Sunshine(2007)- User Reviews

This movie displays rather stunning visuals, and could really have turned into an excellent piece of gripping SF. The premise is interesting: the only hope to rescue Earth from a dying sun is to re-ignite our faltering star with a huge bomb strapped to a spaceship. The closed quarters (a well-done decor) in which the 8 astronauts are confined for the long voyage, and of course the desperate nature of the mission, create an unavoidable psychological tension which is handled believably for the first half of the film. Unfortunately, the authors couldn't resist the idea of featuring a stow-away monster suddenly making its unwelcome appearance, wreaking havoc and killing off the last surviving astronauts after a series of prior mishaps. By then one's believability meter sinks rather low, and the movie hovers around nullity for most of the last act. There are definite moments worthy of the grand-daddy of the genre (Stanley Kubrick's masterpiece "2001 - A Space Odyssey") and I wish the film would have stayed with that inspiration instead of mixing in the tired clich�s of the alien chase scenes. "Aliens" did that far better, and the mix doesn't match.