Beneath the dark curtain of an eternal lunar night a lone man grapples with isolation and paranoia, his only companion a benign robotic caretaker who may have more sinister intentions. This isn't your 10 year-old nephew's summer blockbuster. "Moon", Duncan Jones' homage to the cerebral science fiction movies of the 1970s, slips into theaters beneath the scanners, sans warp drive flashes and the crunch of terminating footsteps. In place of intergalactic bombast, the director and writer takes the refreshingly retroactive approach of bringing story and character to the forefront in his not-so-distant future.
Using a self-described "holy trinity" of the films "Alien", "Outland", and "Silent Running" as his inspiration, Jones has synthesized a well-worn futuristic setting at once familiar, and sorely missed. The influence of their seminal predecessor "2001: A Space Odyssey" is also felt, and the filmmaker unabashedly references Stanley Kubrick's visuals and tone. That he succeeds despite a ludicrously low $5 million budget is truly out of this world.
At the film's outset, Everyman grunt Sam Bell (Sam Rockwell) has been on a self-imposed Earth exile, charged with maintaining a mining station which extracts the valuable hydrogen-based fuel H3 from the moon's soil. He's nearing the end of a three-year contract with the Lunar Corporation and eagerly awaits his relief, savoring occasional recorded video messages from his beloved wife and young daughter with whom he hopes to soon be reunited. At his side throughout this assignment has been Gerty (voiced pitch-perfectly by Kevin Spacey), a robotic valet who navigates around the station on a track tending to the needs of its lone, lonely inhabitant. Jones' vision of HAL 2000 comes complete with its own emoticon "face" on a monitor, alternately happy, sad, or confused depending on the mood of his charge.
On one ill-fated foray into the lunar night to investigate a malfunctioning H3 harvester, Bell's rover suffers a catastrophic accident and he is left severely injured, on the edge of consciousness. When a rescuer arrives he is shocked to discover it is none other than a spitting image of himself, three years younger. Back in the cramped confines of the base the two square-off, with Gerty silently sliding by in the shadows. The duel to uncover the truth about themselves and their situation presents a tour de force for Rockwell, who sinks his teeth into the role(s) specifically written for him with gusto, and pathos. It is truly fascinating to watch the subtle sensitivities he weaves into the performances, as a younger and older self struggle to understand one another and their predicament. These scenes together are seamlessly rendered both technically and in performance. The two Sams even brawl and play a convincing game of ping-pong! A song and dance number to the tune of Katrina and the Waves' "Walking On Sunshine" is narrowly avoided.
To reveal any further plot points or revelations would be to do this refreshing film a disservice. With such rich existentialist food for thought, the stunning visuals of "Moon" are icing on the cake. Jones must be commended for achieving a look that at once seems big budget, but also harkens back to an era of filmmaking when miniatures were used in vast exterior shots and CGI was an unfamiliar acronym. The sets and costumes vividly evoke the grimy corridors of the spacecraft seen in 1970s sci fi films, as well as the garb worn by their inhabitants.
There's already talk that this ambitious son of The Man Who Fell to Earth (if that clue is not enough see any other review of this film to learn Dad's identity) intends to revisit this vision of the future in subsequent films. We can only hope he does, with our fingers crossed that a bigger budget will not turn him to the Dark Side of science fiction filmmaking.
