Moon

Moon - out of 5

Another 2009 movie with a first time writer/director (co-written by Nathan Parker), Moon is an excellent debut by Duncan Jones, who happens to be David Bowie's son. It seems I've been struggling with modern sci-fi movies lately (District 9, the travesty that was the remake of The Day The Earth Stood Still, Transformers), but this one really hit me write in the face in a good way.

According to Jones, he wrote this specifically with Sam Rockwell in mind as the main character, Sam Bell. Sam is pretty much the only onscreen character as others are seen through video messages and such while GERTY, Sam's support robot voiced by Kevin Spacey, is his only on-moon company. Rockwell deserves a best actor nomination for his performance here in Moon. He explores every inch of the space he is given and hits almost every emotion humans have in the hour and thirty-seven minute running time.

Sam is near the end of his three year contract working for LUNAR Industries on the moon alone (with GERTY) extracting HE-3, which has become the new energy source for the world's transportation. As he gets closer to the completion of his contract, some strange occurrences begin to happen to Sam, and he begins to probe GERTY for more information on his work and soon journey home. I can't go into much more detail without spoiling the movie but follow the movie closely as there is a lot of information thrown at you that's so subtle it may take repeat viewings (I watched the commentary and noticed plenty with their help).

Don't go into this expecting ridiculous action and effects as this was made on a mere five million dollar budget (an award winning achievement in it's own right), but the in-camera effects, models, and slight use of CGI all blends amazingly. Some of the moon shots are just insanely well done even though it was so simply shot.

While it's not perfect (first time writer/director, limited budget), this taps into something in our humanity that will have you questioning and pondering moral conflicts of our future. Go along with it, let your emotions flow with Sam's, get into his head. It's one of the best sci-fi movies I've seen in some time and is one of my favorite movies of 2009 at this point.

I wish I could have seen it in the theater. Moon is definitely worth the rental, and I think I'll be buying it someday.