Moon

Duncan Jones’s Moon is a film full of intriguing paradoxes. Jones’s first feature is a science-fiction story that was produced independently on the relatively modest budget of $5 million—not that low in the world of independent filmmaking, but very small considering the film’s genre and setting (a hi-tech lunar space station and its surrounding environs on, as the title would suggest, the Moon). The movie asks really big, provocative, philosophical questions about mankind, yet it’s also an incredibly intimate and focused character study, dealing with the plight of one man, Sam Bell (played by Sam Rockwell), who is the sole human occupant of the aforementioned space station.  Additionally, Moon creates the perfect antidote to the types of films that have recently come to dominate the science-fiction genre in recent years: the big, loud, expensive, action-oriented movies that fill up theaters every summer and holiday season.  While some of these big-budget popcorn movies turn out well (the recent Star Trek is a perfect example), Moon quite distinctly harkens back to a different approach to the genre, and in the process becomes of the most thoughtful, mesmerizing, and satisfying films of the year.

The story begins with the daily routine of the astronaut Sam Bell, who, when we meet him, is just two weeks away from finishing his three-year contract at the space station owned and operated by Lunar Industries, a company that mines the Moon for Helium-3.  The setting is the near future, and in this world Helium-3 has become the primary source of Earth’s energy, so Bell’s job, while lonely, is quite an important one.  Bell is extremely excited to return home to his wife and baby daughter, and passes much of his time talking and sparring with the station’s computer, Gerty, voiced by Kevin Spacey in a manner that not-so-incidentally recalls Hal of Stanley Kubrick’s 2001: A Space Odyssey.

Suddenly, though, strange things start happening to Sam: his health is deteriorating, he begins having hallucinations, and, most shockingly, after Sam suffers an almost fatal accident while driving on the lunar surface, a new version of himself suddenly appears (also played by Rockwell).  The new version has the same name, and looks and acts just like Sam, only he seems younger, healthier, and stronger.  Additionally, the new Sam claims to have just started fulfilling the same three-year contract that the old Sam is about to finish.

The second half of this film, a movie clearly made in a more thoughtful and cerebral tradition of science-fiction, offers more genuine excitement and tension than most recent, flashier examples of the genre. Jones manages to raise questions about humanity, society, and the future while still making a completely entertaining, absorbing, and accessible movie.  The filmmaker is a self-described “sci-fi geek,” and his inspirations here are apparent—2001, Alien, and Silent Running are a few of the biggest.  But, like most great filmmakers, he manages to learn and take from his influences, but create something original and effective in its own right.  While Moon is full of references to the aforementioned movies, it still manages to be a uniquely moving and enthralling experience, and one that deals with big issues in a fresh and contemporary manner.

Along with Jones, Rockwell plays a crucial part in the film’s overall impact and success.  In previous roles, Rockwell has shown incredible range and skill as an actor, playing everything from a wacky alien in The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy to a down-on-his-luck, small-town loser in Snow Angels to game-show host Chuck Barris in Confessions of a Dangerous Mind.  But this is his best, most nuanced and complex performance to date. He not only perfectly incarnates and differentiates between the multiple Sam Bells (and, in the process, successfully hold the screen on his own for about 90% of the movie), but he also manages to give Sam’s struggle a gravity and emotional depth that make the entire film a much more meaningful experience.  Rockwell makes all the story’s big questions and ideas powerfully and distinctly human, and consequently the film stays with you long after you leave the theater.

                                                 David Laub