Friday, July 3, 2009

Movie review and director interview: Moon

Sam I am -- and so is Sam.

By John P. Meyer

Moon is almost as laudable for what it doesn't tell us as for what it does -- one of the movie's major plot points is never explicitly explained, taking it for granted that the audience will be intelligent enough to figure it out.

In my interview with director/writer Duncan Jones (first posted during his visit to Dallas prior to the AFI Dallas Film Fest), I quizzed him about that plot point; turns out I may not be as intelligent as his target audience. (NOTE that you might want to see the film before listening to the interview, as major spoilers come into play.)

Photo by John P. Meyer

Duncan Jones - with a guest appearance by Bogie

Jones produced slick corporate video ads before he got into more mainstream filmmaking, as you can tell by the opening segment of Moon -- which is basically a slick corporate video ad, though one produced for an entirely fictional company. It serves to set the stage for the movie's action, which takes place -- you guessed it -- on the moon.

That company -- Lunar Industries -- has found a way to alleviate Earth's energy problems, and that way is up - all the way up to the moon, in fact. Sam Bell (Sam Rockwell) is serving out the last couple weeks of a 3-year assignment manning automated systems that mine the miracle resource that Earth's energy-hungry populace are so eager to exploit. And he's alone -- all alone.

No barbers on the moon, clearly

Except for GERTY, the talking computer, who expresses (to the extent that it's capable of expression) sympathy for Sam's loneliness, monotony, discomfort, and all the other moods shifts and situational changes that affect him as he progresses through the day. GERTY -- in obvious tribute to HAL -- is voiced by Kevin Spacey, who sounds like he's on long-term, heavy-duty diet of 'ludes. Cleverly, Jones has given GERTY another, very primitive, means of expressing emotion, and this is through a limited set of smiley-face expressions that appear on his (I mean, its) viewscreen. When Sam expresses his excitement about returning home to kith and kin, GERTY puts on a regular smiley; when Sam sleeps through a scheduled transmission from Earth, GERTY's smiley is inverted.

And then there's the discombobulated smiley that makes its appearance when Sam runs smack dab into ... um ... Sam.

At least Sam has his dreams. (Nice one!)

Sam's tasks primarily involve the monitoring of systems and routine scheduled maintenance, though occasionally he gets the chance to hop into a rover and drive off across the lunar surface to a malfunctioning mining rig. It's during one of these non-standard outings that he gets into trouble, and things around the ol' Lunar Industries rec room start to get both functionally weird and emotionally uncomfortable.

Moon pays homage to great space-based sci fi films of the past (2001, Silent Running, Outland) while postulating its own views on what it might be like to spend days, months and years away from one's home planet - and isolated from one's family and friends. It also stands as a cautionary "what if" in regard to the God-like capabilities of unfettered industrial science.

Given its comparatively tiny budget, the film's effects are outstanding: it's easy to believe we're stuck in the sterile interior of the moon base or puttering about on the barren orb's monochromatic surface in a rover. And Sam Rockwell nails the lead role (Hell, it's pretty much the ONLY role), playing an average guy going about his business who is suddenly confronted with a reality beyond his means to deal with.

Though deal with it he does, in courageous and ingenious fashion.

Interview with Duncan Jones, writer-director of Moon

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