A few years ago, NASA unveiled a program called "Mars 2020," whose core mission, or high-priority science goal, was to address key questions about the potential for life on Mars, including finding habitable conditions on ancient Mars. signs of ancient microbial life itself. According to the plan, the four rovers will work on Mars for at least one Martian year (about 687 days), during which time it will drill samples of Martian soil and rocks.
Seeing this, does it feel a little familiar? That's right, the story development of 2017's "Alien Awakening" can almost be moved directly to the follow-up possibility of NASA's Mars program. Some commentators briefly summarized the film as a combination of "Alien" and "Gravity". From the main line, "Alien Awakening" does have many similarities with "Alien", and it can even be said to be the latter. pay tribute. For example, confined spaces, single scenes, relatively long and slow foreplay rhythms, and horror movie routines where astronauts are killed by monsters one by one. As for the part like "Gravity", it starts with a nearly ten-minute long shot scheduling and plots showing the daily life of astronauts.
Of course, compared with "Alien", which can be called a classic in film history, the grand background and profound theme alone are difficult for this film to match. Moreover, it is a sci-fi movie with horror and horror as its main selling point. Its originality is slightly insufficient, and it is easier for old drivers to guess the routine. At the same time, it is not as cold and restrained as "Alien" in creating a thrilling atmosphere. Far and deep. Therefore, if purely from the perspective of a B-grade film, "Alien Awakening" can only be said to be a low-profile version of "Alien".
But if you look at it from another angle, this work is still quite bright, that is, it is close to the truth. The first is in terms of time. From the astronaut David in the film who said that he had watched the live broadcast of the Challenger air disaster when he was a child, and combined with David's approximate age, we can know that the age of the background of the story is almost the same as it is now, which is consistent with "Alien" ” is markedly different. In the world of "Alien", human's technological civilization has developed to the point where it is possible to conduct interstellar travel, which is beyond the level of discussing the first contact between human beings and extraterrestrial civilization or extraterrestrial life. In other words, "Alien Awakening" contains a certain practical significance. It can be said that once NASA's Mars program really finds evidence of the existence of life, then the events in the film may not be science fiction.
In addition to the more serious and realistic script, the crew also put a lot of effort into the shooting venue. Director Daniel Espinosa is used to shooting realistic works in Europe, so when it is his turn to shoot science fiction films, he does not plan to use green screen and blue screen, but has carefully built a highly simulated International Space Station. The film also invited Austrian scientist Rudy Schmidt, University of London cosmology expert Kevin Fonn, geneticist Adam Rutherford and other professionals to provide scientific help, including from the internal structure of the space station to the state of weightlessness. presentation, etc. It is worth mentioning that the Martian creatures in the film are not fabricated out of thin air, but are based on models designed by slime molds in real life. In research, the fungal creature, while lacking a brain, appears to have the ability to learn and even figure out railway lines.
On the horror level, we see an alien monster transforming and killing the astronauts one by one, but on the realistic level, killing and preying is just for survival. The English title of the film is "Life", which literally translates to "life". Just like the monsters in "Alien" it wants to pay tribute to, survival is their only purpose as a living being. We humans are accustomed to excluding ourselves from the natural ecosystem, and to view nature with our own view of good and evil, such as stereotypically classifying jackals, tigers and leopards as evil beasts. This kind of behavior of understanding or judging another creature with its own value may be harmless on earth, but it is quite dangerous in the field of space exploration.
This film is a prime example. Astronauts, especially the black astronauts in charge of research, obviously lack respect and caution for the unknown, and the psychological basis may simply be because this thing is so small and seems to be a single-celled creature. And as the tragedies happen again and again, the astronauts are still entangled in whether its behavior is an intelligent choice or an instinct. But in fact, this issue is no longer important at this time.
Judging from the ending of "Alien Awakening", how fragile the earth is, and the destruction of a space station almost sentenced mankind to death. So, how should we think about the proposition "Should we search for extraterrestrial life?" Perhaps human beings are always unbearably lonely creatures, always asking themselves whether they are the only anomalies in the vast universe, and always thinking of finding another civilization in the vast starry sky. But have we ever thought that although we have reached the top of the food chain on Earth, what about in the context of the universe? Not to mention the trisolarans who attacked us for dimensionality reduction in "The Three-Body Problem", even such an inconspicuous creature in the film is enough for us to drink a pot. Of course, humans have been slaughtered many times by bacteria and viruses on earth. In the face of the "dark forest" of the universe, should we remain silent as gold?
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