Great acting, lazy storytelling

Rating: 5/10 (30 December 2019)

Sam Rockwell does a fantastic job in this film, and if you only focus on his acting (reasonable since it's basically a one-man show) then you might enjoy it. But if you want to enjoy it, you must on no account pay any attention to the actual details of the story. What a stinker! It's filled with inconsistencies as well as just plain lazy filmmaking. The most obvious fault is the complete lack of effort in terms of showing a realistic environment on the moon: everything is portrayed at Earth gravity, except when Sam is on the surface of the moon in his suit. Oh, you say, maybe they have artificial gravity. OK, let's entertain that thought. If they do, then it seems to be portable because it also is in effect when Sam is riding around in the rover. And if that's the case, there should be a pretty significant adjustment going from 1/6 to full Earth gravity (and vice-versa) when entering and leaving the base, but that's never depicted. And in depicting the low gravity on the surface of the moon, they just resort to the "let's film everything in kinda slow motion" effect that every middle-school kid emulates when they pretend to be walking on the moon. Just plain lazy, in my opinion.
But lest you think I'm being overly picky on this one point: there's more! Here are the biggest logical inconsistencies I spotted:
1) Gerty, the computer voiced by Kevin Spacey) is obviously in charge of the station, so when Sam wants to go outside when it's locked down, he must trick Gerty into letting him out. How does he do this? By opening a panel and poking a hose with his Exacto knife. And then he makes the argument to Gerty that there must be micrometeorites puncturing the station! Come on, this makes absolutely no sense at all. And Gerty knows there isn't a meteorite storm, nor is there damage to the outside of the station, yet even after making these statements, he relents and let's Sam outside. This is explicitly against orders and completely NOT in Sam's best interest. Gerty is charged with protecting Sam, and this is exactly the opposite. There's no possible argument for why Gerty would allow such a thing to happen, except that it moves the story along.
2) If the clones begin to break down right at 3 years, why have them on a "3-year" contract? This makes no sense at all. Put them on a 2.5 year contract so they are in reasonably good shape to "go back to Earth". This just introduces needless dramatic tension and grossness with the older Sam falling apart before our eyes.
3) What's with the "suspended animation" chamber (actually an immolation chamber) for the "return home"? For a 3-day trip? Come on, not even a clone would believe that nonsense. Again, just lazy storytelling with no believable support.
4) When new Sam argues with Gerty to convince him to wake up a new clone, he gives this "compelling" reasoning: "If you don't wake up a new clone then me and the other Sam are going to die." Gerty immediately acquiesces because of course he doesn't want Sam to die. REALLY? Gerty has killed multiple Sams already! And what does new Sam plan to do with the newest clone anyway? Wouldn't Gerty want to know that before giving in to this specious argument? Nope, deus ex machina to move the story along once again.
5) The "signal jamming" plot point. First of all, there wouldn't need to be some complex series of towers to jam the comm signal to Earth. All the company needed to do was to program the system to tell Sam the signal was unavailable. But that wouldn't have given our hero the chance to "stick it to the man" by programming the harvester to ram into the tower. For what purpose? Did he think that would permanently solve the problem? No way - he was just being destructive. But now let's look at the bigger picture for a minute: two of the harvesters were already out of commission, putting the energy production at 50% capacity. Now, after this senseless plot point, they're at 25% capacity. So, just to be petty, Sam just endangered the entire population of the Earth by severely limiting the only source of energy they have! Lazy, lazy storytelling.
So yeah, if you want to enjoy this film, just shut off your logic centers and relax. It's all going to be just fine.