Misfortunes of Imaginary Beings: 02/03/20

A blog formerly known as Bookishness / By Charles Matthews

"Dazzled by so many and such marvelous inventions, the people of Macondo ... became indignant over the living images that the prosperous merchant Bruno Crespi projected in the theater with the lion-head ticket windows, for a character who had died and was buried in one film and for whose misfortune tears had been shed would reappear alive and transformed into an Arab in the next one. The audience, who had paid two cents apiece to share the difficulties of the actors, would not tolerate that outlandish fraud and they broke up the seats. The mayor, at the urging of Bruno Crespi, explained in a proclamation that the cinema was a machine of illusions that did not merit the emotional outbursts of the audience. With that discouraging explanation many ... decided not to return to the movies, considering that they already had too many troubles of their own to weep over the acted-out misfortunes of imaginary beings."
--Gabriel García Márquez, One Hundred Years of Solitude

Monday, February 3, 2020

Moon (Duncan Jones, 2009)

Sam Rockwell in Moon

Cast: Sam Rockwell, Dominique McElligott, Rosie Shaw, Adrienne Shaw, Kaya Scodelario, Benedict Wong, Matt Berry, voice of Kevin Spacey. Screenplay: Duncan Jones, Nathan Parker. Cinematography: Gary Shaw. Production design: Tony Noble. Film editing: Nicolas Gaster. Music: Clint Mansell.

Sam Rockwell plays Sam Bell, a mining engineer at the end of a three-year stint as the solitary maintenance man at an outpost on the dark side of the moon. His only companion is a robot called GERTY (voiced by Kevin Spacey), who tends to his every need. The energy corporation for which he works has promised to return him to his wife and small child on Earth when his shift is over, but he has been unable to communicate directly with his family, only receiving recorded messages. Then an accident happens, and the truth about who Sam Bell is comes out. There's an ironic happy ending to the film: "Sam" gets returned to Earth, where he exposes corporate wrongdoing, but the last word is uttered by a Rush Limbaughesque talk show host: "You know what? He's one of two things. He's a wacko or he's an illegal immigrant. Either way, they need to lock him up!" Moon might have been a little better if this satiric note had played throughout the film, but it's solid sci-fi that doesn't depend on flashy CGI and it features a compelling performance by Rockwell.