SFIFF 52: 'Moon'

If American moviegoers favor blue-collar heroism and escapist fantasy, they were well served by British director Duncan Jones' sci-fi feature 'Moon' which screened Sunday night at the Castro. Referencing all the classics of the genre, especially '2001' and 'Alien', this relatively low-budget indie production is set to become an instant classic in its own right, by virtue of the astonishing performance of Sam Rockwell, its central, really its only, character. He plays Sam Bell, the solitary site-foreman and technician for a lunar-surface mining operation, nearing the end of his three-year contract and suffering from the mentally disorienting effects of intense loneliness. His only direct contact is with the 2001-style talking computer, Gerty; his video transmissions to and from his wife and daughter are delayed recordings. When he regains consciousness after an accident he finds a stranger living in the station alongside him, a stranger who not only looks like him but claims to be him. What proceeds is a study in identity rendered hypnotic by Rockwell's virtuoso acting skills. The two versions of Sam circle around one another like boxers in a ring; they are bodies locked into a kind of magnetic intrapersonal orbit, the arcs of which expand and contract, harmonize and clash. It is a tighter, futuristic take on the twins in David Cronenberg's 'Dead Ringers', flawlessly achieved, with notes of poignant humor, resentment, and exasperation sounding within a well of deep recognition.

The set is gorgeous: afficionados will appreciate the fact that it comprises models with some CG layers overlaid; what is created is a scene of haunting visual beauty that speaks to the spiritual dimension of its human predicament. There are plot twists, heroic efforts, a struggle against the machine, but the film ultimately succeeds as a character drama, a brilliant solo performance that is unmatched in films of this genre. Sam Rockwell is a true revelation.