Europa Report
|  In Europa Report, a smart, suspenseful science fiction thriller that purports to be the most scientifically accurate depiction of futuristic space travel since Kubrick’s 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968), a group of six scientists and engineers are travelling to the fourth moon of Jupiter in the hopes of discovering evidence of liquid water—and possibly some form of life—beneath the surface. The film, which was written by first-time scribe Philip Gelatt and directed by Sebastián Cordero, whose previous four films were made in his native Ecuador, makes ample use of diegetic video footage via various cameras that are stationed throughout the spacecraft and news-style interviews with different characters, but it doesn’t feel like another lazy “found footage” movie or pseudo-documentary. The film was clearly made on a tight budget, but the filmmakers get the most out of their resources, keeping much of the action confined to the claustrophobic interior of the spacecraft, but judiciously taking advantage of the digital effects at their disposal once the characters venture out into the vacuum of space and onto the frozen surface of the moon.The story begins in mystery, as it is revealed early on by Dr. Samantha Unger (Embeth Davidtz), the head of the private company that is funding the interstellar scientific expedition, that they lost contact with the spacecraft some 18 months into the journey. The fact that all of the interviews about the mission are with people not on the spacecraft does not bode well for those on the journey, which include the captain, William Xu (Daniel Wu), pilot Rosa Dasque (Anamaria Marinca), engineers James Corrigan (Sharlto Copley) and Andrei Blok (Michael Nyqvist), chief science officer Dr. Daniel Luxembourg (Christian Camargo), and marine biology science officer Katya Petrovna (Karolina Wydra). The characters aren’t particularly deep or memorable, but they are sketched out with enough detail and played with enough finesse by the fine stable of character actors to make their predicament engaging and, most importantly, frightening. I don’t think it is giving too much away to suggest that not all of the astronauts make it, and some of the most memorable sequences in the film involve their demises, which often take on an intensely tragic tone that is intensified by the fact that they unfold via extreme close-ups of their faces (ostensibly from an in-camera helmet). In one case, a character on a spacewalk must make a life-or-death decision in order to save someone else, which leaves him adrift in space without any way of getting back to the spacecraft, fully cognizant of the fact that he will die once his oxygen runs out. The acting, in this regard, is crucial, and the multinational cast—viewers will immediately recognize South African actor Sharlto Copley from District 9 (2011) and Elysium (2013) and Swedish actor Michael Nyqvist from the original Girl With the Dragon Tattoo (2009)—are more than up to the task. Unfortunately, the film makes a major misstep in its final moments, when it first teases us with a fleeting image of ... something, but then returns to that image and lingers on it, eliminating any sense of mystery or wonder. It’s a case when less would have been much, much more. Copyright ©2013 James Kendrick Thoughts? E-mail James Kendrick All images copyright © Magnet Releasing |
Overall Rating: 
(3)
