They have a look around, but when they try to leave, they can’t find their way out of the estate, and there are no people on the estate. A young couple goes to a house viewing on a newbuild housing estate. The opening credits of Vivarium feature lots of footage of cuckoos, which clues you in from the outset that this film shares some thematic links with B rightburn. So the film knows exactly what it’s doing, dissecting each element of the Superman myth to show how, in reality, it would be a horror story. The script is written by Brian and Mark Gunn, the brother and cousin of the film’s producer, James Gunn, who has plenty of chops across both the horror and superhero genres. Only rather than becoming a hero and a symbol of hope for all mankind, this time the superpowered child goes on a murder rampage. It also features a great rendition of the planned-but-never-launched Soviet moon lander, which will be a lot of fun for space nerds. The grainy footage compensates for any shortcomings in the CGI, and the moon spiders, while raising a lot of questions about how they would evolve, let alone stay alive, are an excellent monster that evokes the fear actual astronauts must have had of allowing moon dust into their capsule (moon dust being famously nasty, sharp and hard to remove stuff). Apollo 18 fixes that, with its story of a secret moon mission that took place after Apollo 17. Apollo 18įound footage is not a genre that we have seen much of from space, which if you think about it is odd given it is the only way most of us will ever experience outer space. In an environment like that, the humans wouldn’t stand much of a chance against a reasonably angry chimpanzee, but the monster itself is a fantastic design that aims to create something truly alien and whose kills are far more terrifying than merely “eating” its victims would have been. This is a film about a team of unarmed scientists in a floating tin can, fighting a monster in their pyjamas. Second, no lengthy corridors and mysteriously roomy ventilation shafts. This film takes the well-worn “there’s a monster on our spaceship” premise and sets it on board our own, very real International Space Station. What those people missed is that that was the point. A lot of people said it was basically a rip-off of another, better-known horror film about extraterrestrials (one which may or may not appear in this list). So no Sunshine, where the threat is a guy with sunburn, no Pandorum, and no Event Horizon (whatever your theological understanding, I think we can all agree that if he is not actually indigenous to Earth, Satan has at least resided here long enough to gain citizenship). But the movie aliens that have the ring of truth about them only want to eat you, lay eggs in you, or shift your entire perception of reality in a way that forces you to appreciate the true horror of existence. Yes, some films tell us that when we encounter new life and civilizations they’ll heal our wounds with magic glowing fingers, teach us that nuclear war is bad, and misunderstand our local customs in a delightful and heartwarming way. As we look out into the great black emptiness of space, we are reminded of the question posed by the Italian physicist, Enrico Fermi- “Where is everybody?” Is life as we understand it a freak chemical fluke, never to be repeated in all of the great cold infinity above us? Or is it in fact an inevitable outcome of a relatively common set of circumstances, resulting in a universe teeming with life and civilisations, and if so, will we ever get to meet them?Īnd if and when we do encounter life that evolved under another sun, with intelligence different, yet equal to our own, how do we kill it?
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