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Sunshine

The Globe & Mail

20 July 2007

By Rich Groen

Fifty years from now, climate change has us in a vice-grip, but it's not what you think. Our fragile planet is suffering from a potentially lethal case of global freezing. Seems the sun is expiring prematurely, a diagnosis that has prompted a team of astronauts to venture on a long mission with a long-shot plan: to fly to the not-so-fiery orb and, by launching a megaton nuclear bomb into its heart, kick-start the thing back to life. Think of the strategy as a kind of solar defibrillator, complete with shouts of "Clear" and then kaboom. Or, if you prefer, go with the film's more primal explanation: "It's the Big Bang on a small scale—a new star born out of a dying one."

Such is the engaging premise of Sunshine, which sees director Danny Boyle and writer Alex Garland, whose collaborations include 28 Days Later..., teaming together again to up the apocalyptic ante. The doomsday scenarios differ, but the result is oddly similar: A terrific start eventually disappears down the black hole of the third act, where the initial promise gets bludgeoned by horror-flick tropes. Garland has a habit of writing himself ingeniously into a tight corner, only to panic and, abandoning any subtlety, try to blast his way out.

But back to the nifty beginning. Drawing upon the more realistic half of the sci-fi-in-space spectrum (the likes of Alien and 2001), Boyle takes us aboard a craft that is massive in its overall dimensions but, since bombs the size of Manhattan don't exactly qualify as carry-on luggage, claustrophobic for the poor crew—an international octet who have been forced to endure their vast journey in awfully close quarters. Among them is the stoic Japanese captain (Hiroyuki Sanada), the inevitable American cowboy (Chris Evans), the green thumb who tends the "oxygen garden" (Michelle Yeoh), and a physicist with the oddly photogenic name of Robert Capa (Cillian Murphy, the most prominent star in this acting constellation). Although all concede that the theoretical science behind the rescue mission is bit iffy, morale is still relatively high, and no one except us seems remotely concerned that their ship has been christened "Icarus II"—apparently, these futuristic folks aren't up on their classic mythology.

As they approach the target, zooming past the carcass of the earlier and doomed Icarus I, a navigational error necessitates some repair on the craft, whereupon two volunteers don gold-flecked suits for their walk into space. And what a gorgeous sequence it is. The sun may be ailing, but, this close, it still packs an incinerating punch, allowing Boyle to reverse the usual cinematic polarity of light and shadow. Here, as the astronauts huddle in the lee of the ship, the light is lethal and the shadow benign. Stray beyond the dividing line and you definitely won't be singing in the sunshine—there, instant immolation awaits.

At this point, the script does an evocative job playing off the sun's almost religiously gravitational pull on the crew. They are obsessed with it, and with its warring symbolism—what sustains us can also kill us. Effective too is Boyle's marshalling of the special effects, which are never Star Wars showy, but clean and efficient and credible. And when the plot, well, heats up, leaving oxygen in short supply, the movie makes a smooth transition into "lifeboat" mode—someone must be thrown over to keep the rest breathing.

The problem, when it arrives, can be traced directly to the floating remains of the doomed sister ship. Garland finds in it a reason to introduce a horror-show element, thereby upsetting the hitherto delicate balance between the science and the fiction. Suddenly, the really contrived stuff gains the upper hand. Soon after, the action turns jumpy, then chaotic, finally confusing, and whatever allegorical resonance the film possessed—humankind staring into the centre of its failing soul, desperate to heal what once was healthy—disappears into the clutter.

Too bad, because that last wrong turn completely undoes a picture that had been steering a very impressive course. But that's a common malaise in the movies, which, like the rest of us, are typically pretty good at introducing problems and complicating problems. It's those damn resolutions that give us all fits.