Movie Review: Another Earth

Another Earth (2011)

Four Stars out of Five

PG13

John Burroughs: William Mapother

Rhoda/Writer: Brit Marling

Director/Writer/Cinematograghy/Editing: Mike Cahill

I have long thought and often written about the unique role science fiction can play in innovative movies that still work to explain the human condition. It doesn’t have to be science fiction but the genre should be one that allows a kind of flexibility in the rules that govern the universe the story is staged in. Magical Realism as practiced by Gabriel Garcia Marquez or Toni Morrison is another premier example of how bending the rules can allow the author or screenplay writer to use elements that reasonably expand and show what it means to be a human. In Another Earth, writers Brit Marling and Mike Cahill have used science fiction to explore the tantalizing concept of the “path not taken”. However, the story is so compelling; it would have been a magical movie even without the use of the fantastic elements brought in with the science fiction story line.

High School student Rhoda (Brit Marling) has just been accepted into MIT. She goes out on the town to celebrate with her friends. As she drives home (presumably somewhat inebriated), she hears on the radio a report of another habitable planet being discovered. She looks out her car window for the new planet, and in that moment and its attendant distraction she drives head on into a second car. She has just killed a pregnant woman, her young son and sent that family’s father into a prolonged coma. Four years later she is released from prison. Wracked with guilt she tries to rebuild her life, to find some meaning in her life, and to come to grips with the consequences of her actions. She goes to the now recovered father of that family (William Mapother), John Burroughs to somehow apologize. But her will fails her, and she instead tries to find a way to bring some joy into his life. In a very clever way, the dramatic tension in the movie, is whether or not Rhoda will or won’t tell John Burroughs who she is as she works to help him recover from his personal tragedy.

The science fiction elements of the story are brought into play by showing that this new planet, the one that existed at the fork in young Rhoda’s life is an exact duplicate of the Earth she lives on. Not just geographically but in every way; each person on each of the two planets having lived exactly the same lives up to the point that each of the two Earths becomes aware of one another. It is largely an idea more based in fantasy than science fiction, but in this movie that is not even close to the point. There is some nonsense pedaled in the TV background noise of the movie that tries to give a modicum of explanation for the existence of two Earths; but truly it is not really the point to explain it. The point is only to set up a visually stunning image of Rhoda as she walks out on a pier and stares into the night sky of the second Earth. And even more to the point, to give Rhoda (and the viewing audience) the opportunity to wonder at the consequences of their own lives, their own decisions, and their own paths not taken. In Rhoda’s case, it is a heartfelt examination of the three lives her moment of distraction extinguished. And to the spiraling effects on her life, on John Burrough’s life, even on the lives of her immediate family. Had she only not looked out the window; if only …

The story is at times painful to watch. But it is so easy to relate to. Such an accident could befall any driver. The story is so grounded in reality; this movie could easily have stood on its own without the second earth and “path not taken” themes. But by using them, Marling and Cahill have expanded the message in a provocative and meaningful way. A way that makes this movie a movie I would recommend to almost anyone.