After 14 hours of work and insanity having to isolate myself from the rest of the work to be able to finish what I have started I went back home and watched Moon. It could have not been a better ending for a day souranded by 4k HMI and Chickens. Even when my favorite roll of Sam Rockwell is in Gentlemen Broncos (a crude representation of the actual reality of American comedy), Duncan Jones, the director of Moon has been capable to demonstrate his controversial poetry in a science fiction movie that was made in 33 days and where all the outdoors special effects took place in over 8 days according to Cinefex magazine July 2009. Apparently it was also shot during a writer’s strike, which had caused most other productions at Shepperton studios to shut down.
Beyond the bitter and camouflage reality of corporations in a near future and the brilliant cinematography based on classic cinema bases (almost theatrical), the modern aspect of the movie is in its plot. There are lots of messages that one need to pick with a photographic eye. The image with the names written on the screens crossed and next to it saying the word Judas, in the galley, the shelf is marked ‘Soylent’ (Soylent Green is a 1973 American science fiction film depicting a dystopian future suffering from pollution, over pollution dying oceans and a hot climate due to the green house effect)
I like also the games Duncan plays related with our history in cinema. Like the way we uncontrollable feel an untruthful reaction when we meet Gerky (The Computer and only partner of Sam in the Moon) by thinking of Hal 9000 from 2001 A Space Odyssey. And that way of the director of forcing us to think of this that movie as much as the very ambitious thought of of making us the Tarkovski masterpiece Solaris (1972) too. “Solaris” is an allegory on man’s place in the universe, the twisted concept of reality, the meaning of love, grief and – ultimately – life. Aspect that Duncan has been also put in scene in Moon. But with all my respect I don’t think there is a better science fiction movie ever made than Solaris and Duncan still has to go a long way to demonstrate his capacity to be at the level of one of the most interesting thinkers and poet that Russia has ever gave birth. …Lovely Cover too….
