Moon: A movie for the thinking SciFi fan

We saw the movie Moon Friday night. It stars Sam Rockwell, who is essentially the only actor, outside of Kevin Spacey who does voice-over for GERTY, the base computer. Yes, think HAL from 2001: A Space Odyssey. There are numerous allusions to the 1968 Stanley Kubrick classic, which I found unobtrusive and mostly appropriate.

The movie is a psychological character drama that showcases Sam Rockwell's substantial talent, very well. Space opera this definitely ain't. It's more like a visit to an insane asylum that ultimately leaves you wondering what happened. At the end there are many, many unanswered questions and nothing (well, not exactly nothing) is resolved. In particular, the central conflict of the movie is not resolved, though we are given clues that things just might be different.

I found the premise completely plausible, scientifically. Sure, there are things we can't quite do, yet, since the movie is about a guy working alone in a power generation station on the far side of the moon ... but if you can accept all that as plausible, some other things (that I won't reveal because they would be spoilers) shouldn't bother you, too much. What I found slightly less plausible is the premise that the fictional company would do what they've done to this guy. More along the lines of: Did they really think they would/could get away with it indefinitely? That's the part that chafes on the brain.

I suppose companies are so brutally inhuman as this one (Lunar Industries, I think it's called) is portrayed, but given there is evidence the protagonist is "in" on the cruel deception, I am called to wonder at his own level of humanity. Because, humanity--more specifically inhumanity--is what this movie is about. In the end (and this should not be a spoiler) we find that the so-called inhuman computer is perhaps the more human (maybe even the most human) character. And that's interesting.

I think the movie is rather well done. Definitely something you will want to see more than once. I suggest buying the damn thing so you can get to the heart of what's going on, because there's far too much to absorb in a single sitting. I suspect every moment of film contains clues (perhaps answers) to what's really going on, and you will want to figure out what's really going on.

Good movies are good for various reasons They may have a really good story, with good, compelling characters. They may present ideas, glimpses into life in worlds very different from our own. They may evoke popular tropes (follow mythical storylines) that tell us something about ourselves and the nature of being. They may ask (and answer) the age-old questions of who we are, how did we get here, and where we are going.

This movie is good because its characters are human and elicit our sympathies, and tells us something about ourselves. But it won't leave you with anything resembling a comforting vision of the future, because in the end, human nature isn't changed. It is what it is, and it's ultimately not quite the good thing we'd like to think it is. But humanity does exist, and it's revealed at the level of individuals. In Moon, that's where we find it, so for that there may be a small ray of hope.

Final verdict: recommended. I'm going to buy it and study it frame-by-frame, and that should tell you something.