Hello this is Jake Winters for Eye on the Triangle this is Snowverated and this week I will be taking a look at the film Moon

Moon is set in the future where a man is working by himself mining for a power source that helps to keep the world supplied with power. He lives there with his only companion being an artificial intelligence designed to keep him safe and happy.

From the moment this movie started I believed it was going to be a stereotypical space movie where the robot turns on the man. I won’t say if I was right or wrong but I will say it did not end in the way I expected it to. The movie did end up facing some actually interesting conflicts and had an interesting plot arch. There were tense moments, sad moments, and heroic moments. Honestly it is hard to see why this movie flew so low on the world’s radar back in 2009. It wasn’t hugely popular but did have some success with 9.76 million USD pulled in. This is a large amount of money but to put it into perspective The Dark Knight, released in the same year, made 534.9 million. So for many this movie may have been easily overlooked. If you are someone that got so hyped up about batman you missed every other movie that year I suggest taking a look at this one

The filming of the movie had to use some unusual techniques. Without going into too much detail about the film, they had to shoot a scene where the same actor was on the screen but in two places at the same time. This was done well enough but at times it felt very rough. You could tell where the cuts were to deal with the problem and I felt it could have done better. The CGI in the movie is not exactly spectacular either but I may be saying that because I am spoiled with movies like Interstellar and Avatar in terms of CGI. Beyond computer generated setting though I felt like the props and set design were done well. Not everything in the movie was explained leaving some ambiguity and high tech awe to the surroundings which I like. Throughout the film, although it is not a key point, I found myself intrigued with the layout of the base. I wondered why there were ladders in some places and weird separating of sections of the base throughout. This undetermined aspect of the area added life to it. It made me realize that this is a setting I am not familiar with and have no experience in. Sometimes films make spacecraft seem too comfortable and familiar and it seems as though it is normal.

The story is neve overly exciting or dramatic but there are a lot of tense and suspenseful scenes. This film takes its viewer on a rollercoaster of emotion. I think you can see almost every emotion in this movie which is something I don’t think can be said about every movie but there is an extremely wide range in this one. The acting by Sam Rockwell, essentially the only actor in the movie, is superb. He does talk to Gerty, the robot voiced by Kevin Spacey, though and that is different than being the only actor. I really felt like he nailed the eccentric character that had been living on the moon for 3 years by himself and the other character he plays was well done too. Im trying not to give too much away here.

Duncan jones, the director of this movie, also directed the upcoming Warcraft movie. He has said that he wants to go on to make moon into a trilogy and hopefully does as it is a spectactular idea, and while the film is not left open ended. There is so much to be built upon in this concept and the way the film ends is a perfect balance between beginning a new story and ending this one. It is as though you are closing one book and just reading the first page of the next.

I am going to give moon a 7/10. I felt like there is more that could have been done to make it a great film and bring it above the 7 but it just wasn’t there. The plot was interesting and the acting was solid but some of the filming was a little shaky and was not perfect. This film is the perfect set up for a great trilogy. If Duncan jones revisits this story, and I realy hope he does, he has a lot of great content to work with and I am sure it will be a great film. Im sure that once you watch this movie you will also be on the lookout for his next film

Thank you for listening to this week’s edition of snowverated and Eye on the Triangle. If you have any comments on my review feel free to send an public affairs@ W-K-N-C.org. Have a good night