Review: ‘The Aeronauts’ doesn’t exactly soar, but Jones does

Would you like to ride in Eddie Redmayne’s beautiful balloon? Tom Harper’s “The Aeronauts,” starring Felicity Jones and Redmayne, is loosely based on a record-setting 19th century balloon expedition into the atmosphere. Since “The Wizard of Oz,” it’s been mostly losing air, save for the occasional cameo: the aloft opening of Tarkovsky’s “Andrei Rublev”, the harrowing runaway balloon of the Ian McEwan adaptation “Enduring Love”. But Harper, the British director of one of the year’s most pleasant surprises, “Wild Rose,” has tried to bring some modern flare to the old balloon, utilizing computer generated effects to send soaring its star attraction: a red-and-white striped Victorian contraption graced by a band of aqua blue and a thicket of ropes and sandbags. “The Aeronauts” turns into not a prestige picture but a novel big-screen adventure — even if Amazon has truncated the film’s exclusive theatrical release to two weeks before it begins streaming.