Astronaut Sam Bell has a quintessentially personal encounter toward the end of his three-year stint on the Moon, where he, working alongside his computer, GERTY, sends back to Earth parcels of a resource that has helped diminish our planet's power problems.
Director:
Duncan Jones
Stars:
Sam Rockwell,
Kevin Spacey,
Dominique McElligott
In 2027, in a chaotic world in which women have become somehow infertile, a former activist agrees to help transport a miraculously pregnant woman to a sanctuary at sea.
An extraterrestrial race forced to live in slum-like conditions on Earth suddenly finds a kindred spirit in a government agent who is exposed to their biotechnology.
Set in a future where a failed climate-change experiment kills all life on the planet except for a lucky few who boarded the Snowpiercer, a train that travels around the globe, where a class system emerges.
A soldier wakes up in someone else's body and discovers he's part of an experimental government program to find the bomber of a commuter train. A mission he has only 8 minutes to complete.
Director:
Duncan Jones
Stars:
Jake Gyllenhaal,
Michelle Monaghan,
Vera Farmiga
In the colorful future, a cab driver unwittingly becomes the central figure in the search for a legendary cosmic weapon to keep Evil and Mr. Zorg at bay.
In 2074, when the mob wants to get rid of someone, the target is sent into the past, where a hired gun awaits - someone like Joe - who one day learns the mob wants to 'close the loop' by sending back Joe's future self for assassination.
Director:
Rian Johnson
Stars:
Joseph Gordon-Levitt,
Bruce Willis,
Emily Blunt
A commercial transport ship and its crew are marooned on a planet full of bloodthirsty creatures that only come out to feast at night. But then, they learn that a month-long eclipse is about to occur.
50 years into the future, the Sun begins to die, and Earth is dying as a result. A team of astronauts is sent to revive the Sun - but the mission fails. Seven years later, a new team is sent to finish the mission as mankind's last hope.Written by
harpster_2004@yahoo.co.uk
The interior of the ship was built entirely on London sound stages. Production designer Mark Tildesley deliberately chose to make the ship messy with lots of exposed wiring to resemble the exposed nerves of the crew. See more »
Goofs
(at around 7 mins) As pointed out by one of the characters, the ship enters the "blackout" area around the sun (and loses contact with Earth) anomalously early, before Mercury's orbit in fact. Communications from this close to the sun are not a problem in reality (and were possible with 1970s technology), but the writer and director took deliberate creative license to improve the tension. See more »
Quotes
[first lines]
Capa:
Our sun is dying. Mankind faces extinction. Seven years ago the Icarus project sent a mission to restart the sun but that mission was lost before it reached the star. Sixteen months ago, I, Robert Capa, and a crew of seven left earth frozen in a solar winter. Our payload a stellar bomb with a mass equivalent to Manhattan Island. Our purpose to create a star within a star.
[long pause]
Capa:
Eight astronauts strapped to the back of a bomb. My bomb. Welcome to the Icarus Two.
See more »
Crazy Credits
The opening words of the film's title SUNSHINE seem to burn up from the heat of the sun. See more »
Peggy Sussed
Performed by Underworld
Written by Karl Hyde & Rick Smith
Published by Sherlock Holmes Music Publishing Ltd. / Chysalis Music Group USA
Licensed courtesy of Smith & Hyde Productions t/a Underworldlive.com See more »
Sunshine is, quite simply, brilliant. From the opening sequence - simple yet effective and revealing so much about the character in question - right through to the end, I was gripped.
Oddly for a sci-fi film, the power isn't in the effects or the sheer fantastic nature of the plot, it's in the people. From scary-eyed Cillian Murphy to pretty-boy Chris Evans, every performance is believable. Their reactions to events are so much more genuine-seeming than in just about every other film I've seen in recent years; be it joy, shock or grief, you can share it with them and this is something that a perfectly-worked score and some very accomplished camera-work add to handsomely. Whilst the personalities do lean towards certain conventions, none of them are so much so that they couldn't be explained away as being a result of or necessary to their profession - the slightly distant and isolated physicist; the cool-headed and pragmatic captain; the biologist who is passionate about their charges but emotionally-distant from their crew-mates.
The dialogue too is spot-on with nothing coming across as being too clichéd or too hammy. It all seems like real things that real people would say, from the casual banter to the emotional outpourings and everything in between. Unlike so many other films, the characters are human and they act like humans - there is no casual detachment and needless bandying of glib phrases.
The effects are exactly what they need to be in balance to this - believable but not distracting from eight very dynamic performances; complementing rather than show-stealing and over-awing.
All in all it's more of a psychological thriller than a traditional sci-fi extravaganza and whilst this has been done many times before - 2001: Space Odyssey, Solaris, Silent Runnings; to name a few - Sunshine does it superbly and without fault. I'd highly recommend this film to anyone who is looking for something more than just easy entertainment to kill a couple of hours. Conversely, if you ~are~ just looking for something light then keep on looking - this is not a film to be only half-watched.
23 of 29 people found this review helpful.
Was this review helpful to you?
| Report this
Sunshine is, quite simply, brilliant. From the opening sequence - simple yet effective and revealing so much about the character in question - right through to the end, I was gripped.
Oddly for a sci-fi film, the power isn't in the effects or the sheer fantastic nature of the plot, it's in the people. From scary-eyed Cillian Murphy to pretty-boy Chris Evans, every performance is believable. Their reactions to events are so much more genuine-seeming than in just about every other film I've seen in recent years; be it joy, shock or grief, you can share it with them and this is something that a perfectly-worked score and some very accomplished camera-work add to handsomely. Whilst the personalities do lean towards certain conventions, none of them are so much so that they couldn't be explained away as being a result of or necessary to their profession - the slightly distant and isolated physicist; the cool-headed and pragmatic captain; the biologist who is passionate about their charges but emotionally-distant from their crew-mates.
The dialogue too is spot-on with nothing coming across as being too clichéd or too hammy. It all seems like real things that real people would say, from the casual banter to the emotional outpourings and everything in between. Unlike so many other films, the characters are human and they act like humans - there is no casual detachment and needless bandying of glib phrases.
The effects are exactly what they need to be in balance to this - believable but not distracting from eight very dynamic performances; complementing rather than show-stealing and over-awing.
All in all it's more of a psychological thriller than a traditional sci-fi extravaganza and whilst this has been done many times before - 2001: Space Odyssey, Solaris, Silent Runnings; to name a few - Sunshine does it superbly and without fault. I'd highly recommend this film to anyone who is looking for something more than just easy entertainment to kill a couple of hours. Conversely, if you ~are~ just looking for something light then keep on looking - this is not a film to be only half-watched.