That crazy Arbogast is at it again. More savings for the ongoing One You Might Have Saved Blogathon. I'm always game for saving a doomed character in movie history with whom I feel a certain degree of connection so what the hell, let's do it again, but beware, SPOILERS ABOUND!For this entry I choose Sam Bell number five. The movie is Moon, directed by Duncan Jones and starring Sam Rockwell as Sam Bell, which is, for what it's worth, the fifth time in his career he has played a character named "Sam." If you've seen Moon you know that there are an endless number of Sam Bell clones who all serve mining duty on the moon for three years until they are disposed of, or die, to make way for the next clone who will serve for three more years and so on. None are allowed to know they are clones or that they will never leave. Each clone works alone and is under the impression that he is the real Sam Bell and will go home after a three year tour of duty.
If you think I just spoiled the movie for you I didn't, not really at least. For one thing, I did give a spoiler warning at the top of the post but mainly, the movie itself is not concerned with a big twist/reveal at the end of the movie. The clone element of the story is revealed fairly early on and the movie quickly becomes a tale of two clones, Sam Bell 5 and Sam Bell 6, who become dependent on each other in much the same way Dustin Hoffman and Jon Voight do in Midnight Cowboy. While many reviews, like this excellent one from This Island Rod, rightly mention nods to 2001, Blade Runner and Outland, none I have seen so far mention Midnight Cowboy and to me, that's the primary influence.
Like all the best science fiction, it's not about the setting or the technology, it simply uses setting and technology to explore character. And so, while Midnight Cowboy and Moon may take place in worlds some 235,000 miles apart, they tell much the same story: two men struggling to make their way in the world, realizing too late for one that helping each other is what they needed to do all along. And what they need to do in this case is get off of the moon before a "rescue" team shows up to correct a mistake in the system, that is, eliminate one of the clones.
The newer clone, Sam 6, is awakened to start his tour of duty, memory implants of a life on earth in place, after Sam 5 has an accident leaving him stranded on the surface in a large moon rover. The glitch in the system occurs when Sam 6 finds Sam 5 and brings him back to base. There are two of them now, and they were never supposed to know of the other. This presents a problem for the company running the operation. See, they don't know the two know of each other. They think Sam 5 is still stranded on the surface and are sending that previously mentioned "rescue" mission to get rid of him before Sam 6 discovers him, which, of course, he already has, unbeknownst to them. Sam 6 sees all of this coming and devises an escape plan while the older clone, Sam Bell 5, gets sicker and sicker. Constantly hacking and walking with an odd limp, more vulgar and unkempt than Sam 6, he is the lunar spiritual brother of Ratzo Rizzo.
By the end, a plan is devised and an escape is made but one that Sam 5 can never enjoy. His diseased body is too battered and bruised for this world and while the journey home may give him hope, as the trip to Miami does for Ratzo, it's a trip we know he'll never survive. And so, placed back in his rover for the rescue team to find, he dies and while we know he must, we still don't want him to. He's so helpless and filled with the desire to see his daughter, a daughter that does exist for the real Sam Bell, but is nothing more than a stranger to Sam 5, that we want him to make that journey home, desperately. Which brings us around to the whole point of this post and of Arbogast's ongoing blogathon. If I could, I'd walk into that station with the best medical team I could find and, by God, we'd make Sam better. We'd get him well and bring him back to earth safely. And even though his daughter wouldn't know him, since her real father, the real Sam Bell, is fifteen years older, I'd make sure, somehow, he got a chance to at least see her. And all of this is a testament to just how well Sam Rockwell pulls this whole thing off. He takes two identical characters and makes them so different, I forgot, and easily, that it was the same actor playing them. Rockwell makes Sam 5 so sympathetic that when he finally does shuffle off this mortal coil we wish only that we could've saved him. And if I could, I'd go all the way to the moon to do so.
14 comments:
You gave a spoiler warning but didn't reveal the film until after the spoiler. Which kind of spoiled your warning.
Well, it's revealed in the very next line. If someone forgot I gave a spoiler warning that quickly, I kind of want to spoil the movie for them. Besides, in all seriousness, it's a relationship movie, really. Twists don't have much to do with it.
I told you it was good! HA!!
Rockwell is amazing in this. You're right, you just flat out forget it's all one guy. His performance(s) feel so goddamn effortless.
I've heard people complain that Rockwell is just a collection of actorly tics, and I have literally no idea what they're talking about.
Also, to be fair, spoiler warnings shouldn't just be applied to movies that have twists. It's not related to "twist endings" exclusively. It's about stories, and watching their unfolding in a pure state. I know, that sounds obnoxious, but whatever.
Yeah, whatever, you obnoxious bastard. Actually, I agree, which is why I gave the spoiler warning and why I said the clone thing wasn't the spoiler because it isn't. But I had to talk about the characters and couldn't really make the reader understand unless they could get the details.
Anyway, I was very pleased with the film and, like you, don't know what people are talking about with the "actorly ticks" line. I've never heard that but it rings false. His two characters feel so unique, so different from each other he almost comes close to failing by making them too different so they wouldn't be clones anymore. But he doesn't and it's great.
The "tics" comment I'm thinking of specifically was made, I believe, about Rockwell as a whole, not specifically about his work in MOON, but either way I just don't see it. I think he's terrific, and if anything has ever proved that, it's MOON. I really think he's astonishing in it.
He really is, I agree. And you know what he should do to people who accuse him of not being good? MOON them! Get it? See, cause, you know, the movie title and everything. MOON.
Wonderful post!
I watched Moon recently and was very happy that it did not go where I expected it to go (namely the evil robot direction). It reminded me more of Silent Running and some of the more human elements in Phillip K. Dick's books.
Sarah, I thought of Silent Running too. Both movies have that kind of quiet, gentle humanism that doesn't scream its point at you. I was also kind of expecting the evil robot turn too, and very glad it didn't happen. Surprised as well.
I agree, he was excellent, and Sam 5 was heartbreaking. It was hard enough watching him when he was well; he was so desperately lonely and had completely given up on his appearance, or really everything but getting "home." Watching his body break down and fall apart was awful.
And the robot was actually a sweet and sympathetic character too.
It was the robot, Gerty, that surprised me the most. I am so accustomed to the evil computer/robot subplot, its most famous example being HAL in 2001, that I fully expected the same thing here, especially after Gerty clams up after being discovered talking to the corporation guys.
Well now I have to see this. I find Sam Rockwell riveting. Partially in the way that he just turns into a character and I forget all about him. I don't find myself thinking, "Sam Rockwell was so good." after a film he's been in. I walk out with thoughts running through my brain about the film being good, thinking that the character was so riveting or ruminating on how I hated seeing him hurt or reveling in his defeat or wishing I could meet him... and then I blink and remember that it's Sam Rockwell, not the character.
And THAT just fascinates me about him.
It's a superb performance. It's not a film that goes in too many directions. It stays focused on the two characters and their interactions and Rockwell is key to the whole thing working. I think you'll like it very much.
Moon was easily my favorite film of last year, it got shunted by the Academy and financially screwed over after home release.
Regardless of all that bull I could not have been more pleasantly surprised by Moon.
Keep up the entertaining work Greg!
Thanks Jake! And it was totally snubbed. Rockwell should have been a shoo-in for a nomination and no one even mentioned him as being left out.
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