Another Earth

Another low budget sort-of-science-fiction film with a lot of art house appeal.  Another Earth is about a woman who is in a car crash and crippled with guilt over her irresponsible actions.

She spends years in jail and then stalkes the man she plowed into.  She spends a lot of time moping around and looking sad and remorseful.

In the background of this sad sack story of a drunk driver is the secondary story of a second earth appearing in the sky one day.  The other earth is an exact duplicate of our own earth.  It keeps getting closer and larger and maybe the title here should have been When Worlds Collide With a Car Crash.

Another Earth puts the story of this second planet drifting toward us so far in the background that it is totally unbelievable when our hero wins a writing contest where the prize is a rocket trip to the other earth.  She is still guilty about the car wreck, as this is the primary story, so she decides not to travel to the second earth.

Another Earth leaves us wondering about cause and effect and if an exact duplicate of our earth remains an exact duplicate after it discovered that we exist.  This was the kind of deep thinking used in Flashforward where knowing the future helped to shape and change it.  Only I kind of liked Flashforward and I all but fell asleep watching Another Earth.

The pace is slow, the acting is low key, the music is hypnotically slow, and nothing much happens.  Instead of the disaster film that a second earth inching it’s way closer every day should have been, all Another Earth cares about is one loser and the worst day of her life.  And we are never even given much insight into her, other than the fact that she is sad a good deal of the time and seems to be good at moping floors.

Another Earth ends with a mystery, so the one tiny bit of interest that was generated is never satisfied.  This was not a sci fi film, it was a melodrama with science fiction window dressing.


Jon Herrera
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