Kevin Spacey-bot isn't evil after all

Moon is a really big small film. Duncan Jones managed to make a proper sci-fi film on an independent budget. I say 'proper' because there aren't any big space battles, and nothing explodes. A man on the moon finds himself (and I don't mean that in a soulful, emotional way) and is understandably confused about it. Sam Rockwell has no trouble playing the same character twice and it's all seamlessly stitched together in a way that I don't entirely understand. It's about ideas, exploring the sort of themes that are automatically tragic. Utter hopelessness is an ambitious thing to go for, and it doesn't usually work for me. But watching a man slowly deteriorate on the moon as he stares at the distant Earth is, I have to admit, quite sad. I would have liked half an hour more of it though. The film ends abruptly at a point where you think it's just moving into its last act. I get the feeling that with a little more money they would have made this last section. After piling all those effects into an indie film, there couldn't have been much left to spend.

But perhaps the most surprising thing about Moon is that the sinister Kevin Spacey-bot wasn't all that bad. In fact it was quite nice. Didn't try to kill anyone. Didn't shut off any oxygen supplies. And when asked it even explained the entire plot of the film, without even trying to be mysterious. Nice robot.