Sunshine
2007 · Directed by Danny Boyle
Original language: English
- science fiction
- thriller
The story
Fifty years into the future, the sun is dying, and Earth is threatened by arctic temperatures. A team of astronauts is sent to revive the Sun — but the mission fails. Seven years later, a new team is sent to finish the mission as mankind’s last hope.
What it’s like
Cold, glittering space-blackness broken by the blinding white of the sun itself, with the Icarus ship's interior lit in clinical fluorescent whites and the blue-gray glow of monitors, so the frame keeps flipping between sterile calm and overwhelming heat. Danny Boyle's camera moves restlessly, handheld in the tight corridors and drifting through cavernous, reflective hulls, and the score by John Murphy and Underworld pulses with tense electronic throbs that give way to near-silence in the vacuum scenes. Its vibe is taut, awe-struck dread with flashes of rapture, the feeling of staring too long into something beautiful and dangerous. It suits a late-night watch with the lights off and the volume up, or a sci-fi evening where you want tension that builds in slow, claustrophobic steps. The pacing starts measured and turns relentless in its last act, and the emotional core is a set of crew members working through guilt, isolation and the weight of carrying humanity's hope on their shoulders. Intensity is moderate to high: brief but sharp violence, a grim body-horror turn, and sustained peril. It is for viewers who like cerebral science fiction with a thriller's pull and a strong sense of physical place.
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