Starring: Michael Nyqvist, Sharlto Copely, Embeth Davidtz, Daniel Wu
Directed by Sebastian Cordero
Magnet Releasing
MPAA Theatrical Rating: PG-13
This found footage (I know) space mission movie is exactly the kind of story that was promised during the final scenes of 1984's ill-received sequel to 2001: A Space Odyssey. Arthur C. Clarke's prescient ending to 2010 invited Roy Scheider and the people of Earth to explore all of the moons of Jupiter EXCEPT Europa. We were to attempt no landings there.
Two decades later, real-life astronomers tell us that there might actually be life in the water under Europa's icy crust. Clarke was right, and this is all fertile ground for a science fiction thriller, which is exactly what Europa Report turns out to be. Director Sebastian Cordero makes an odd choice to tell the story through mission-cam footage edited out of order, but it ultimately works. The audience knows that the mission will suffer losses from the get-go, but the confined spaces and limited cameras add to the growing dread.
Bear McCreary's music is effectively unsettling and Cordero injects a lot of tension through cameras that stop working at inopportune times. I kept waiting for something supernatural or vicious to happen and that was part of the fun. The film's science crew is relatively believable, generally putting mission objectives and data ahead of personal motivations. As scientists, their personal motivation IS the mission, which makes most of the choices feel authentic. Somehow, the filmmakers even made the found footage gimmick pay off emotionally--no easy feat with such a beat-to-death device, so I walked out of the theater smiling. -MJ
