vietnamese refugee and amputee Ngoc Lan Tran (Hong Chau), Dusan’s housekeeper, who had been downsized against her will and exiled from her country. Not one to suffer fools, she forces Paul to experience another downside of the downsized world – the massive tenement where she and other impoverished immigrants live on the other side of a vast, imposing wall.
Thrust in her world, Paul would come to understand a love he could have never imagined, a perspective he would have never realized and a chance at greatness he never saw coming.
Downsizing Movie Trailer
Take a peek inside the miniature world with this Downsizing movie trailer and tell us if you like this unique story.
Downsizing Movie Reviews
The movie released in 2017 has mostly average reviews from critics and audiences. IMDB user ratings put the movie at 5.7/10 and Rotten Tomatoes barely crosses the halfway mark, with a dismal audience rating of 23 percent. Here’s what critics had to say about the movie,
“There are some funny lines here, but the story rambles inordinately.” ~ Matthew Bond, The Mail on Sunday
“Unfortunately, the central character is as small figuratively as he is literally, and that limits the movie’s capacity to enthrall and engage.” ~ James Berardinelli
But there are few pluses to the movie, according to these critics,
“Damon is in prime everyman mode as Paul, a good guy with a good heart who wouldn’t mind catching a break, a big break, just once.” ~ Richard Roeper, Chicago Sun-Times
“The premise is absurd to the max, but Payne delivers a comedy for those who enjoy contemplating bigger themes behind the laughs along with an ending that is aptly sublime.” ~ Bruce Demara, Toronto Star
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