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Moon - Sam Rockwell brings the mission to life
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Sam Rockwell stars as astronaut Sam Bell in Duncan Jones' Moon.
Science-fiction can often times suffer from overused clichés and certain stories can beat the audience over the head with a proverbial “sci-fi stick.” Death rays, big-eyed aliens, faster-than-light spaceships. Those sorts of things. Director Duncan Jones’ Moon, while immersive, uses no such outlandish elements and refrains from using the sci-fi stick. Instead, it envelops the viewer in a subtle and believable atmosphere and offers the dramatic story of Sam Bell, an employee of a lunar mining company who simply wants to complete his mission and return home to his wife and daughter. Because three years on the far side of the Moon, as he puts it, is the “long haul.”
Sam Rockwell plays Sam Bell and delivers a captivating performance that provokes the viewer’s fascination with his unique situation, making it easy to feel connected to the character in an emotional way. The viewer wants Sam to see his mission through, wants him to return home.
As the drama unfolds Sam begins to suspect that things on the lunar station aren’t quite normal. He investigates and makes a disturbing discovery: an unconscious duplicate of himself, whom he brings back to the station to revive. From that point on, Sam Rockwell’s dynamic performance literally doubles in scope and magnitude and his emotions are simply fascinating to observe. The explanation for the double Sams will not be revealed here, for good purpose and for fairness’ sake.
Aside from the captivating plotline, the film offers a number of subtleties that contribute to its atmosphere. When Sam awakes, his alarm clock cleverly belts out the chorus of Chesney Hawkes’ 90s hit “I am the One and Only.” Sam gives names to the significant objects around him to keep him company, from the station’s autonomous mining rig vehicles to individual plants in his carefully-tended garden. And then of course, there’s GERTY, Sam’s enigmatic robot assistant voiced convincingly by Kevin Spacey. GERTY expresses himself through a small screen that displays variations of the smiley-face. GERTY’s personality can be happy, sad, puzzled, or sometimes just odd. In one scene, when Sam asks him a difficult question, GERTY, always the helper, responds after a brief pause “Are you hungry, Sam?” All of this is wrapped up neatly in a well-presented package by director Duncan Jones who uses bright light, monochromatic schemes, and steady, slow camera shots to bring the lunar world and drama to life.
Moon is powerful science fiction film that pays homage to such classics like Stanley Kubrick’s 2001: A Space Odyssey and Ridley Scott’s Alien. The film most likely won’t be receiving a wide release, but that doesn’t mean San Diegans shouldn’t have a chance at seeing it. Hillcrest’s Landmark Theaters traditionally shows low-profile and independent films and should be featuring Moon for a while longer. Sam Bell’s story is an interesting one. The film begins with him running on a treadmill wearing a shirt that says “Wake me when it’s quitting time.” Mining the moon is a tough job, but someone has to do it. And in Sam’s case, that someone was always him.
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