Not New, But Shining a Light on Danny Boyle's "SUNSHINE"

Sunshine is an awesome concept spin. It’s worth watching alone. The overall sense that’s meant to be conveyed is of bleak loneliness anyway. In a not-too-distant future the sun’s energy reserves are nearly expired. In order to jumpstart what remains, Earth sends a science team in a specially sun-shielded craft to detonate a weapon which will create a chain reaction of biblical proportions allowing the earth to remain habital for another few decades. The main catch is that this mission is the earth’s second attempt. The first mission left for the sun and was never heard from again.

Observation Deck

Cillian Murphy is the science officer designated to weaponize the payload. Chris Evans (Sudbury, MA represent!) comes off quite well as the technology officer. That guy that played Dogen in the final season of LOST is the ship’s captain and the chick from Damages is also on board. What Danny Boyle conveys so masterfully is the way that the crew members interact with each other and what life would be life on a mission that, quite possibly, no one will be returning from. When life and/or mission threatening event begin to take place, what manner of morality takes precedence? If you are trying to complete a mission in order to save the entire human race, at what point does the survival of individuals on the mission stop outweighing the success of the mission? And, perhaps most importantly, how does years of space travel with a small group of individuals and the knowledge and weight of your task impact the psychic of those on board? When this small group of Earth’s best and brightest problem solvers comes face to face with their own destiny, what is the outcome? Watching the characters battle each other and their own fragile minds in the face of mortal struggle is definitely the beauty. Danny Boyle’s vision of the environment as the mission draws closer and closer to its ultimate goal is also astonishingly beautiful, and the focus of more than one of the characters personal psychosis. An obsession with the sun and its beauty, the source of both their life force and mortal struggle, permeates the minds of each character and manifests in different ways. Is there a payoff to SUNSHINE? There is a payload… That’s for sure. Boyle really seems to lose sight of the crux towards the end. Or perhaps in his head the only way for the movie’s ethereal destructive elements to manifest was as the monster he devises, that somehow the crew seems to manifest in the absense of a real enemy. Any way you slice it the third act flies off course further than the mission. But at that point it almost doesn’t matter. I’m fond of telling people that the best science fiction uses hypothetical fantastic situations to examine the best and worst of the human condition. If that is my measure for SciFi greatness then SUNSHINE is great. I hope Danny Boyle keeps exploring the “How would this really play out” scenario he has been so successful with in movies like 28 Days and Sunshine. He seems to bring Cillian Murphy as far out of his shell as he is capable of coming, which is a nice bonus.