Moon by Duncan Jones is the second film I've seen in a year which pays homage to the cult sci-fi flick Silent Running (1972). The other film was Wall-E whose first third is in some ways almost a direct sequel to Running....
Moon is the story of an astronaut on a mining colony on the moon trying to cope with isolation and paranoia. The plot, of course, is another take on Robinson Crusoe but the visuals, the pace, the themes are homages to 2001: A Space Odyssey and Silent Running. Everyone has seen 2001 but few people outside sci-fi geekdom have caught Running, which is a shame because it's a good film. Here's the excellent Wikipedia summary of the story:
Silent Running depicts a future in which all plant life on Earth has been made extinct, except for a few specimens preserved in a fleet of space-borne freight ships converted to carry greenhouse domes. When orders come from Earth to jettison and destroy the domes, the botanist aboard the greenhouse-ship 'Valley Forge' (Bruce Dern) rebels, and eventually opts instead to send the last dome into deep space to save the remaining plants and animals. The film costars Cliff Potts, Ron Rifkin and Jesse Vint.
I thought I was the only person who'd actually seen Running which tended to be shown at 1 a.m. on BBC 2 in the 1980's, but clearly people at Pixar watched it and liked it and Duncan Jones liked it too. Anyway you can get it on Amazon and some sneaky fellow has uploaded the entire film onto YouTube in 10 minute segments here. It's Bruce Dern's best role and although a little bit hokey near the end I think you'll like it.
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Ok, that's it, I'm proud of myself that I got through this whole blog without mentioning once that Duncan Jones is David Bowie's son. . . Oh crap.
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I should also add that I'm going to the countryside for a few days so if I dont respond to your comments its because I have no internet connection (or have been killed by the terrible and dreaded bunyip)
34 comments:
It's good stuff alright. They obviously like their Philip K. Dick, too. Plus, it was made for five million, and looks fantastic. And I love that they used remote-controlled cars for the outdoor space buggy scenes.
Cheers, Dec
I've really been looking forward to Moon. Did you like it? Sam Rockwell is great. I thought he was excellent in Confessions of a Dangerous Mind. I missed Moon's brief stint at the local art theatre and am waiting for Netflix eagerly.
Silent Running is definitely on the must see dork list, mine too. You should do a top ten must see sci-fi dork out movie list! I dunno though, Bruce Dern was pretty awesome in The Burbs, too.
Beware the Bunyip!
Oh yeah, it's also interesting that Doug Trumbull did the visual effects for Kubrick's 2001 before directing Silent Running and doing effects for Blade Runner.
I think Silent Running was a fairly big hit in the US when it first came out even if it's a little obscure now.
Holden, I think you're right. I went and saw it, though it wasn't at a theater but at some state college film screening with a friend, but it wasn't long after the commercial run because I had heard of it. And I couldn't really be accounted a sci-fi geek by any stretch of the imagination--which I'm not saying as a boast, by the way. I liked it, and whether or not it was his best role, it was the first time I saw Dern playing something other than a sniveling, whining villain.
For some reason, though, I always mix this movie up with Soylent Green. This could be because I am pretty good about mixing up movie titles, or it could be because there is some common theme. I know I saw Silent Running, because I remember Bruce Dern. But I don't know if I ever saw Soylent Green.
It's curious that the bunyip doesn't have any aboriginal references in that Wikipedia article. Or maybe it did, because I skimmed. Anyway, the explanation may be that it only eats people of European extraction. I know it's too late to say this now, but do try to stay away from billibongs.
I just had to throw in billibong--I so rarely get the opportunity to use it and it's a great word.
Seana, Solent Green's the one with Big Chuck Big Heston, along with Chuck Connors, Joseph Cotton, Leigh Taylor-Young, and even Edward G. Robinson. I don't want to give away the magical ending, but in a Saturday Night Live skit, Phil Hartman does that super dramatic line by Charlton Heston: "Soylent Green is [won't spoil it]!!!" In the skit they make a series of Soylent movies since the first was so successful -- like Planet of the Apes – but the titles are Soylent Yellow, Soylent Purple, Soylent Fuschia, and so on. Phil/Charlton barks that same line using the appropriate color in each movie. It’s hilarious.
Thank you, Holden. Now I suppose I am going to have to see Soylent Green just so I can watch the Saturday Night Live skit.
I loved Chuck Connors as The Rifleman. Also in Branded. Of course, I was about six. I'm not sure that his style of acting would hold up all that well.
Dec
Its a great film. I had it slightly spoiled for me by a review but even so I still was taken aback by events and still enjoyed the movie.
HB
Yeah I loved it. I though Rockwell was the best thing about the ill fated Hitchhiker movie too.
I really should do a dork list. I've seen em all. Dark Star would have to up there near the top and John Boorman's Excalibur as well as all the obvious ones.
HB
Yeah Blade Runner's not a bad little movie either.
Only took it 27 years to make a profit.
Holden
It might have been a hit but not a Star Wars style hit thats for sure and now its pretty off the radar or was...
Seana
I didnt like Soylent Green as much, but the circumstances might be to blame. I saw it during a 24 hour Chuck Heston schlock fest which also included Planet of the Apes, Touch of Evil and The Omega Man. Soylent may have been on at 3 or 4 in the morning when I was starting to fade.
A film of that period I do think holds up well is Logan's Run, although my favourite scene when I was 13 or so when I saw it for the first time was Jenny Agutter getting her kit off.
The Bunyip is leaving us alone so far which is nice of it.
Everybody,
We're staying up at a place called Surfer's Paradise which is Miami Beach transplated to Queensland (the jungle is just behind us and the broad Pacific just in front). I've always actually liked Miami so I do like it here. I think its great in fact. Although I have been having a few margaritas so I may not be in quite the position to judge.
I haven't seen it in years, but I do remember enjoying this movie. Didn't Lucas get the idea for R2D2 from one of the robots in this flick?
I really hope the bunyip hasn't developed a taste for margaritas over the years. All that salt. On the other hand it would be cool if there was a recent sighting, even if it would probably be your last one. Best keep the digital camera at the ready.
Speaking of excellent science-fiction, Adrian, in DIWMB Michael kills some time watching a sci-fi flick while waiting to air someone out. Was it Nemesis he was watching?
Brian
Yeah I think I read that too. Where would Kenny Baker be with out it, eh?
It probably is unnecessary to mention this but in Tunisia I visited the Tatooine location. Oh and the Life of Brian one too.
Seana
No Bunyips so far but we were just at a playground by a creek without a camera, ideal territory for the Bunyip to jump out scare everyone and then we have a lifetime of no one believing us.
Matt
Yeah I remember bit. I dont have the book with me at the mo, but its a good question. I dont know. Planet of the Apes maybe? I'm pretty sure there's an Apes mention somewhere in the Dead trilogy. (I saw all five Apes movies in a row once at a film festival and was deeply traumatised by that experience). Apes 3 is surprisingly good was the only thing I remember. (Apes 1 of course is terrific)
Ah, the only reason I ask is the description reminded me of one of the best movie-watching experiences I had in high school. The description - cyborgs, bad cops, a rainy LA - reminded me of that flick, Nemesis. Great flick to watch with a bunch of buds and beer.
But speaking of Planet of the Apes:
http://www.hassleinbooks.com/
You're right, we would never believe that you had seen a bunyip, even with pictures. It would just be too coincidental.
And yes, you must always post anecdotes about all the places you've visited because of books and films. Some people might follow in your footsteps. And some people...well, let's just say that we are all edified in different ways by it.
Wasn't Gonk from Star Wars (he's in the Jawa sandcrawler, and he gets his feet seared in Jedi) a recycled version of Huey and Duey from Silent Running?
Anyway, if Ellroy's American Underworld ever makes it to the screen, I think Sam Rockwell would make a terrific Wayne Tedrow Jr.
Matt
Ok now I remember. He's watching Blade Runner right? Something the androids being the good guys?
Seana
I'd love to write a travel book. The writer I most envy is Paul Theroux getting to jaunt off for months at a time and getting a terrific book out of it. I dont however think I have the sensibility for it.
Stuart
I really hope I live to see that but ONLY as a mini series on HBO. I think trying to compress all that into a film would be a mistake. However it would be a great 3 season mini series.
Oh, come on. You could write a travel book with your hands tied behind your back. What are you talking about with this sensibility stuff?
Now that Paul has shown us the way, you know that you don't even have to be pleasant.
Seana
I dont think so. If you read a Theroux or any good travel writer, they're always talking to people, asking them questions about their life etc. I could never do that in a million years. I'd be mortified. And a travel book of me just looking out a train window page upon page is going to be very tedious.
I think you could talk to people and be disappointed in their replies, just as Theroux is. He is not exactly what you would ever call garrulous, or even affable. A lot of what he writes is just the conclusions he draws from watching people. Often wrong ones. You could do that too.
All it has to do is be entertaining. Theroux is also a literary fetishist, which you know, but others don't. He's always going to places because some writer he admires lived there or died there or something.
Watching people, as Mark Twain did quite a lot of in Innocents Abroad, and being disappointed in certain expectations of the trip, an upset or two, some vague insight into life if you really must write a bestseller like Eat, Pray, Love--that's really all it takes. Well, it helps if there is some harmless trangression, but you could manage that. In fact, if you look back through your blog posts, you already have.
Seana
I do have two travel observations from my visit to Queensland: all Australian have a tattoo on their right shoulder, belly button piercings can be justified on no aesthetic ground whatsoever.
Someone should take up the cause of belly button piercings, but it won't be me.
Tattoos are so ubiquitous in Santa Cruz that I could tell the woman sitting behind me at Shakespeare Santa Cruz wasn't a local when she pointed out a young woman with tattoos covering her arms and said loudly to her husband, "Look how horrible she looks!"
I admit it possibly wasn't the greatest look for her, but she turned out to be one of the ushers, and ended up sitting right next to me and in front of this woman. I trust that the woman's appreciation of Julius Caesar wasn't marred too much by her aesthetic dismay. I found the girl to be a very polite person, at least she tried to be quiet while eating her cake.
Actually, although I usually enjoy the festive atmosphere of the glen, I have to say that the audience was bugging the hell out of me right from the get go that day. And it was not the tattooed people who were doing the bugging.
I suppose it didn't help that the woman who was waiting behind me in line was going on about the deficiencies of our local businesses and said, and Bookshop Santa Cruz, they're such jerks there! Why do they think we should support them?
I don't have a huge team spirit about the place, but it's times like that that I think, why the hell do I bother?
Shouldn't sweat the bunyip, though, IIRC according the the monster manual it's got something like AC 5, around 60 HP. Weakness is cold iron, so as long as you have a frying pan around you should be ok.
Seana
I just dont think they look very nice (belly button rings) even on a very slender woman but on the average sized lady its jumping off into silly territory.
I too have my right shoulder tattooed so I'm not one to talk.
Before you ask. It looks a bit like the symbol for the Arts Council of Northern Ireland.
Matt
I still have my Monster Manual lying around the house somewhere.
I remember having problems with it though. Like when you do Sticks to Snakes which is a high level Cleric spell it gives you these tiny snakes that do 1 die 4 worth of damage. What about a bloody spitting cobra or something.
belly button piercings can be justified on no aesthetic ground whatsoever.
There are much worse places.
(Not that I have direct experience)
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