MJ's Blog

Sunshine is a beautiful piece of science fiction, which contains plenty of action and drama. The director (Danny Boyle) has assumed a clean and developed future, unlike some other films (see Blade Runner) that have set themselves in a bleaker future.

It is the story and not the setting that creates the bleakness as the crew of the Icarus 2 are on a mission to re-ignite the sun and save humanity. This really is humanities last chance as 7 years earlier Icarus 1 disappeared when on an identical mission.

During the final stages of Icarus 2’s mission they discover Icarus 1 floating in space and the teams physicist Robert Capa (Cillian Murphy) decides it is worth the risk to save the payload from the first mission. However as the team deviate from their original plan errors start creeping in and crew members start losing their lives.

When the crew docks with the Icarus 1 they discover that the ship was sabotaged and the crew all burnt to death. The culprit for the sabotage is Captain Pinbacker (Mark Strong) of the Icarus 1, who manages to follow the crew back to the Icarus 2. Pinbacker then begins sabotaging the Icarus 2, whilst the remaining members of the crew fight on and prepare to deliver the payload and in the end only Capa is left to manually detonate the bomb.

The film is well produced and deals with some interesting subjects such as addiction to (sun)light, as members of the crew are often seen staring at the stunning colours produced by the sun. There are some other notable performances from Mace (Chris Evans) and Corazon (Michelle Yeoh).

Review: Sunshine (2007)