Moon is a classic small budget sci-fi film driven by fascinating ideas and twists, and guided by a stellar Rockwell

Rating: 8/10 (14 December 2018)

Moon is a demonstration of what good, intelligent science fiction looks like. Particularly in the early stages, it feels like a simple movie with obvious enormous influence from 2001, most apparent in GERTIE. However, Jones quickly makes it clear that Moon has a whole host of creative twists up its sleeve. I love that it's not just predicated on one end twist, either - your perspective is constantly being altered as the movie progresses. At first, you think GERTIE has sinister intentions, then that Bell is just going crazy from isolation, and then as we learn about the second Sam, things really start getting wild. The idea is smart and completely plausible - an immoral but clever company mines the Moon and uses clones to keep the labor going basically indefinitely. I did feel like Bell would be way more shocked by the revelation that he's a clone and have a really strong reaction to meeting/being with a clone than he had after 3 years alone, and once they found out what was going on he would also be more overt and intent on going home (he did end up focusing on it, but it wasn't the intense "I have to get home now" I was expecting). The score is phenomenal, and especially considering the budget, it's very visually pleasing. Rockwell is indisputably the engine that makes Moon work, though, showing great depth and contrast between the two differently aged versions of Sam. It is extremely smart and raises plenty of questions, as a great sci-fi movie does.