This 2007 movie, directed by Danny Boyle, was on tv last night and with nothing else worthy of my attention, I decided to watch it.  I’d never heard of it before but the very brief blurb on the tv guide website intrigued me.  It sounded just sci fi enough to interest me.

It stars Cillian Murphy, Rose Byrne, Cliff Curtis and Chris Evans, amongst others and centres around our own sun, which is dying.  The powers that be, decide to send a nuclear bomb (why do American movie makers think nuclear bombs solve everything?) strapped to a spaceship in the hopes of re-igniting our life giving star.

Also relevant to the story is the fact that a previous mission failed to release the bomb and also failed to return to Earth.

I was delighted to find the action begins right at the start of the film, without any of the boring scene setting.  The inter personal dynamic between the characters is pretty good, if a little dramatic and I was very pleasantly surprised to listen to dialogue that I found believable and natural.

The character of Searle, played by the gorgeous Cliff Curtis, from the tv series Missing,  seems a little suspicious as the movie unfolds and I found myself believing that he would turn out to be a bad guy.  I was wrong and he gives his life to save the others.  They find the original lost spaceship and plan to use it to help them re-ignite the sun but soon discover it has been sabotaged and is unusable.  A video recording made by one of the crew of the original craft seems to indicate that he went nuts and killed his crew members and sabotaged the ship.

The cast also includes Michelle Yeoh, of Babylon AD fame, who plays a character named Corazon.  Her character is a little weak and I feel she had little to bring to the table in this movie.  Another thing that disappointed me was that each character was the only one who could fulfill his/her particular role.  I’d have thought in a real life situation, NASA would ensure many crew members could fulfill different roles, in case of accidents or death etc.  Still, I know it’s a movie so let’s move on.

I really enjoyed this movie, apart from the end.  I found the introduction of the nutjob from the previous spaceship, and his subsequent behaviour, was too silly.  The movie makers went a bit overboard in making him a fully functioning wacko and it made me cringe.

Everyone dies in the end, which pleased me and made up for the fact that yet again, one lone person saves the day with seconds to spare (groan).  The movie is atmospheric without resorting to ridiculously low light levels which is a very annoying habit movie makers have when they don’t want to bother with effects (or can’t afford them).  The dialogue is good and the story simple but well played.

I’d recommend it.