6.2
A teenage girl and her father travel to a remote alien moon, aiming to strike it rich. They've secured a contract to harvest a large deposit of the elusive gems hidden in the depths of the moon's toxic forest. But there are others roving the wilderness and the job quickly devolves into a fight to survive.
Sophie Thatcher
Cee
Pedro Pascal
Ezra
Jay Duplass
Damon
Andre Royo
Oruf
Sheila Vand
Inumon
Anwan Glover
Mikken
Luke Pitzrick
Number Two
Arthur Deranleau
Fahr
Alex McCauley
Bahr
Doug Dawson
Heshir
Krista Johnson
Gali
Brian Gunter
Mesur
Trick Danneker
Jack
Christopher Morson
Zed
Shepheard Earl
Conductor
Ben Little
Prisoner
Director, Screenplay
Christopher Caldwell
Director, Screenplay
Zeek Earl
February 7, 2019
10
This film knocked my socks off, since it was exactly the kind of hard science-fiction that I often read as a young man. In it, we are transported to a future time when space travel is commonplace; in this movie we see a man and his daughter who are hard-scrabble people trying to get by in life, but not wealthy. They are prospectors, and hope to strike it rich on a planet where breathing the air is deadly, so the atmosphere has to be filtered & atmosphere suits must be worn when outside.
The planet is spectacularly real. The airborne spores can be seen, and we are shown their deadly effect; most of the action takes place while wearing the suits which filter out those deadly spores. This film impressed me mostly for its realism; the suits were well-worn, the spacecraft were also, and much of their equipment had to be jury-rigged to be useful.
The actors did a great job; Cee (Sopie Thatcher) was a natural, and totally believable, and had good chemistry with Ezra (Pedro Pascal) who really carried the movie; he sometimes reminded me of Nathan Fillian in Firefly. I would've preferred a bit more background on their characters, and a few times I was unimpressed by their emotional reaction to certain events, but those are minor quibbles about an excellent film, which I urge all lovers of hard science-fiction to enjoy, as I certainly did!
As there are so very few real sci-fi movies to compare it with, I give this film 5/5; it's excellent!