by Adam Shaftoe

Created on: March 21, 2009

In Sunshine, director Danny Boyle (Slumdog Millionaire, 28 Days Later, Trainspotting) attempts to resurrect and ostensibly reinvent the archetypal space odyssey/space disaster film. Without a doubt, Sunshine is one of the most visually stunning cinematic works of recent history, perhaps even trumping Guillermo del Toro's stab at high fantasy, Pan's Labyrinth. Sunshine's only noticeable flaws rest with its late-in-the-plot attempt at genre crossing.

Set in the not too distant future, Sunshine is the story of the good ship Icarus II. Much like its namesake, the Icarus II is tasked with flying a little too close to the sun. The crew's mission is relatively straight forward: Drop a giant nuke into the sun to save it from a premature death. The film immediately scores points for avoiding fifteen minutes of back story heavily laden with science-sounding words relating to nuclear fusion.

The marriage of non-spoon fed narrative with intense visual style should resonate clearly with anybody who has seen 2001: A Space Odyssey, Clockwork Orange, or Alien. Placed within the wider canon of science fiction films, Sunshine does much to restore the credit rating of a genre that has found itself under siege by a legion of box office flops thank you very much Chronicles of Riddick. Danny Boyle should be recognized for successfully pitching a movie that defies the studio mandated safety net of pairing anything that is a bit too fantastic with derivative family friendly hokum. Go tell it from the mountain that there is still a place in the world for intelligent science fiction films.

Avoiding the pitfall/death knell of Brian De Palma's unremarkable Mission to Mars, Sunshine deliberately avoids showcasing its ensemble cast as professional, but painfully boring, astronauts. A fist-fight between ship's engineer Mace (Chris Evans) and resident physicist Robert Capa (Cillian Murphy), only ten minutes into the film, sends a clear message to the audience: These might be very smart, very dedicated people, but they are still flawed humans.

The wonderfully flawed nature of the ensemble acts as a constant catalyst for the film's plot. When Icarus II's navigator, Trey (Benedict Wong), makes a potentially fatal miscalculation he slumps into such a deep depression that the ship's psychologist, Searle (Cliff Curtis), assesses him as a suicide risk. Addled with guilt and plagued by thoughts of humanity's annihilation, Trey is sedated into a coma for his own safety. Sunshine offers images of responsibility

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