My Take on Sunshine

[Silver Phantom 2]

The movie's simply incredible. Effects. Story. Villain. Characters.

What I love is how Pinacker says, "At the end of time, there will be a moment where there will be only one man left. And then that moment will pass. One man alone with God." And Pinacker believes that that man will be him. But at the end of the movie, Capa doesn't have to do anything more for the mission, or for himself, or for humanity. He's completed his task and he's standing at the place where space and time mold together with a wall of sun staring into him. Even though the back story says he's an atheist, "God" seems to be a metaphor for absolute power. Which is the underlying tone of the film: power.

Think about it, in the movie, all the characters are defined by their view of power:

Capa - it's controllable
Kenada - it's respected
Harvey - it's inherent and absolute
Corazon - it's natural (yet controllable)
Searle - it comes from within
Mace - it's predetermined
Pinacker - it's uncontrollable

I think this is where the "God" concept plays into the movie. And maybe I'm looking too deep, but think about it. Eight astronauts are tugging an object the size of Manhattan to restart an object 100x the diameter of Earth. Impossible by almost any standards. But the power is within. The villain is obviously Pinacker because he's wrong (and tries to kill everyone), but everyone else at least has some piece of a right idea about power.

[kagmi]

That's interesting, I hadn't thought about it this way. I think you're really onto something there when you say that each member of the crew embodies a different aspect--but aspects of what I'm not sure. I agreed that Capa's final scene strongly echoed of Pinbacker's words, but I wasn't sure exactly what that meant.

To me it almost seemed like Capa was in that moment refuting what Pinbacker said--here he is defying the apocalypse by his own capability (haha, almost a pun there on his name; I wonder if that's intentional), and he's standing with...yes, with this power, that's odd in that it's pictured as absolutely beautiful yet far from benevolent. There is a sort of almost religious admiration of the sun and the phenomena of physics throughout the movie, yet it's made clear that these phenomena are not friendly. I guess the central message is really that we have to take care of ourselves. Scary thought in this day and age.

[reignfire]

Wow, interesting look at it. However, I noticed you forgot Cassie.

[kagmi]

Hmm, that's true. And interesting. Cassie, if I had to choose, would say that power must be benevolent (as she seems incapable of admitting the necessity of killing Trey). But that's clearly disproven by the movie, and she's clearly not an antagonist...