“The eye is the best of artists,” Emerson
“Survival of the fittest,” Charles Darwin
Sci-fi quality runs from the memorable 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968) to the ludicrous Plan Nine from Outer Space (1957), but most try to comment on the human condition despite how other worldly the story is (Forbidden Planet, 1956). Ex Machina’s (2014) director writer Alex Garland has crafted another of the first order, Annihilation (2018), which masterfully combines the visceral confrontation of Alien (1979) with the cerebral underpinnings of 2001.
Why Netflix has tossed this gem around the world for 5 years until it had the courage of its own US broadcast can be attributed to the challenges of its ideas and terror of its imagination. A visitation by way of a bright meteor-like crash into a lighthouse impels authorities to send numerous inspectors to search out the beacon only to witness none but one, Kane (Oscar Isaac), to return albeit in a subtly-altered state.
The most-recent retinue to search out the lighthouse is curiously five females, led by Lena (Natalie Portman), a biologist whose wife she is of Kane, though unbeknownst to most of the other soldiers. In a Darwinian sequence of close encounters with verdant forest, hybrid animals, and non-descript aliens, the ladies are culled to a precious few.
Here's where it gets interesting, for these highly-prepared scientists seem ill-prepared to deal with encounters that do not conform to their training and experience. It is less a comment by a male writer/director than a recognition of universal xenophobia when it comes to species not our own. Here Emerson has the best answer (see above) for letting the democratic eye see the truth aesthetically without the encumberment of rationality.
That these encounters inevitably lead to transformation is evidenced in Kane’s return and Lena’s interrogation by heavy, hazmat-suited males bookending the story, lending credence to those who see feminism in the tale.
The fantasy is neither male nor female—it is human. Transcending even the exploration of civilizations not our own, Garland has supported Darwin’s thesis that we will in the end seek evolution of our species over that of other than our own.
The film Annihilation hints at extinction without preparation, subjugation without cognition, or otherwise dangers like climate change and sexism will defeat us without visitation from alien species.
Annihilation (2018)
Director: Alex Garland (Ex Machina)
Screenplay: Garland (based on the novel by Jeff VanderMeer)
Cast: Natalie Portman (Black Swan), Oscar Isaac (The Card Counter)
Run Time: 1h 55m
Rating: R
John DeSando, a Los Angeles Press Club first-place winner for National Entertainment Journalism, hosts NPR’s It’s Movie Time and hosts Cinema Classics as well as podcasts Back Talk and Double Take out of WCBE 90.5 FM. Contact him at JohnDeSando52@gmail.com
