Have any of you seen the new movie "Moon", and if so, do you recommend it? Broadway Centre Theatre Theater Info<http://www.rottentomatoes.com/movie/showtimes/theaters.php?houseid=1684> 111 East Broadway Salt Lake City, 84111 [cid:image001.gif@01CA0625.8CCBE610]88% Moon <http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/10009075-moon/> [More Theaters] <http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/10009075-moon/showtimes.php?zipcode=84115&date=> Showtimes: 12:55, 3:05, 5:15, 7:25, 9:35 Moon Sam Rockwell is a wonderful hybrid between a handsome leading man and a quirky character actor. This rare quality serves him well playing a man (Sam), working alone for a three-year shift on the dark side of the moon, whose reality breaks down as he nears the end of his tour. I really loved him in this movie, and the movie as a whole. The part was actually literally written for him, and deservedly so. First-time feature-length Director Duncan Jones sought to emulate the more rough and tumble psychological drama of the great 1970's science fiction movies, such as Alien. Jones also directs the story he wrote, which was made into a screenplay by first-timer Nathan Parker. The setting is space, the future, whatever, but the practical aspects of the story are timeless. Jones succeeds in capturing the tone and slow burn pacing of those movies without being overly long or tiresome. The science is sound and grounded, per my super-finicky engineer companion, and the whole atmosphere is gritty blue-collar grunt just trying to make a buck and trying to hold on to his sanity in the long isolation before he can be reunited with his family. I hate to spoil anything, but I will say that his utter beleaguerment, broken only by his helper robot Gerty is interrupted by an unexpected person. Indeed, it is interrupted by literally the absolute last person Sam would ever expect to encounter. The film processes required to make the scenes between Sam and this new person are effortless-looking and natural, driving the reality of the whole movie home. Gerty's flat Kevin Spacey voice is condescendingly supplemented by corny smile faces and other emoticons, which provide grim levity to the dialogue of Sam's situation. We the audience are left to question what is real and what is not - then abruptly we are given the answer. In that moment, I frowned to myself, "We got that straightened out too soon," but then the story turned down a whole new interesting path and kept the tension up as well. As the man on the moon nearing the end of his three years, Sam is lonely, cantankerous, a little cynical, and weary. The new arrival is alert, fit, and does a lot of big thinking to get the plot angling toward what the story is really about. By the very end we have had some great mind-benders, some well-earned pathos, and some wonderful opening up of Sam's narrow world. It's basically non-violent, yet at moments I felt a deep - not horror, exactly, more like dismayed awe - at what we are discovering with Sam. My companions and I left the theatre feeling very satisfied, and I hope you will as well. Moon feels like a classic work, and I hope it gets the audience it deserves, and Rockwell gets the recognition that continually and inexplicably eludes him. MPAA Rating R-language Release date 6/19/09 Time in minutes 97 Director Duncan Jones Studio Sony Pictures Classics Ann M. Blanchard Executive Assistant to the Associate VP Undergraduate Studies 110 Sill University of Utah (801) 581-3188 a.blanchard@ugs.utah.edu