Silent Running (USA, 1972)
Directed by Doug Trumball
Starring Bruce Dern, Cliff Potts, Ron Rifkin, Jesse Vint

It's long been fashionable for film reviewers to slag off films for being sentimental. The problem is not so much the notion of sentimentality in and of itself, as the context and manner in which it is applied. Criticising Steven Spielberg for being sentimental is simultaneously apt and foolish - apt when it meddles with or cheapens a dark subject matter, as with Schindler's List, but foolish when it is complimentary and integral, as with E.T. or Close Encounters.Silent Running's reputation has suffered from a similar stigma, namely that a grown-up science fiction film with serious thematic intentions cannot bow to something as feeble as human emotion. The clichéd view of 1970s science fiction, created by 2001 and cemented by Solaris, is one of a cold, clinical, existential world where any concession to audience emotion is strictly verboten. But while such an approach worked wonders for Stanley Kubrick and Andrei Tarkovsky, Silent Running is still a damn fine film which proves that substance and sentimentality can go together.Doug Trumball made Silent Running in direct response to the perceived coldness and clinical precision of 2001. Having created many of the special effects on Kubrick's film, including the iconic star-gate sequence, he sought to make a film about the future of humanity in which computers and apes were not the most human characters. Where Kubrick's films focussed on Mankind, Trumball wishes to look at people as individuals. And where Kubrick balanced Humanity's physical insignificance with its God-like potential, Trumball praises Man's capacity for compassion even in the face of insignificance, disinterest or despair.If one was feel as cold and calculating as HAL, one could easily dismiss Silent Running as nothing more than 'hippies in space'. Being a product of the early-1970s, when America was experiencing the death throes of hippie culture, such connotations are to some extent inevitable. It is undoubtedly true that Bruce Dern's character conforms to popular, if cynical, stereotypes of hippies, from his loose-fitting clothing and drawling delivery to his obsession with nature which many (the crew included) would consider unhealthy.One of the problems with Silent Running from this point of view is its questionable attitude towards mankind in the pursuit of pro-nature or 'hippie' ideals. The position towards technology is ambivalent; Dern yearns for a monastic existence where Man eats the fruits of His own labours, but it is ultimately the machines which sustain the forest. More problematic is the implication that preserving nature is more important than human life, to the point where murdering his crewmates appears to be justified. The film could be making the point that one has to go the hard yards in the name of one's principles, but it remains questionable whether in its content or its presentation.But if we put this immediate concern to the back of our minds, Silent Running's ecological theme emerges as more than a simple choice between Nature and Man, or Man and Machine. It is more prominently a film about harmony, about how the march of progress has made humans overly dependent on technology. Technological progress, including the development of space travel, has increased the standard of living of the astronauts to such an extent that they take their resources for granted.Dern's colleagues no longer care about the forest or the food they eat because they have been living in a world where their every want is met. They behave almost like spoilt children, spending their time racing around the cargo bay and joking around. Dern's position is similar to that of the 19th-century Arcadians like John Ruskin and Henry David Thoreau, writers who warned against the increasing luxury and apathy brought on by mechanical progress. Dern is the Arcadian among the lackadaisical industrialists, still able to enjoy himself but ever watchful of the consequences of progress, and mindful of the alternative which could soon cease to exist.When WALL-E was released three years ago, numerous critics compared the opening section to Silent Running. There is an obvious parallel in the role of robots tending to the Earth (or what is left of it), and in the loneliness of this occupation both practically and philosophically. Like WALL-E, Dern and his droids are going against the grain to do what they believe is right, and both have developed eccentricities through isolation which has caused them to deviate from their original 'programming'. With WALL-E, it is his bizarre passion for Hello Dolly!; with Dern, it is his desire to teach droids how to play poker.Although WALL-E could not have existed without Silent Running, it remains the superior of the two films. Although one of the longer PIXAR efforts, it feels tightly structured and well-paced, while there are long sections of Silent Running which feel superfluous or needlessly slow. This may be down to the involvement of Michael Cimino at a script level; his first writing credit in Hollywood contains the same flaws in pace and emphasis which would scupper him as a director. The poker scene, for instance, feels like it shouldn't be there, or at least like it should be a lot shorter.Parts of Silent Running have also dated quite badly. Peter Schickele's soundtrack has stood the test of time rather well, but Joan Baez' warblings are a distinctly Marmite experience. Some of the dialogue is preachy, with Dern going over many of the same arguments to the point of exhaustion. But to be fair, it is very difficult to sustain a story with a limited number of locations and characters without the luxury of extended dream sequences (Solaris) or multiple versions of the characters (Moon). Trumball may be no Kubrick, but all in all he has done a reasonable job.One aspect which hasn't dated, however, is the special effects. When Trumball was interviewed recently for the Blu-Ray release, he commented that organic, miniature or optical effects date better than CG visuals because they are more "photo-realistically impressive", i.e. have weight and tactility. The external shots of the Valley Forge are shot from the correct perspective so that we aren't conscious of them being model shots, and the explosions look and feel both realistic and custom-built.The most illuminating special effect, however, is the three drones which Dern uses to tend to the forests after commandeering the Valley Forge. The drones, inspired by characters in Tod Browning's Freaks, were created by double amputees walking on their hands. This and the facial structures of the drones create a human-like movement which we can recognise and use as a starting point for empathy.What makes Silent Running remarkable, and ultimately successful, is the strength of its emotional pull. The tactility of the special effects, the honesty of the script and the tender nature of the final act has the same effect that the ending of E. T. does; you feel as though you have earned the right to blub your eyes out because of how well the characters have been formed and how much you have enjoyed their company. Much like The Man Who Fell To Earth, the emotional weight of the characters allows us to overlook or forgive any narrative shortcomings and enjoy having our hearts broken.Silent Running remains an underrated and underappreciated science fiction film. It's not without its flaws, whether narrative or otherwise, and it has to take a back seat to 2001 both in ambition and in execution. But what it lacks in awe and spectacle it makes up for in heartache, coupled with a good-natured and welcome intelligence. WALL-E may have since surpassed it, but it remains compelling viewing.

Rating:
Verdict: An underrated sci-fi heartbreaker

Source Code (USA, 2011)
Directed by Duncan Jones
Starring Jake Gyllenhaal, Michelle Monaghan, Vera Farmiga, Jeffrey Wright

Low-budget filmmaking has one big drawback: you become so used to creating so much with so little, that when someone offers you a huge pile of money, you panic and lose all your marbles. So many promising, talented filmmakers, who earned critical acclaim through their Spartan early efforts, have come a cropper the second the budget started to creep up. It takes a truly great filmmaker to hold his or her nerve when Hollywood beckons - and one such filmmaker is Duncan Jones.Consider the evidence. Source Code, Jones' second feature film, has a budget of $32m - just over six times the budget of Moon two years ago (without adjusting for inflation). Obviously with more money involved and access to the latest special effects, you would expect a more mainstream effort. But Source Code is every bit as gripping, intelligent and distinctive as his debut - and that should warm the cockles of anybody's heart.Source Code could be pithily described as Moon's mainstream cousin, since the two films have a number of similarities in terms of subject and execution. Quite apart from both having their roots firmly in the smart end of science fiction, they both have prominent elements of conspiracy, rooted around individuals being unknowingly exploited by their governments.

More importantly, both Moon and Source Code manages to address complex abstract issue of morality, truth, duty and reality while remaining intimate and human. In a genre which is often characterised as being cold and distant, Jones gives us a series of believable, well-rounded and intelligent characters which seem compelling even if we know what we are seeing is fixed and pre-determined. We enjoy their company as our brains race around, frantically looking for the answers to the various riddles the film offers us.Just as Moon looked back to the likes of Solaris, Soylent Green and Silent Running, so Source Code refers back to a number of previous works within science fiction. Apart from its superficial resemblance to Groundhog Day and Déja Vu, the film owes a large debt to Terry Gilliam's Twelve Monkeys. Both Cole and Colter Stevens are characters who are sent to the past (in a sense) to prevent a future disaster - and both eventually rebel against their mission and choose to remain in the doomed reality.There are also fleeting comparisons with The Jacket and Jacob's Ladder, which deal with the idea of a mentally ill soldier wrestling with demons which may be the product of his imagination. But Source Code departs from this sub-genre by focussing less on the nature of the fantasy and more on the ethics behind the source code itself. It is less about what happens during those eight minutes, as what is causing those eight minutes to occur and for what purpose.The conspiracy elements in Source Code address strong ethical issues while tapping into public anxiety and suspicion over Western involvement in the Middle East. Central to this is the idea that soldiers' semi-functional brain matter could be used in government operations after their death, a practice sanctioned by military courts but over which the soldiers themselves would have no say. The film addresses the idea of soldiers being drilled to obey even in death, taking the deconstruction of 'grunts' from Full Metal Jacket and bringing it into the 21st century.

As with Moon, Source Code explores the idea of manipulating human lives for political gain. The difference is that this manipulation is now occurring on both sides, with both the bomber and the US government going to extremes to achieve their respective goals. When Stevens finds and confronts the bomber, he says that "we have a chance to rebuild from the rubble - but you need rubble to start with". This is echoed in Stevens' own predicament: in order for the source code to work as a weapon against terrorism, it needs a small number of mentally special cases which have come about through the war on terror.Source Code is also about the fragmentation of identity, and particularly the role of the mind in creating or assigning identity. On a basic level, the film explores what it would be like to be somebody else for a short period of time. During his eight-minute periods as Sean Fentriss, Stevens re-evaluates the world around him and finds a way to come to terms with who he is as he discovers what really happened in Afghanistan. Towards the end of the film there is a heart-breaking sequence of Stevens (as Fentriss) calling his real-life father and apologising on his own behalf.But this exploration of identity is not confined to the events within the train. As we spend more time inside the source code, the film raises the question of whether identity is determined by the mind or self, or whether it is the product of how others perceive you. In his mind, Colter Stevens knows he is an ex-soldier, but the more time he spends in the source code, the more the two personalities begin to intersect until we don't entirely know where Stevens ends and Fentriss begins.This line of questioning is brought to a chilling conclusion by the final revelations about Stevens' mental state. But even before we get there, Source Code does a great job of throwing us off with the various twists. Ben Ripley's script plants subtle little doubts about the safety of the source code - like Stevens commenting on hydraulic fluid leaking out, or how cold the chamber is becoming. As its emerges that what he is seeing is largely projection, we are thrown into a maelstrom of doubts about what is real, leading us to cling to the character as he stumbles blindly through the darkness.Source Code is also technically accomplished, both in its shooting style and its approach to the time loop storyline. Going back to the same eight minutes over and over could quickly become tedious, but Jones never lets that happen, using a variety of creative decisions to keep us interested. The first time around, everything is played straight for tension, so that the bombing comes as a complete surprise. But gradually more comedy is introduced to defuse the tension, such as Stevens' ribbing with the comedian or predicting what Michelle Monaghan is going to say. By the time he is hunting for the bomber, Jones scrolls through the time rapidly until it becomes necessary to slow down and take in a twist.The only flaw with Source Code is its ending. As with the so-called 'happy' ending in Brazil, you can understand the reasons for doing it, and it adds up to some extent mechanically - for instance, the recurring images of the mirror sculpture being finally explained. But you still come away feeling like the film would have been more emotionally and intellectually satisfying had it ended in the freeze-frame on the train. And that's not to mention the alternate time line, which shows source code yet to be used - again, it works, but it isn't necessary.Despite its ending, Source Code is a really great sci-fi thriller and one of the best films of 2011 so far. Jones demonstrates his intelligence and visual flare as a director, wringing every last drop of emotion and nuance out of what could be a preposterous premise. Jake Gyllenhaal gives his best performance since Donnie Darko in the lead, and is supported by strong turns from Vera Farmiga and Jeffrey Wright. It will take many more films before Jones begins to challenge Christopher Nolan for the mantle of Britain's best living filmmaker. But on the basis of this, he's well on his way.

Rating:
Verdict: A smart and slick second effort