Sunshine - movie review
Potential spoilers ahead. You may want to just read the last paragraph.
But mainly it's how I wish to set my mind before I watch this movie. But this is on hindsight of course.
It'll be easy to brush this off as another Armageddon. But it's not. The crew is not a bunch of rednecks. In fact, if not for the obvious lack of a black guy, I'd say it's pretty much a united colours of benetton ensemble.
What's interesting is how it scopes a discussion on society when viewed under a microscope. What happens when everybody in a society is rational, highly intelligent and outcome driven? Given a situation that can potentially tear the society apart, would the people within the society go the democratic way and put it to a vote? Or, since they are all rational, highly intelligent and outcome driven, will they sit down and discuss the pros and cons of each of the choices and decide on the best possible solution for the given situation?
In this question, you start to ask yourself this: if this is so, why then are we voting in a democracy? Maybe it's because we are not rational neither are we highly intelligent. Is the outcome in a vote within a democracy necessarily the best? Is a vote system rational? Is it intelligent? And the decision made at the end of a vote; does it serve the outcome the best?
If any of the answer to any of the question is a "no". Then should we get a group of people who are the most rational, intelligent and "knows what is best for us" to run us, wouldn't that be great? What happens to freedom of choice then?
But it gets trickier. Because the movie is set in a "do or die" scenario. Freedom of choice will get in the way of survival. So is "freedom of choice" a good or bad thing? And when you are indeed given a choice within a small society but you know that whatever you choose will not change the outcome, will you choose the "ethical" choice? Will you choose the "ethical" choice and leave the others to choose the "unethical" choice and protest against the outcome on "higher moral grounds"? What if the "unethical" choice outcome ensured your survival?
There a little bit of subtlety embedded by Alex Garland. It hints on the side on which he is on when it comes to the "science vs faith" debate. There is no mention of god and the only mention of faith is faith in scientific theories. Everybody in the movie as about to sacrifice their lives in order to deliver the payload and save planet earth. Except for this one guy who speaks of god as if he were his best friend. Maybe Alex Garland was trying to hint that in the end, when it comes to saving the world from whatever predicament we may be in: global warming, nuclear crisis, etc etc, the people who will stumble us are those who act from their religious faith. While that may not have been the design of their god but it is through their acts that you can tell how they interpreted the words of their gods.
The Last Paragraph
Of course, you can otherwise watch this movie as it is, an old fashion everybody dies in the end sci-fi flick with great special effects and a suitable amount of gore and violence. Great music by Karl Hyde and company aka Underworld and a great song as the credits roll by I Am Kloot called Avenue Of Hope - check out the insane Chinese subtitles that go with the song. The spaceship in the movie is named Icarus. Icarus, of course, with the waxed wings flew too near the sun and his wings got melted. There is a very interesting reason why the spaceship is named thus. Read it here.
But mainly it's how I wish to set my mind before I watch this movie. But this is on hindsight of course.
It'll be easy to brush this off as another Armageddon. But it's not. The crew is not a bunch of rednecks. In fact, if not for the obvious lack of a black guy, I'd say it's pretty much a united colours of benetton ensemble.
What's interesting is how it scopes a discussion on society when viewed under a microscope. What happens when everybody in a society is rational, highly intelligent and outcome driven? Given a situation that can potentially tear the society apart, would the people within the society go the democratic way and put it to a vote? Or, since they are all rational, highly intelligent and outcome driven, will they sit down and discuss the pros and cons of each of the choices and decide on the best possible solution for the given situation?
In this question, you start to ask yourself this: if this is so, why then are we voting in a democracy? Maybe it's because we are not rational neither are we highly intelligent. Is the outcome in a vote within a democracy necessarily the best? Is a vote system rational? Is it intelligent? And the decision made at the end of a vote; does it serve the outcome the best?
If any of the answer to any of the question is a "no". Then should we get a group of people who are the most rational, intelligent and "knows what is best for us" to run us, wouldn't that be great? What happens to freedom of choice then?
But it gets trickier. Because the movie is set in a "do or die" scenario. Freedom of choice will get in the way of survival. So is "freedom of choice" a good or bad thing? And when you are indeed given a choice within a small society but you know that whatever you choose will not change the outcome, will you choose the "ethical" choice? Will you choose the "ethical" choice and leave the others to choose the "unethical" choice and protest against the outcome on "higher moral grounds"? What if the "unethical" choice outcome ensured your survival?
There a little bit of subtlety embedded by Alex Garland. It hints on the side on which he is on when it comes to the "science vs faith" debate. There is no mention of god and the only mention of faith is faith in scientific theories. Everybody in the movie as about to sacrifice their lives in order to deliver the payload and save planet earth. Except for this one guy who speaks of god as if he were his best friend. Maybe Alex Garland was trying to hint that in the end, when it comes to saving the world from whatever predicament we may be in: global warming, nuclear crisis, etc etc, the people who will stumble us are those who act from their religious faith. While that may not have been the design of their god but it is through their acts that you can tell how they interpreted the words of their gods.
The Last Paragraph
Of course, you can otherwise watch this movie as it is, an old fashion everybody dies in the end sci-fi flick with great special effects and a suitable amount of gore and violence. Great music by Karl Hyde and company aka Underworld and a great song as the credits roll by I Am Kloot called Avenue Of Hope - check out the insane Chinese subtitles that go with the song. The spaceship in the movie is named Icarus. Icarus, of course, with the waxed wings flew too near the sun and his wings got melted. There is a very interesting reason why the spaceship is named thus. Read it here.
![[Valid Atom 1.0]](valid-atom.png "Validate my Atom 1.0 feed")
No comments:
Post a Comment