Christopher Nolan's Interstellar (2014) showcases Matthew McConaughey's character, Cooper, journeying through an outer space wormhole to save humankind. What makes the journey of Interstellar a cinematic masterpiece are the stunning visuals, the authentic sound design, and the genuine acting from McConaughey and Mackenzie Foy, who plays Cooper's daughter Murph, that illustrates the love and bond between father and daughter. Interstellar deserves to be seen on the big screen to fully be immersed and absorb the intricacies of the film's story and production. Interstellar is a world you must enter, not just watch.

Much of the film was shot in IMAX, which enables both magnificent wide-angle landscapes and intimate close-ups beyond the capability of other film formats. The visuals include not only the complexities of outer space, but also shots of the family farm in Alberta where Cooper lives. The weather changes dramatically, revealing the looming blight, a global plague, that would ultimately end human existence. Even the blandness of the farm's landscape is elevated to beauty by the wide-angle framing of the IMAX cinematography. The wormhole is a key component to the film, and Nolan wanted to make it as scientifically accurate as possible. Nolan's goal for the wormhole was to make viewers feel as if they are traveling through it themselves. The vibrancy of colors the design team utilized for the wormhole make it visually exhilarating. The most thought-provoking visual is the tesseract of Garganta. The tesseract is a cubic grid-like structure of five dimensions that is able to perceive simultaneously the past, present, and future. Constructing this tesseract as accurately as possible was an extremely tedious job for the effects team to complete. The visual complexities of the tesseract and the fear and awe it elicits from Cooper as he interacts with it can only be fully appreciated on the big screen.

As stunning as the visuals are in Interstellar, the most notable components of the movie are the breathtaking score and sound effects. Nolan believed that the sound design of Interstellar was crucial for the audience to be a part of. Via the score, Hans Zimmer composes the journey of Cooper and the emotional turmoil he experiences in the storyline. Throughout much of the movie, the score is calibrated at a high volume. However, in some parts of the film, strategically placed, it is deathly silent. This contrast creates an eerie stillness, as seen in the quiet emptiness of space, that is as stunning as the kinetic scenes of the film. The silence forces the audience to pay attention to that stillness, to become still themselves. The sound effects in the film pop out as well, compelling the audience to feel as though they are inside of the movie and that the cinematic world around them is happening in real time. For example, when Cooper is inside the spacecraft, the sounds surrounding Cooper feel as though they are surrounding you when seen in a theater with a state-of-the-art sound system. The score and underlying sound design of the world in Interstellar partners with the visuals and the characters' emotional experiences, ultimately forming your own emotional experience. In a theater, this emotional effect on the audience is possible; however, the distractions that surround people when they watch a movie on a device would interfere with the compositional aims of the film intended for the big screen audience.

Cooper's main objective, besides saving humanity, is to be reunited with his family, especially with Murph. From the beginning of the movie, many scenes involve Cooper and Murph's relationship as father and daughter. When Cooper decides it is his duty to leave his family and venture to space, one of the most difficult scenes to watch is when he says goodbye to Murph, who he (spoiler alert!) will not see in person again until Murph is on her deathbed. The most heartbreaking scene is observing Cooper's devastation when receiving a video of his family and, shockingly, seeing his children as full-grown adults only days after having seen them as children in the previous video he had received. In each video, Murph gets older and older, but Cooper has not yet aged a day due to time-space travel. The utter rawness of fear, longing, and guilt McConaughey displays in that scene should be felt wholly by a viewer. That agonizing vulnerability McConaughey delivers can only be fully experienced in a theater that can present the IMAX format's capability of capturing rich, intimate close-ups.

Only by watching Interstellar on the big screen can you fully engage with and appreciate the film's intricate artistry of direction, acting, and technical production. If Interstellar were to be seen on a television or device, the full visual, aural, and emotional experience for a viewer that Christopher Nolan achieved would not be fulfilled.