Moon
Wednesday, March 3, 2010 at 10:10AM 
Interesting bit of lunar paranoia from the fruit of David Bowie’s loins (had to be careful with the wording on that sentence, I can tell you), Duncan Jones.
Moon is sort of Solaris meets 2001 meets Silent Running with a little of John Carpenter’s overrated cult hit Dark Star thrown in for the film’s small dash of humor.
Sam Rockwell plays Sam, a working man on the moon, hired by an energy conglomerate to oversee its helium excavations on Earth’s favorite satellite. In this not too distant future man has overcome his fossil fuel woes and the planet is - by the standards of the company’s press releases anyway - a carefree, energy efficient and wonderful place to live. Which, given the bloodlust for oil these days, sounds like a pretty reasonable assessment of a world with energy options.
Sam has been stationed alone at the processing facility for almost three years now and his stint is nearly up. His days consist primarily of maintaining the equipment on base, venturing out on the lunar surface to check on the automated roving harvesters and trying to keep a sense of sanity amidst the isolation and loneliness.
He is assisted by a do-all computer named “GERTY” (voiced by Kevin Spacey), his co-worker and ersatz friend, that is frightfully reminiscent of HAL from 2001. But Jones’ script is a bit cleverer than sheer homage and veers from this obvious technophobia into less explored territory. Namely, and without being too ambitious, the philosophical notions of not only “what” it is to be human, but “who” we are as individuals.
SPOILER ALERT: we don’t really ever find out, which is why Moon outshines most of the sci-fi dreck out there.
It’s a plaintive meditation on the self that keeps you on an intellectual edge throughout. Is all the paranoia justified? Is the energy company a nefarious entity with ulterior motives? What about GERTY‘s loyalties? Is Jones making some grand socio-political/economic statement about the dehumanization of the worker in contemporary corporate culture? Is he exploring the boundaries of human consciousness? Or are all of the strange happenings simply due to the fact that Sam has lost his fucking mind from what Ren and Stimpy called “Space Madness”?
And my own personal question outside the parameters of this most enjoyable film – is Sam Rockwell the weirdest actor working in Hollywood today?
Reader Comments (5)
I'll be watching this movie tomorrow morning as it is supposed to rain all day here. Rainy days and watching movies is just about the best legal activity I can think of in the years of my twilight. I'll get back to you on the results.
JM
Maybe you should watch the Twilight series of films in your twilight?
Too late on that, Dude! I've seen them all already. And I love Kirsten Stewart's squirrel teeth. But thanks for inquiring.
JM
Moon was flat out boring as hell! Kevin Spacey's voice didn't help much
either.
I guess it was too much like Space Odyssey in too many ways; cold, slow and totally non-engaging. I love psychological meltdowns, but this guy was a clone, right? His demise didn't affect anyone else really, so who cares? But that's just me.
JM
Was he a clone? Are you? So many questions. I do care.