In the Shadow of the Moon
Directed by: Jim Mickle
Produced by: Brian Kavanaugh-Jones, Ben Pugh, Rian Cahill, Linda Moran, Jim Mickle
Written by: Gregory Weidman & Geoff Tock
Cast:
Boyd Holbrook as Thomas Lockhart
Cleopatra Coleman as Rya
Bokeem Woodbine as Maddox
Rudi Dharmalingam as Naveen Rao
Rachel Keller as Jean
Michael C. Hall as Holt
Every once in a while, Netflix shows us that it is possible to make a good, thoughtful science fiction movie that doesn’t have superheroes or vast galactic empires with outlandish-sized spacecraft. Call Me Mother was a good recent example of Not-Stupid SF.
In the Shadow of the Moon has an unbelievably stupid initial premise, but manages to rise above it and turn out a well-thought out plot, mystifying but accessible, combined with really solid acting and direction.
The premise is this: once every nine years to the day, there is a ‘super moon’ that can alter the laws of physics on Earth, making time travel possible. Two minutes with an almanac would show that the Moon doesn’t do anything the same every ‘nine years to the date’. As for laws of physics, the Moon creates tides and bad poetry, and that’s about it. So the movie has this weird foundation that combines astrology with an utter lack of understanding of orbital mechanics (which astrology does anyway) and it’s supposed to be the basis. It’s (fortunately) not vital to the main plotline, and the writers could have easily substituted something more pseudo-plausible such as a magic box and time travelers with a case of OCD that makes them pick anniversaries unnecessarily. (The ‘magic box’ is a plot device I’ve used myself. “I have this plastic box with dials and buttons, and it runs on six AAA batteries and can control hurricanes and earthquakes.”
Fortunately, the Moon doesn’t get brought up until about half-way through the movie, by which time the viewer is utterly engrossed and doesn’t give a shit what the Moon thinks.
The open sequence shows downtown Philadelphia in the near future, 2024, looking thoroughly trashed from a recent large explosion. Through shattered office windows, we see a flag fluttering down toward debris-and-fire flecked streets. It looks like the US flag, only instead of fifty stars, it has five.
We then switch to 1988, where two beat cops in Philly are investigating a bus accident with multiple fatalities. They notice the driver has three puncture wounds in a small triangle on the back of her neck. Shortly thereafter, they learn of two other victims, miles apart, dead that same evening through the same thing: sudden onset haemorrhagic discharge, first the nose, then the ears, the eyes, then everything, a five minute case of Ebola. And a triangle of puncture wounds on the back of the neck.
They spot the suspect, a woman in a blue hoodie with an injured hand, and give chase. One of the cops attempts to detain her, and she breaks his leg. The other, the protagonist Thomas Lockhart, accosts her, and she manages to subdue him, kicking away his sidearm and using his own cuffs to chain him to a subway bench. As she’s walking away, he grabs his taser and zaps her in her calf, causing her to jump, lose her balance, and fall to her death in front of a racing subway train.
But before she subdues him, she makes some curious remarks, such as “Is this where it ends?” She somehow knows the cop in some fashion, including a lot of personal details.
Then when their examining the remaining pieces of her in the coroner’s office, they find a bullet in her blood hand that came from Lockhart’s gun. But he hadn’t fired his gun; she kicked it away before he could. There are enough blood splatter patterns in this movie to bring bliss to fans of Michael C. Hall, playing the immediate superior and brother-in-law to Lockhart.
Anything beyond that falls into spoiler territory, and one of the genuine joys of this movie are the plot twists and developments. Nobody is going to complain that it is too predictable or slow-paced—indeed, some critics think it tries to do too much too fast. That may be so, but it does so in an exceptionally entertaining and engaging manner.
It’s a fun movie with a great plot development and a social warning. The characters are thoroughly human, backed by strong performances. It may be the best SF movie I’ve seen this year, and one of the best cop buddy/police procedurals as well.
And no, I don’t give a damn about the opinions of the Moon.
Now on Netflix.