Space oddity
High energy, but not a lot of intelligent ‘Life,’ in sci-fi actioner
THE space genre has grown so serious in recent years that “Life,” in its cheesy way, is a welcome change of pace. It harks back to the days when aliens wanted to rip our faces off. But this is derivative material: Director Daniel Espinosa embraces every cliché in his story of astronauts whose experiments with a sample from Mars go spectacularly wrong.
“Life” is a high-budget affair with impressive cinematography, occasionally dizzying in its depiction of a zero-gravity workplace. But for all its CGI showiness, the fact that Ryan Reynolds and Jake Gyllenhaal signed on for this splatterfest is the film’s most impressive feat.
Espinosa nicely bucks the trend of starting out on a placid note, beginning midcrisis, as technician Rory (Reynolds) makes an emergency repair to the space station he shares with five others. And things go downhill from there.
“Its curiosity outweighs its fear,” says scientist Hugh (Ariyon Bakare) as a Martian organism expands overnight into a sentient plant. What could possibly go wrong? Why not stick your hand in there, right?
It’s not long until that familiar klaxon starts wailing. Calvin, as the specimen has been named, is on the loose and grows into a hybrid of the “Stranger Things” monster and Audrey II from “Little Shop of Horrors.”
“We never trained for this!” says Gyllenhaal’s character, an ex-military tech. You’d think this guy might be the one who’d given some thought to fighting off an invader. Capable as they supposedly are, he and the rest of the astronauts make one rookie mistake after another — slamming airlocks shut but forgetting an open hatch or two for Calvin to scuttle into. Helpful tip: When a colleague goes glassy-eyed and acts weird, don’t take him at his word when he says he’s OK.
The ick factor is high: Calvin’s method of killing involves slithering into his victims’ mouths. (I found myself covering mine.) These scenes become redundant: gory death, seal off part of station, panic, repeat. Gyllenhaal seems helpless to rise above material that has him saying lines such as, “What is going on?”
At least Reynolds makes a darn good space cowboy. “F-- k this,” he growls at one point. “Permission to kill this f-- king thing.” He brings welcome levity to a film that otherwise takes itself too seriously. If you’re going to have one of your last survivors tearfully recite “Goodnight Moon,” please do it with a wink at the camera: In space, nobody can hear you whispering “hush.”