The Dog Stars ends just as it starts to get compelling, but I suppose that’s rather the point when so much of the population has already disappeared because of a virus.

It’s worth adding that I missed the first few minutes because I had to run downstairs at Odeon Greenwich and ask for the lights to be turned off, something that had already happened with The Odyssey in the same screen.

As seems mostly to be the case, I went in knowing absolutely nothing. If I’m honest, I half expected a comedy about a person and their dog, which audience members will quickly learn is not the case.

These almost apocalyptic, post pandemic films are right up my street, which perhaps says more about me than any film can.

And The Dog Stars is largely fine. There are some stunning aerial shots of a world emptied of most of its population, although I’m not convinced IMAX added enough to make it essential. It’s a lovely film to look at and, for the most part, a lovely enough film to watch.

But I could feel it pulling.

The pacing isn’t awful because the film is slow. It’s awful in comparison to what the film repeatedly demonstrates it could be. Too often it settles into a rhythm of quiet, drama, quiet, drama, and you begin to feel the structure rather than simply experience it.

Then comes Grand Junction.

Following the old ‘there’s a signal on the radio, I must head towards it’ trope, an unlikely trio find themselves in what initially appears to be a haven. Then the woman running the community tries to marry off the doctor, things become increasingly sinister and, without spoiling everything, there are enough discoveries to make me fairly convinced that something deeply unpleasant is happening there. I’m still not entirely convinced they weren’t cannibals.

For a moment, the film becomes properly tense. Grand Junction is fascinating and horrible and I immediately thought it would make an incredible scare maze. But just as you begin to understand what this community might really be, everything erupts and the characters are back in the plane.

I wanted to stay there longer.

That’s The Dog Stars all over. Just as you want to spend time with these people, just as the characters begin to emerge from themselves and the unimaginable grief of everything they’ve lost, just as hope gives the film something new to threaten, it ends.

And perhaps that is the point. Life doesn’t necessarily provide satisfying dramatic structures, particularly when almost everything that once gave it structure has disappeared. The vast aerial cinematography certainly captures that emptiness, and I like enormously that the film doesn’t begin with the event itself.

But ambiguity and restraint aren’t automatically interesting. Too often The Dog Stars feels as though it is approaching something compelling only to silently recoil and do something else instead.

It’s an enjoyable enough film, particularly if you don’t overthink it. I had a lovely time watching it at the end of an absurdly long day at the cinema.

I just wish the film it eventually threatened to become had arrived a little sooner.