Film breathes new life into alien theme

AUSTIN, Texas: A deadly Martian creature hunts astronauts within the close, claustrophobic confines of a space ship in the new thriller Life, an exploration of mankind’s hubris in its search for extraterrestrial life.

Life, now in cinemas, follows the astronauts aboard the International Space Station (ISS) as they discover and nurture a living organism from Mars.

As the alien life form, initially a cute blob named Calvin, quickly grows and becomes stronger, the astronauts find themselves fighting for their lives within the confines of the space station.

“When we go out and we take something from its nat- ural habitat… the question is when do we step over the threshold of ownership and maybe gradually create our own disaster?” actress Rebecca Ferguson, who plays the newest recruit aboard the ISS, said at the South by Southwest festival in Austin, Texas, in the US, where the film premièred.

Deadly aliens have long been a fascination for Hollywood movies, such as 1996’s Independence Day, in which aliens try to destroy Earth, and 1979’s Alien in which a monster hunts humans on a spaceship, similar to the plot of Life.

The appeal of a space thriller lies in the isolation and close confines of the environment, said Ryan Reynolds, who plays an engineer aboard the ISS.

“People love stories like that where you’re stuck and you’ve got to deal with whatever problem you have in the five or six rooms available to you to neutralise it or do whatever you need to do, so I think it’s kind of panic-inducing,” the actor said.

The tension is heightened by the zero-gravity environment that the film is set within, said Jake Gyllenhaal, who plays a military veteran doctor on board the ISS.

The cast spent the majority of the film shoot suspended on harnesses to emulate how astronauts move without gravity.

“You never really know what’s up and what’s down,” Gyllenhaal said. “A horror film and a thriller where you don’t know where that next thing is coming from, it makes it four or five times more terrifying.” – Reuters

Ryan Reynolds