Sunshine (2007)

 

100 best Science Fiction films

Popular Mechanics list

#87. Sunshine (2007)

 

Everybody loves a Space Epic, but they are goddamned hard to do, and the more serious (meaning more Grown-Up than “Flash Gordon” (original film serial 1936)), the harder it gets. Reviewing lists of “Best Science Fiction Movies” the Space Epics are always present, but often take a back seat to other SF sub-Genres like Alien Invasion, Mad-Scientist, Post-Apocalyptic, VR, etc. (Not this list though, “Popular Mechanics” loves them some Space Epic).

 

Another problem is that most serious Space Epics are in the shadow of one film, the creation of co-Writer (with Arthur C. Clarke) and Director Stanley Kubrick, “2001: A Space Odessey” (1968), which was an extraordinary triumph combining, as no one ever did before or since, the themes/tropes of Hard SF, First Contact, and Spiritual Transcendence. Even since, most others have been stalked by I call “2001 Envy,” Because none of these films can escape being compared to “2001 …” and that the themes/tropes keep dragging one into that one film, most filmmakers are trapped and unable to forge a whole new path. We see this Envy in big-and-small productions like “Solaris” (1972, though its Director, Andrei Tarkovsky, reportedly hated “2001 …”), “Star Trek: The Motion Picture,” “The Black Hole” (both 1979), “Solar Crisis” (1990), “Solaris” (2007 remake of the 1972), “Love” (2011), and “Interstellar” (2014). There are even Earth-bound SF films that display the Envy, like “Phase IV” (1974), “Close Encounters of the Third Kind” (1977), “Altered States” (1980), “Contact” (1997), “A.I. Artificial Intelligence” (2001, another Kubrick project, but ultimately Directed by “Close Encounters …” Director Steven Spielberg), “Arrival” (2016), and “Annihilation” (2018, a project by this film’s Screenwriter Alex Garland).

 

The sticking points are usually to find some new way of making Space Flight just as beautiful (in fairness, several have delivered this without aping “2001 …”) and finding a new language to address Transcendence in a SF-context (almost no one has been able to pull that one off, almost all listed above have some equivalent to “2001…” legendary “Star Gate” sequence).

 

Well, here we have the Space Epic that most broke from the pack even though Screenwriter Alex Garland and Director Danny Boyle (frequent collaborators) rolled up their sleeves and wrestled the Angel of “2001 …” quite explicitly. They escaped the Envy largely because they took on an almost unique attitude, it’s almost anti-Transcendence; it indulges it to a degree, but also casts a cold eye on the concept.

 

Their accomplishment is especially surprising because “Sunshine” is virtually a remake of the fore-mentioned “Solar Crisis” (a film filled with so much Envy it was almost painful to watch).  Both are tales of an Entourage Casts engaging in a last-ditch attempt to save Humanity because our Sun going cold. In their massive Spaceships they fly to the Sun, hoping to reignite it with a massive Bomb. Both Crews face dangerous Mechanical Failures and Sabotage. In both films the first Crew fatality was in the context of near-identical acts of self-sacrifice. Also, both films had (on paper) near-identical budgets (around $40-$45 million), but that’s without adjusting for inflation, so “Sunshine” was actually cheaper to make than “Solar Crisis,” yet superior by every possible measure.

 

“Sunshine” is set almost entirely inside the Spaceship Icarus II in the year 2057 and it is rich in Space Travel Verisimilitude. That’s another surprise, because the core concept of the movie seems to deny the option of Scientific Realism. In outline the story is one of irresistible Techno-Adventurism which attracted SF Writers for nearly a century (the oldest one I know is “Phoenix” by Clark Ashton Smith), so it’s a story told so many times that maybe, just maybe, Screenwriter Alex Garland, hadn’t seen “Solar Crisis,” and did the remake thing by accident. As attractive a plot as it is, the  idea holds no water in terms of Physics: When the Sun starts to die, it won’t do in a manner even remotely similar to the way described in the film; the Fissional material required to reignite it simply doesn’t exist on Earth, it would require not one-or-two big Space Ships heavily loaded-with-Fissionables, but billions of them; and the mechanics of Gravity is repeatedly a Plot Point but pretty much all of that was wrong. But no one except actual Physicists complained, this film wasn’t like the fore-mentioned “The Black Hole,” where even non-experts bitched that the Science was so bad that the Audience felt dumber for watching it.

 

Real Science is often in conflict with SF, and Director Boyle offered some advice of the subject, "You have to research the science and then you have to dump it … I hope we found a balance, although it is more science fact than science fiction in some ways, more NASA than Star Wars, but that's just my taste ... So, I hope the drama and excitement is there and you don't feel like you are back to school again."

 

This film is “Competence Porn,” but of an unusually sophisticated type. That phrase is applied to SF where the Future belongs only to the mostly Highly-Skilled and Professional, no slouches need apply, so this film’s Characters who could get jobs in Star Fleet (from “Star Trek” a  TV and film franchise first appearing in 1966) or on the Space Ship Discovery (from “2001 …”), but there also so far richer than SF’s usual Paragons. Also, after their excellence is established, we watch them fail repeatedly. As the story progresses and the success of the mission becomes less probable, relationships start to break down; tough decisions to save the mission aren’t agreed to be all, and all are the best-of-the-best and they know it, so someone always walks away from a debate resentful; further, they must eventually face that even if they succeed, they’ve lost any hope of returning home; and, after a certain point, they won’t even be able to talk to their loved ones still on Earth for the rest of their one-way trip. Though loaded with “Star Trek” and “2001 …” references, it starts looking more like “Dark Star” (1974), the most anti-2001 of all Space Epics, where the erosion of the Characters’ Professionalism and Interpersonal Squabbles are central to all proceedings. Slowly the Confidence Porn erodes, the Psychological Strain becomes too much for a few, while others manage to stay just this side of the breaking point and seem all the more Heroic for not falling over.

 

It's a crew of eight and the lead Character is not the Captain but Physicist Robert Capa (Cillian Murphy, and the only character with both a first and last name), who is too much a Pro to wear any of his anxieties and insecurities on his sleeve, but there’s no missing his quiet desperation. The Captain, Kaneda (Hiroyuki Sanada), is worthy of note though, he’s a man anyone would be proud to follow into Hellfire. I also especially liked Dr. Searle (Cliff Curtis) in charge of the crews’ Physical and Psychological Health, but finding himself drawn into dangerous Metaphysical fixation with the Star that is failing Humanity, and Biologist Corazon (Michelle Yeoh), who find the most serenity of all tending the Icarus II’s Greenhouse/Oxygen Garden.

 

Some things were dropped in early drafts of the script, like a Romance between Characters Robert and Pilot Cassie (Rose Byrne). Boyle explained, “The scenario dictates to you in a way is that these people are equal, they’re all equally important. And, although they get gradually killed off, obviously, they are, up until that moment, equally important. That kind of ensemble is unusual, but it’s often the case in space movies ... They all have to share the limelight, so there isn’t the space to develop the relationships in the normal way that you might if you were just focusing on two people.” In another interview, “The good thing about space, it's [ideal for] ensemble acting; it doesn't really suit massive stars.”

 

An when Ensemble Casting greets Competence Porn, there’s also changes the way Characters are conceived. An amusing demonstration of that concerns the “Southern Reach” novel series by Jeff VanderMeer, about a Team of Highly Skilled Professionals doing Dangerous Stuff, and VanderMeer saw no need to identify the Ethnicity of the lead Character in the first book “Annihilation” (2014), but in the second, “Authority” (same year), we find out she’s Asian. In the film version of the first book that same Character is played by a White Actress because poor Garland (in this case Screenwriter and Director) didn’t know any better, and he got chewed out for that by some.

 

About this film Boyle said, “The instinct in casting it was the script doesn’t define the gender and it certainly doesn’t define their nationality or their race or anything. And it’s quite interesting. Space movies tend to be quite colorless like that. There’s just a group of people. You can kind of identify [with] any of them because they don’t have any social conventions that they’re obeying on Earth. They have nothing really to define them.”

 

Actress Yeoh was the first to be cast and Boyle told her, "You can play any part you want.” She picked Character Corazon, which is a Mexican name.

 

One of Boyle’s wishes was that this film might inspire more commitment to Space Exploration so, despite the Scientific untenability of the core-concept, there was devotion to how the Science would work regarding the Character’s day-to-day interaction with their Artificial Environment. Boyle’s research into the subject shaped his casting choices: In the Real-World, right now, the USA remains the leader in Space, but a lot of that in a continuance of legacy, while new investment in Space seems to mostly be coming from Asia so, half of the film’s Cast is Asian. Never-the-less, all spoke English with USA accents even though some of the Characters presumably from the USA were played by Actors from places like Ireland (Murphy) and New Zealand (Curtis).

 

The progressive erosion of Competence Porn, and the examination of who does and doesn’t falter under pressure, reflects the film’s commentary on the idea of Spiritual Transcendence. Many Religions have Worshiped the Sun, and Sun Symbolism is central to every Religion I can think of. Here, what has been so Worshipped is failing, and those who depend on it can only save it, not through Prayer, but Force-of-Will, cold Rationality, and massive Capital Investment. Force-of-Will is presented as a Moral Force seemingly detached from Religiosity and the longing for Transcendence is there, but there’s still work to do first.

 

Though both Character’s Searle and Corazon demonstrate they have strong Spiritual Inclinations, none of the Characters speak of their Religious Inclinations. All these people joined the Mission aware of the dangers, recognizing there was a potential expectation of Self-Sacrifice, but none were happy to embrace Martyrdom. They expected to go home, but when that was denied them, they kept working (so the Competence Porn never completely disappears). No one but the Villian ever uses the word “God” or gives the Afterlife any consideration.

 

Writer Garland is an Atheist (he said the inspiration for this script came from “an article projecting the future of mankind from a physics-based, atheist perspective”). Director Boyle was once devoutly Religious and had even considered the Seminary as a young teen, but is now Agnostic. Lead Actor Murphy was an Agnostic who moved to Atheism around the time this film was made. Murphy said, “For me, making the film, the themes that were more outstanding for me were science versus faith, or science versus religion, and again I think that’s pretty topical given what’s going on in the world.”

 

Boyle seems to look at the film slightly differently than Garland or Murphy, “The question is, of course, whether that ‘spiritual dimension’ is just a constraint of the language - the fact that we simply have no other vocabulary to describe such things. I think that’s what Alex [Garland] believes. But for me, what [Character] Capa sees at the end of the movie is definitely something beyond the rational.” In a different interview, "There is the question about what happens to your mind when you meet the creator of all things in the universe, which for some people is a spiritual, religious idea, and for other people is a purely scientific idea. We are all made up of particles of exploded star, so what would it be like to get close to the Sun, the star from which all the life in our solar system comes from? I thought it would be a huge mental challenge to try and capture that.”

 

The sets are massive, though the very biggest were Blue-or-Green Screen creations. Director Boyle avoided CGI effects as much as possible, though there’s still a lot of CGI and other post-production FX. It was the most FX-heavy film Actor Murphy had involved in up-to-that-point and prior to its release he had no idea what it would look like. As much as possible, Boyle used Actors within the effects, not their CGI Doppelgangers, "There is part of our brain where we admire the effect, but we put it in a side compartment of our experience because you know there's no way an actor can live through that, or be there in that moment." In a separate interview, “The biggest danger with CG, I think, is that it looks a bit plastic sometimes, and secondly, actors look a bit bored … they just can't summon up the energy to say, ‘I believe this.’ Or, they overdo it. They overcompensate and go, ‘I really believe it!’ and they're overacting. So, I always wanted there to be something there that was feasible so the actors could react to it the way they would to other environments. So, I spent a lot of time on that, making sure they had stuff to look at that was convincing … and let them lose themselves in the moment.”

 

Even with the luxurious environment created for the interiors of Icarus II, the sense of Claustrophobia is tangible. Boyle said his goal was to create the kind of suspense evoked by “Wages of Fear” (1953) an emotionally Claustrophobic Thiller set out-doors in a vast Jungle, and he succeeded. The venue might be Infinite Space, but the sense of being Imprisoned hangs over every scene. Here Cinematographer Alwin H. Küchler, Lighting and Digital Effects Artist Rob Andrews, and Visual Effects Supervisor Tom Wood, deserve special mention. The images of the Sun were not literally retina-scorching, but that idea was conveyed by contrasted with the Dark Abyss of Space (unusual for a Space Epic, there are no beautiful Star Fields in the background, because the Icarus II was so close to the light of Sun and the other Stars are invisible, one of the movie’s many nods to Real-World Science to create Verisimilitude). The interior of any Space Ship would be well lit and so is the Icarus II, but carefully, subtly, dark shadows are allowed to creep in to create the contrast for when Characters are forced to look into the Heart of the dying Sun.

 

Boyle again, the film was “Based on light — it's the art of lightness, really, rather than the art of darkness. So, to portray [the sun's] power, and to incrementally increase it as they get closer and closer, was the greatest challenge. And the way we did it, we tried to rob the audience of the colors orange and red. We didn't have any of those colors inside the ship. And then when you went outside the ship, you suddenly felt all this orange light. It's like you had been thirsty without being aware of it; you had been denied this color range. And then suddenly you're flooded with it.”

 

The film falters badly in its third act, when the Sabotage sub-plot is introduced. First and foremost, it was just tonally wrong, multiple Critics complained “Sunshine” had suddenly become a Slasher movie. Though the Saboteur’s motive was something introduced though multiple Characters in the film’s early passages, it’s still unconvincing -- the infinity of Space has driven him mad, and he believes that all must die so he can have his Transcendence, "For seven years I spoke to God. He told me to take us all to heaven." Just as bad, the story-telling suddenly got clumsy and many in the Audience became confused, thinking Character Searle was the Saboteur even after the credits rolled – nope, it was somebody else, but I won’t go Spoiler on you here.

 

The film was abundant and unapologetic in its references to its predecessors. “2001” was the touch-stone even as the story distanced itself from it. Composer John Murphy deliberately echoed the legendary-even-though-unused score of “2001 …” by Gyorgy Ligeti. Other Musicians associated with the film were loquacious in the praise of Ligeti, Karl Hyde of the band Underworld said, “I’d never heard anything like it.” He adored the sounds of the Planets as choirs of Alien Angels ringing throughout the Heavens.

 

Then there’s the redemptive qualities attributed to of the Greenhouse/Oxygen Garden which references “Silent Running” (1972). And a Character named after a Character in “Dark Star.” And the use of the Trope of receiving a Mysterious Distress Message from another Space Ship, most famously applied “Alien” (1979).

 

Boyle saw this deliberate referencing as almost mandatory. Speaking explicitly of the influence of the first “2001…” “Solaris,” and “Alien,” he said, "You can't avoid them. They're imprinted, whether you like it or not. Any way you turn, any decision you make, you realize that they've been there before you. So, you have to put in little homages to them, because you're borrowing … there is no way round it. They are just extraordinary films, and making an impact like they had is all you can hope to achieve." In another interview, "They are the giants that hover over you. You have to borrow from them sometimes and you have to try and sidestep them sometimes."

 

Boyle also has some interesting observations about the limitations placed on SF set on Space Ships, “Not in fantasy sci-fi, like ‘Star Wars,’ where you can go to any planet and find creatures or whatever. But when it's based on a certain amount of realism, and on space exploration as we know it, then it comes down to: there's a ship and a crew and a signal that changes everything.”

Elsewhere he said, “I tend to make high energy pictures that try and disrupt things with odd camera angles or things like that … [But] This kind of sci fi is serious, classic 70’s sci fi which leads to philosophical ideas. It isn’t like a playground. It’s very serious. So, you tend to shoot quite classically. The beginning of the film is much slower. This is the slowest film I’ve ever made in terms of the first half hour … It has to go at that pace. It’s something about the eternity of the distances that are involved.”

 

But, in a different interview, he saw a, “connection with the [his own] other films … You have a bunch of people who are isolated together either through choice or through circumstances and how they disintegrate or how they cope with them. That’s how it connects with the other films … ‘The Beach’ [2000], that’s a group of people. You think about ‘Shallow Grave’ [1994], it’s three people living in this flat. You think about ‘Trainspotting’ which is kind of like a sealed group of friends destroying each other. I obviously really like films that have that kind of group dynamic in them.”

 

The film got mostly good reviews, even with almost all complaining about the third act, but still Bombed in the Box-Office. The disappointment hit Director Boyle hard as it had been a difficult, three-year, production, "There’s a reason why many directors only make one science-fiction film … It’s because you exhaust yourself... spiritually.” He declared he wouldn’t do SF again.

 

Boyle’s features have been diverse and he had six under his belt by the time he made this film. The three most popular were “Shallow Grave,” a Crime film dark enough to be considered Horror, “Trainspotting” (1996), about the daily life of junkies but became a Crime film in its third act, and “28 Days Later” (2002), a Horror film built on a SF foundation. He would return to SF eventually, working on the third film of the “28 Days Later” series (not released at this writing), but that is a much different kind of SF than this film. Boyle is on recoded saying the sub-Genre of the Serious Space Epic is narrower than Zombie films, which “28 Days Later” is.

Trailer:

Sunshine Trailer