Film Review

By Frederic and Mary Ann Brussat

Moon
Directed by Duncan Jones
Sony Pictures Classics 06/09 Feature Film
R - language

In this indie sci-fi drama, Sam Bell (Sam Rockwell) is an astronaut in the near future living on the moon and just coming to the end of a three- year contract with Lunar Industries. He has very little to do except regularly check the machines outside which mine the energy from the sun. In the all-white environment, Sam spends his ample spare time building models and watching old movies. His only companion during this lonely work is Gerty (voiced by Kevin Spacey), an artificially-intelligent computer outfitted with a robotic arm and a screen which displays its emotions.

Sam is quite angry with the multinational corporation which runs this space station since they have not been able to fix a broken satellite. As a result, live communications home to his wife and daughter have been curtailed. On a drive on the moon in a lunar rover, Sam is badly injured and when he returns to the space station, he discovers that a cloud of mystery hangs over him and that nothing will ever be the same again.

Duncan Jones directs this engaging low-budget sci-fi movie that eschews fancy special effects for a tight focus on a man under pressure in a situation that challenges all he's ever thought about himself, his family, and his work. The excellent screenplay by Nathan Parker from a story by Duncan Jones keeps our interest as Sam deals with one conundrum after another as he tries to make sense of what has happened to him.

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by Frederic and Mary Ann Brussat