Moon (2009)

Theatrical Poster

An astronaut nearing the end of his isolated 3 year shift on the moon starts to suspect something is amiss.

Sam Bell (Sam Rockwell), an astronaut working for Lunar Industries, is approaching the end of his 3 year shift on the moon harvesting energy for a futuristic Earth. His only companion is GERTY (voiced by Kevin Spacey), an intelligent robot whose function is to help Sam with his missions.

A mixture of nerves and excitement about seeing his wife and young daughter arouse Sam into seeing people and objects around the station, despite him being the only one in it. Later, after an accident with a harvester, Sam makes a startling discovery that changes his entire outlook on his mission in space.

Mid-way through the film, the audience is subjected to Sam's hallucinations and one begins to wonder if the whole film is a manifestation of Sam's imagination, or something altogether more sinister. It is this mystery that keeps the whole film rolling on, leaving behind any feelings of over-the-top isolation - and thus boredom - that could have occurred with a mostly solitary actor.

To keep the focus away from loneliness, the bizarre and unique robot GERTY, voiced by Kevin Spacey, helps to keep the film on track. Despite its comical look, GERTY's emotion interface actually aids in portraying a second set of emotions on board the station.

Visually, Moon is impressive too. Aside from the outstanding and bleak landscape, the moon buggies are also accurate - at least perceivably - and perhaps more importantly they move accurately too. Often films recreate a planet or moon's gravity wrong leading to obvious problems where objects land far too heavily or float off without any explanation. Moon gets it spot on.

If there is a single criticism it is that the film struggles to get the point across in the first half an hour. However, once you are past that you will find a film that is brimming with original ideas that plants itself firmly in a genre that is notoriously difficult to get into without being compared directly with some of the huge players such as Star Wars and 2001: A Space Odyssey.

Overall, an impressive film that will leave you questioning exactly where the moral high ground lies in our not to distant scientific future.

Lists

• #24 in Empire's 100 Best British Films Ever