Ingenious science fiction offering, packed with thought-provoking ideas.

Rating: 8/10 (19 October 2009)

As a movie genre, science fiction seems over the past ten years to have returned to the standard B-movie approach which involves good guys and aliens blasting the hell out of each other with lasers. More philosophical and thought-provoking science fiction has been harder to come by. "Moon" - Duncan Jones's debut feature which premiered to considerable acclaim at the 2009 Sundance Film Festival - is a wonderfully clever sci-fi story, featuring a remarkable performance by Sam Rockwell. It takes elements of "2001: A Space Odyssey", "Solyaris" and "Silent Running", and weaves them into its own uniquely fascinating story of isolation, madness and human exploitation.
Sam Bell (Sam Rockwell) is the lone worker at a moon base called Sarang, where he monitors and occasionally repairs giant harvesting machines. The machines are gathering helium-3, which provides Earth with energy. Sam is in the final fortnight of a three year contract, and is desperate to get back to his wife and child on Earth. Hardly surprising, since his only companion during three years at the base has been a robot named GERTY (voice of Kevin Spacey). Worse still, a communications malfunction means that Sam has only been able to send and receive pre-recorded messages to his family – live chats have not been possible. Whilst out on the moon's surface driving a rover to one of the giant harvesters, Sam accidentally crashes the vehicle. He comes round back at the base and is told by GERTY that he's had an accident but when he goes out to the crash site to investigate further, he finds a body still in the wreckage. His own body! Now there are two Sam Bells on the moon and neither is sure which of them is real. Gradually the two Sams piece together the answers and learn that they are victims of a shameful conspiracy which will drive them to the edge of sanity
Jones not only directed but conceived the original story, with the final script being penned by Nathan Parker. They deserve credit for creating such an engrossing, thought-provoking story and filming it so inventively. Rockwell's performance as the multiple "Sam Bells" is absolutely superb. It's no exaggeration to say the film relies on him immensely – it wouldn't work were it not for his believability in the role. Kevin Spacey's vocal work as GERTY is also noteworthy, evoking memories of Douglas Rains' chilling voice-only performance as HAL in "2001: A Space Odyssey". Clint Mansell's score has a haunting, deliberately repetitive rhythm which suits the story perfectly. There are, perhaps inevitably, moments where the film has a slow-moving quietness about it (how else could Sam's loneliness and tedium be conveyed?) but on the whole this is an impressive movie and one which I think will stand the test of time.