Suicide vs self-destruction

Rating: Null/10 (21 April 2018)

Let notice be served. This thought-provoking movie asks a lot questions, dangles a lot of idea but is not hot on providing answers.
Flashback montages notwithstanding (which helps with the narrative, not mar it as in some incompetently directed movies), the plot is easy to follow. I'll attempt a chronological account of the storyline first.
Somewhere near the coast, a lighthouse is hit by what looks like a meteor, with unexplainable results. Something that I could (inadequately) describe as a force field develops, engulfing the lighthouse. This thing that looks like a multi-colored dome then starts to grow. Over three years it has engulfed neighboring villages (but not before they have been successfully excavated). The multi-colored dome blocks all radio signals in and out. Expeditions sent in to investigate have not been heard from. A name is given to this threatening phenomenon: The Shimmer.
Meanwhile, parallel to this event, something happens to a happily married couple, Lena (Natalie Portman) and Kane (Oscar Issac), who met in the military when they were both serving. Now a professor of biology, Lena finds her husband suddenly sent away on some covert mission and no news from him for a year. He then comes back, like an apparition out of nowhere. As Lena tries to find out why her husband has become an empty shell of an existence, he starts to vomit blood. Lena eventually learns that he had volunteered for an expedition into The Shimmer and is the only person so far who has come out, although obviously not intact. The rest of the story depicts Lena's adventure in The Shimmer in an expedition team of 5 led by stern Dr. Ventress (Jennifer Jason Leigh) a psychologist. The other three members are Josie (Tessa Thompson) a mild-mannered physicist, Cass (Tuva Novotny) a nice anthropologist and Anya (Gina Rodriguez) an outspoken paramedic. What happens to this expedition in The Shimmer I shall leave you to discover - the intellectual challenge, the shock, the horror, and all the rest of it.
Like her husband, Lena is the only one that comes out alive and is taken immediately into quarantine and questioned. Unlike her husband, she still has he senses around, albeit clearly stunned and perplexed by her harrowing experience. The movie is structured as this questioning session in quarantine, embedded with flashbacks and flashback-with-flashbacks. Not difficult to follow though, you have my words.
After flexing her artistic muscle with "Black Swan" and demonstrating her popular appeal with the "Star War" and "Thor" movies, Portman has given us something new, an ordinary woman caught in something that is anything but ordinary. A job well done for her. Leith you are unlikely to forget if you have seen her recent Oscar-nominated performance in "The hateful eight", flamboyant all the way. Here in "Annihilation" her performance is restraint and nuanced, demonstrating her versatility. Similarly, Thompson's shy, introvert portrayal of Josie provides an interesting contrast to her
ass-kicking Valkyrie in the latest instalment of "Thor" where she, incidentally, takes over from Portman as the female lead. Veteran Oscar Issac does not have much to work with in "Annihilation" but still delivers admirably what is required of his character.
I just realized that arguably I haven't really said ANYTHING about this movie. Let me resort to borrowing a comment from a critic, to the effect that this movie will mean different things to different people. To that, I can only add a small clue, my summary line, which is taken from a dialogue in the movie.