Space Oddity (2023)

Space Oddity is the kind of sweet, offbeat crowd-pleaser that sneaks up on you: a romantic comedy with a sci-fi daydreamer’s heart and a drama’s gentle honesty about what it means to belong somewhere. Kyra Sedgwick keeps the tone buoyant and warm, letting the Mars-sized ambition play alongside grounded, lived-in emotion, and the result feels charming rather than gimmicky. Kyle Allen makes Alex’s wide-eyed obsession endearing, Alexandra Shipp brings a spark that feels like sunlight, and Kevin Bacon adds just the right human texture to the family orbit around them. If you like romances with a quirky premise and a big, sincere center (and you don’t mind a PG-13 mix of suggestive material and a bit of language), this one is easy to like and surprisingly hard to forget.

Space Oddity wants to be a charming, offbeat blend of Mars-daydream sci-fi, small-town romance, and tender family drama, and you can feel Kyra Sedgwick reaching for something sincere and quirky. The problem is the movie’s ingredients don’t quite fuse: it often plays like a checklist of familiar beats, with a structure so tidy it becomes predictable and a tone that leans into mawkish sentiment before the emotions are earned. Kyle Allen and Alexandra Shipp are likable enough to keep it afloat, and there are moments of gentle warmth, but the sci-fi hook mostly functions as window dressing rather than a satisfying engine for the story. If you’re hoping for sharp comedy, credible science-fiction stakes, or a romance with real bite, this may feel a bit bogus and overly easy; if you’re fine with a soft, PG-13 crowd-pleaser that prioritizes sweetness over cohesion, you might still have a decent time.