Bonechilling, frightening and unexpecting with...empty characters?

Rating: 8/10 (26 March 2017)

I'm starting to notice a trend in movies throughout the beginning of the year. Ever since January, we've been getting quite a few different horror/thriller films this year. The results have been mixed to generally positive; Split and Get Out have received positive attention for instance. And now we have Life.
Life is about a group of six astronauts who discover a single cell on Mars. They all research it for a while, the cell grows into a life form, and they discover that the life form is very deadly, and the astronauts must work together to keep it from reaching earth.
I'm going to start with what I didn't like about the movie. My main issue with it has to be the characters. For the most part, they feel very dry and empty. So much so that I couldn't remember a thing about them. There were only two characters who felt like they had any sense of character. The two I'm talking about are Ariyon Bakare's character since he is a scientist and holds a lot of focus in the beginning as the main researcher. Then there's Hiroyuki Sanada's role. His reasoning for wanting to go back to earth makes him the only character I wanted to root for. Aside from that, it's hard for me to care about the movie's characters.
If I were to talk about the things I liked about it, I would like to start with the overall feeling of the movie. After the first act, everything begins to feel tense. There are many tense scenes that have left me feeling horrified, and that's what I believe is the main strength of the movie. If you're going into a thriller movie, you'll expect many intense moments. That's what you get throughout the movie. Something I find very impressive throughout it is that almost the entirety of the film takes place in a space vessel. It's amazing how well it plays into the movie and how well the director, actors and cameraworkers perform their duties and how the movie works so well in such a small, boxed in area. I had my doubts walking in, but what works works really well. Another thing I liked about it was how it ended. I'm not gonna go in-depth with it because that would lead into spoiler territory.
Overall, I thought this movie was very frightening and unexpecting. It had many twists and turns that kept me on the edge of my seat. However, the movie's weakness would have to be the characters. But I can forgive that with its gripping and thrilling plot.