150 Word Review: ‘Sunshine’ (2007)

Don’t stare at the sun

One of my favorite movie subgenres is what I call “Space Madness,” which includes everything from 1968’s 2001: A Space Odyssey about a spaceship’s insane A.I. to 1997’s Event Horizon, in which a team of astronauts on a deep-space rescue mission lose their minds and souls. I’ll add Danny Boyle’s overlooked 2007 sci-fi thriller Sunshine to this list. The movie is both elegant and depressing af.

In Sunshine, a crew from Earth is sent on a desperate mission to jump-start the heart of a slowly fading sun with a special nuclear device. Their ship looks like a giant umbrella, the canopy tiled in special heat-absorbing gold scales and pointed directly at the star, which is still capable of instantly incinerating humans. The cast is a collection of “oh wow” actors, including Cillian Murphy, Michelle Yeoh, and Captain America. Here’s a tip: never answer a distress call from a dead spaceship.