| Sunshine | |
|---|---|
Theatrical poster |
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| Directed by | Danny Boyle |
| Produced by | Andrew Macdonald |
| Written by | Alex Garland |
| Starring | (see below) |
| Music by | John Murphy Underworld |
| Cinematography | Alwin H. Kuchler |
| Editing by | Chris Gill |
| Distributed by | Fox Searchlight Pictures |
| Release date(s) | 6 April 2007 (UK) 20 July 2007 (US) |
| Running time | 107 minutes |
| Country | United Kingdom |
| Language | English |
| Budget | GB£20 million[1] / US$40 million[2] |
Sunshine is a 2007 British science fiction film directed by Danny Boyle and written by Alex Garland about the crew of a spacecraft on a dangerous mission towards the Sun. In 2057, with the Earth in peril from the dying Sun, the crew is sent to re-ignite the Sun with a massive nuclear device. The crew is made up of an ensemble cast consisting of Cillian Murphy, Rose Byrne, Cliff Curtis, Chris Evans, Troy Garity, Hiroyuki Sanada, Benedict Wong and Michelle Yeoh.
Boyle, who is best known for films such as Trainspotting and 28 Days Later, directed the film. The script was based on a scientific back-story that took the characters on a psychological journey. The director cast a group of international actors for the film, and had the actors live together and learn about topics related to their roles, as a form of method acting. To have the actors realistically react to visual effects that would be implemented in post-production, the filmmakers constructed live sets to serve as cues.
Previous science fiction films that Boyle cited as influences included Kubrick's 1968 film 2001: A Space Odyssey, the 1972 Tarkovsky version of Solaris, and the 1979 science-fiction horror film Alien. Sunshine was released in the United Kingdom on 6 April 2007 and in the United States on 20 July 2007. The film grossed £3.2 million in the UK over twelve weeks, and in the US, it placed #13 in the box office in the first weekend of its wide release. With a budget of US$40 million,[2] it ultimately grossed almost US$32 million worldwide.[3]
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In 2057, the failure of the Earth's Sun threatens life on the planet, compelling humanity to send a spacecraft that carries a payload intended to re-ignite it. The first spacecraft with the payload, the Icarus I, was lost seven years previously for reasons unknown, having failed in its mission. A second spacecraft with a new payload, the Icarus II, is sent to the sun in a final attempt due to all fissile materials on earth having been mined for the payload.
When the Icarus II passes Mercury on its way to the sun, communications officer Harvey (Troy Garity) discovers the distress beacon of Icarus I. Physicist Capa (Cillian Murphy) is asked by Captain Kaneda (Hiroyuki Sanada) to decide whether to change course and approach Icarus I. After a risk assessment, Capa decides to rendezvous with the stricken vessel in order to acquire another payload and double their chances of success, since all simulations of the explosion end with uncertain results. In planning the new course, navigator Trey (Benedict Wong) forgets to realign the heat shield to match the new trajectory, which results in damage that puts the spacecraft at risk. Kaneda and Capa embark on a spacewalk to make repairs, and an unintended automatic override by the ship's computer puts the two men at risk of fatal solar exposure.
Kaneda orders Capa to return to the ship, choosing to sacrifice himself to complete the vital repairs. The incident that causes the override turns out to be a fire in the ship's oxygen garden, started by sunlight reflected from an exposed part of the ship, dangerously depleting oxygen levels and making a return trip impossible. Trey blames himself for his neglect, and psychiatrist Searle (Cliff Curtis) sedates him, assessing him as a suicide risk.
The Icarus II rendezvous with the Icarus I, and the lost spacecraft is explored by four men of the crew: Harvey, Capa, Searle, and engineer Mace (Chris Evans). While the Icarus I has a functional oxygen garden, the ship's operational computer is found to be sabotaged, rendering delivery of the payload impossible. Mace finds a video left behind by Captain Pinbacker (Mark Strong), who states the mission was purposely abandoned, thinking it was the 'will of God' that humanity should die. The crew of Icarus I is found dead in the unshielded observation room, having immolated themselves. During the group's exploration, the airlocks inexplicably decouple, stranding the crew members on the Icarus I. In a risky move, Searle stays behind to jettison the three men using the coordinated vacuuming of the airlock to propel them to the airlock of the Icarus II. Harvey is knocked into space and freezes to death, and Searle, trapped on the Icarus I, submits himself to the same fate as the original crew in the observation room, exposing himself to the sun.
Five remain on the Icarus II: Capa, Mace, Trey, Cassie (Rose Byrne), and Corazon (Michelle Yeoh). The survivors check the Icarus activity file and discover that someone must have manually decoupled the airlock as there was no hardware failure. While Trey -- now the prime suspect for sabotaging the airlock -- is elsewhere, the four other crew members discuss that the remaining oxygen reserves would only allow them to reach the sun to deliver the payload if there were only four people. Everyone except Cassie decides Trey must be killed, but when they go to Trey, they find he has apparently committed suicide.[A] During a final inspection some nineteen hours before the delivery point, Capa discovers with surprise from the spacecraft's computer that even without Trey the reserves would not last for them because of an unaccounted-for fifth person on the spacecraft. He discovers that Pinbacker is still alive and had made his way onto the Icarus II observation room.
Pinbacker attacks the crew members, killing Corazon in the oxygen garden (with a scapel), and then attempts to sabotage the spacecraft so it would not complete its mission, removing the mainframe computer from its cooling system. Mace attempts to undo Pinbacker's sabotage, but is trapped in the coolant reservoir and freezes to death there. Capa is trapped in an airlock but manages to manually uncouple the bomb from the rest of the spacecraft. He then travels to it via spacesuit shortly before the bomb's booster rockets are activated, taking it out of solar orbit. He finds a badly wounded Cassie in the payload section, having been pursued there by Pinbacker. Both evade this saboteur long enough for Capa to commence setting off his bomb. Pinbacker, once again goes to stop them and he and Capa struggle as they speedily descend straight down towards the surface of the sun. Capa is able to overpower Pinbacker by flaying his arm and detonate the bomb just before point of impact.
On Earth, Capa's sister reviews her brother's last words on video while her children build snowmen. Suddenly, the sky brightens, an indication of the mission's success, revealing that they were building snowmen near the Sydney Opera House.
In March 2005, following the completion of Millions (2004),[4] director Danny Boyle was briefly attached to direct 3000 Degrees, a Warner Bros. project about the 1999 Worcester Cold Storage Warehouse fire in Massachusetts, but due to opposition from surviving victims and firefighters, the project did not enter production. At the same time, Boyle received a script from screenwriter Alex Garland, who had paired with Boyle for The Beach (2000) and 28 Days Later (2002). Producer Andrew Macdonald, working with Boyle and Garland, pitched the script to 20th Century Fox, who were reluctant to finance the film based on its similarities to the 2002 remake Solaris, which performed dismally for the studio. The project was instead financed by Fox's specialized film unit Fox Searchlight Pictures. Since the preliminary budget at US$40 million was too demanding for Fox Searchlight, Macdonald sought outside financing from British lottery funds, U.K. rebates, and outside investor Ingenious Film Partners.[5] With financing in place, Boyle entered pre-production work for Sunshine, for which he planned to commence production by the following July.[4] Since Boyle had previously worked with Fox Searchlight on 28 Days Later, the existing relationship permitted the director with freedom in production, working in a small studio.[6]
Boyle and Garland worked on the script for a year, spent a second year preparing for production, filmed for three months, and spent a third full year editing and completing visual effects for Sunshine.[7] After completion of filming for Sunshine, Boyle said that he would not revisit the science fiction genre, citing production as a spiritually exhausting experience.[8] The director said making the film had conquered his fear of the difficulty encountered in producing a science fiction film, and that he would move on from the genre.[9]
Screenwriter Alex Garland was inspired to write Sunshine based on scientific ideas about the heat death of the universe,[10] specifically "an article projecting the future of mankind from a physics-based, atheist perspective," according to Garland.[8] The article was from an American scientific periodical, and Garland had wondered about what would result from the sun's death.[11] Garland brought the script to director Danny Boyle, who enthusiastically took up the project due to his long-time desire to direct a science fiction film in space.[12] Boyle and Garland worked on the script for a year, creating 35 drafts in their experimenting.[13]
The director also considered the story of Sunshine as a counterintuitive approach for the contemporary issue of global warming, with the death of the sun being a threat.[12] Originally, Sunshine was scripted to begin with a voiceover talking about how parents tell their children not to look into the sun, but once told, the children would be compelled to look. Boyle described the sun as a godly personality in the film, creating a psychological dimension for the astronauts due to its scale and power.[14] The director also described the film's villain as based on light, explaining, "That's quite a challenge because the way you generate fear in cinema is darkness." The director also sought to have the characters experience a psychological journey in which each person is worn mentally, physically, and existentially and is experiencing doubt in their faiths.[15] To capture the dangers of the voyage that the crew members went through, the director cited Bill Bryson's A Short History of Nearly Everything as influential in "articulating the universe's power".[16]
The story was also written in part to reflect the existing brilliance yet arrogance of real-life scientists when the film's scientists are presented with the crisis that threatens Earth.[17] The time period of the story, 50 years in the future, was chosen to enable the level of technology to advance to the ability to travel to the sun, but to simultaneously keep a feel of familiarity for the audience. Scientific advisers, futurists, and people who developed products for the future were consulted to shape an idea of the future.[12]
To shape the science of the film, Boyle and Garland hired scientist advisers, including NASA employees and astrophysicists.[17] One physicist, Brian Cox of University of Manchester, was hired to advise the cast and crew after the director had seen Cox on the science TV series Horizon.[18] The physicist gave regular lectures to the film's cast members about solar physics. Cox also advised the filmmakers to scale down the nuclear device in the film from the mass of the Moon to the size of Manhattan. In the film's backstory, a Q-Ball enters the Earth's sun and begins to eat it away. According to Cox, the sun would not be dense enough in real life to stop a Q-ball, but filmmakers took creative licence in writing the backstory.[10]
Boyle originally included romantic subplots,[19] including a sex scene planned between the characters Capa (Murphy) and Cassie (Byrne) in the ship's oxygen garden.[20] However, the director considered the attempt for relationships in space too "embarrassing" and excluded the subplots.[19] Boyle further distanced the characters from possible relationships by ensuring that the cast members wore little to no make-up to avoid any romantic overtures.[21] The director also avoided including humor in the script with the exception of a few gags, believing that humor was a difficult fit for the story.[22] "You get intensity of experience in space movies but not joy. So there's not much room for comedy or sex - everything is waiting to destroy you," explained Boyle.[23]
Director Danny Boyle chose to have an ensemble cast for Sunshine to encourage a more democratic process, similar to the ensemble cast in Alien. Boyle also chose to have the cast be international in order to reflect the mission's purpose "on behalf of all mankind".[17] The space crew in the film also consisted of American/Asian nationality because of the filmmakers' belief that the American and Chinese space programs would be the most developed and economically empowered 50 years in the future.[24] The director had also received advice that there would be advanced space programs with India and Brazil, but the advice was overlooked to avoid creating a cast that was too disparate.[25] According to producer Andrew Macdonald, the actors were required to speak with American accents to target the U.S. audience as much as international audiences due to the budget level of the project.[26]
To prepare the international actors for the film, Boyle had the cast undergo method acting.[21] At the beginning of the film, the characters had been together for sixteen months, so Boyle desired to capture a sense of togetherness among the actors by assigning them to live together. He also enrolled the cast members in space training and scuba diving, as well as watching films together,[12] such as The Right Stuff (1983) and the documentary For All Mankind (1989).[27] Boyle also took the cast on a tour of a nuclear submarine to comprehend claustrophobic living conditions. He also had the cast experience weightlessness in the zero G environment of an acrobatic plane.[12]
Cast members operated a Boeing 747 flight simulator and were introduced to futurologist Richard Seymour.[28] The book Moondust by Andrew Smith, a collection of accounts of the men who had walked on the moon, was assigned reading to cast members.[29] The book had been assigned by Boyle because it covered the psychological effect on the men that traveled to the moon. The director sought to manifest the effect by having the sun and its power influence the mindsets of the ship's crew.[30]
Filming for Sunshine took place at 3 Mills Studios in East London. An elaborate set was constructed, containing eight stages, 17 sets, and detailed models. The filmmakers employed three film units.[26] Filming began on 23 August 2005,[31] lasting for 15 weeks, with August and September being difficult months due to the heat and the cast's requirement to wear spacesuits for their roles.[32] Cinematographer Alwin H. Kuchler chose to film in anamorphic format to capture a physical sense of the light. "We shot certain sequences in a very dark environment, which you get used to, so when the Sun plays a role, we wanted the audience to have a physical reaction to it," Kuchler said.[33] Due to filming with the actors taking place on a stage, director Danny Boyle constructed live effects so the actors could realistically respond to computer-generated effects that were later implemented.[34]
To increase the sense of claustrophobia in Sunshine, Boyle refused to cut back to scenes on Earth, a traditional technique in most films about the planet in jeopardy. The director also kept a sense of confinement in Sunshine by avoiding filming the primary ship, Icarus II, from the outside.[28] He also attempted to avoid filming star field backgrounds, keeping the background pitch black, but was forced to keep stars in the background to keep a sense of movement.[15]
A scene in a snow-covered park with three stone monoliths was a homage to a similar scene in 2001: A Space Odyssey. The scene was filmed at a May day memorial in Stockholm, Sweden.[35] The Sydney Opera House in Sydney, Australia was chosen by Boyle out of six monuments that he considered universally recognisable. The Opera House, according to the director, possessed a "heat-thing" that made the location his choice. The snowy territory of the final scene was shot in Stockholm, Sweden, and a composite shot was created combining Stockholm's background and the Sydney Opera House.[12] A slightly different ending was shot after the original, but the alternate ending was not chosen as the director felt that it did not fit the film. The alternate ending became available on the DVD of Sunshine.[25]
The presspack says that the claustrophobic environment in the film was inspired by Wolfgang Petersen's Das Boot (1981).[26] Boyle also cited inevitable visual influences from science fiction films in space by Andrei Tarkovsky (Solaris in 1972), Stanley Kubrick (2001: A Space Odyssey in 1968), and Ridley Scott (Alien in 1979).[36] Influences from other science fiction films also included Paul W. S. Anderson's Event Horizon (1997), John Carpenter's Dark Star (1974), and Douglas Trumbull's Silent Running (1971).[8]
Filmmakers consulted NASA to design the scientific aspect of the film. Technical requirements for the ship were provided in order to be feasible. An oxygen garden was also recommended to provide oxygen for the ship and to enable a ship's crew to grow their own food rather than rely on pre-packaged food.[30] Boyle met with a department within NASA that was focused on the psychology of deep-space travel, and the department advised the director that Earth routines like preparing one's own food, eating it, and cleaning up after were activities crucial to an astronaut's sanity.[37]
The gold-leaf reflective shield in Sunshine was influenced by NASA's satellites that are sent out to deflect heat and radiation. Director Danny Boyle chose to design the space suits to be gold along these lines, despite encouragement to model the suits after the NASA design. The helmets of the film's suits were designed to have cameras mounted in them, which created a sense of claustrophobia useful for the actors in their performances.[12] The helmets were also limited to a slit for visibility instead of a full-face visor as further consideration to protect the characters from radiation in space.[15] According to Boyle, the funnel shape of the helmet was influenced by the character Kenny from South Park.[12]
Boyle included "Icarus" in the name of the film's ship to continue a theme of bleakness, saying that no Americans would give their ship such an ill-fated name. According to the director, "They'd call it Spirit of Hope or Ship of Destiny. They'd call it something optimistic... in America they would sacrifice all plausibility, because there would be hope."[38] The ship's exterior was designed to look like an oil tanker.[5] The ship's interior was influenced by the design of a nuclear submarine that filmmakers had visited in Scotland, though the space was larger due to NASA's advice that smaller quarters would affect astronauts' sanity.[7] The corpses of burn victims in the film were modeled on the Pompeii victims from the Mount Vesuvius eruption.[5]
Cinematographer Alwin H. Kuchler provided an idea to render the interior of the ship in the colors of grey, blue, and green, with no reference to orange, red, or yellow. Scenes were intended to be shot inside the ship at long intervals, and when the shot changed to the outside, yellow-starved audiences would be "penetrated" by sunlight.[13] The visual effects of the sunlight were based on photographs from the Solar and Heliospheric Observatory project.[39] Boyle also sought to pursue inexpensive methods in filming sequences involving actors and visual effects. In a scene in which a character dreams of falling into the sun,[B] the actor was placed in a gantry, around which 20 men slid a rig of lights.[2]
In another scene in which a character dies from solar exposure among ashes from cremated bodies, massive blasters propelled biodegradable dust at the actor in the director's attempt to have the computer-generated effects follow the actor instead of vice versa.[23] Boyle commented on his approach to using effects, "There is part of our brain where we admire the effect, but we put it in a side compartment of our experience because you know there's no way an actor can live through that, or be there in that moment."[2] During the post-production process, Boyle hired one visual effects company, London's Moving Picture Company, to work on the film's 750 visual effects. The assignment of a single company was contrary to the industry trend of hiring multiple vendors to work on a film's effects. Boyle chose one company for ease of quality control, though the decision resulted in a prolonged post-production process.[5]
When the film was mostly complete, director Danny Boyle provided the film to the band Underworld, who improvised a score for the film.[21] Karl Hyde of Underworld was influenced by the music of avant garde composer György Ligeti, which had been used in Stanley Kubrick's 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968). Lux Aeterna by Ligeti particularly influenced Hyde.[8] When Underworld finished recording, the band sent its work to composer John Murphy, who completed the score, resulting in a hybrid between Underworld and Murphy.[21] The band I Am Kloot also contributed to the score with the track Avenue of Hope.[40]
Despite high praise for the score from many fans of the film, a soundtrack for the film was heavily delayed to be released, in part due to 'disputes' between the lawyers of Underworld and Fox Searchlight.[41] Although not released close to the film's debut, a soundtrack was still widely expected to be eventually released, until the film's producer Andrew Macdonald stated in a fansite interview that the soundtrack was "stuck" and that there were "no plans to release" it.[42] However, as of 19 Sept 2008, there are plans to release the full soundtrack on iTunes. Underworld confirmed this on 10 Sept 2008 on an internet radio broadcast. [43]
The soundtrack was released on iTunes USA on November 25th, 2008.
Sunshine was originally slated for a theatrical release in October 2006, but the release was later changed to March 2007. The film was finally set to debut in April 2007.[56] Sunshine made its world premiere at Fantasy Filmfest in Bochum, Germany on 23 March 2007.[57] The film was commercially released in the home country of the United Kingdom on 6 April 2007, grossing £1,021,063 in 407 theatres for its opening weekend.[58]
The film also opened the same weekend in seven other markets, performing most strongly in Hong Kong (US$267,000), Taiwan (US$442,000) and Singapore (US$198,000).[59] On the weekend of 13 April 2007, Sunshine opened in 22 more markets, garnering US$5.3 million for the weekend. Its French debut was the strongest with US$1.2 million in 380 theatres, but the film only had average performance in New Zealand (US$120,149 from 36 theatres), Switzerland (US$60,285 from 11 theatres) and Finland (US$42,745 from 15 theatres).[60]
The following weekend of 20 April 2007, the film expanded to 44 markets, garnering US$5.9 million for a total of US$18.6 million thus far, considered a disappointing amount. Sunshine had poor débuts in Spain (US$1 million), Germany (US$638,549), and Italy (US$453,000).[61] By the end of April, Sunshine had opened to most markets, with the notable exception of the United States, for which a release date had yet to be established at the time.[59] The film's theatrical run in the UK lasted twelve weeks, totaling £3,175,911.[62]
The film was originally slated to be released in the United States in September 2007, but the release date was moved earlier to July 2007.[63] Sunshine was released in the United States and Canada at select locations in Los Angeles, New York City, Chicago, San Francisco, Boston, and Toronto on 20 July 2007.[64] Sunshine opened in 10 theatres in the United States and grossed US$242,964 over the opening weekend.[3]
The film was released everywhere else in the two countries the following weekend of 27 July 2007.[64] In the film's first wide release weekend in the United States and Canada, Sunshine grossed US$1,262,996 in 461 theaters, ranking #13 at the weekend box office.[65] In its theatrical run, the film grossed US$3,675,753 in the United States and Canada and US $28,268,852 in other territories for a worldwide total of US$31,944,605;[3] the film's budget reportedly was US$40 million.[2]
The film received 75% positive reviews out of 138 reviews, with an average rating of 6.8/10 at the movie review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes.[66] Among the "Cream of the Crop" reviews at Rotten Tomatoes, 59% out of 30 reviews were positive, with an average rating of 6.4/10.[67] On another aggregator, Metacritic, Sunshine received an average score of 64 out of 100 based on 34 reviews.[68]
Critically, the film was moderately well received in the UK.[69][70] However, many found the last reels disappointing, with one critic suggesting the switch to 'slasher movie' mode might have been inserted to appease teenage audiences.[71]
Film critic Roger Ebert gave the film 3 stars and said that "the [actors] are effective by trying not to be too effective; they almost all play professional astronaut/scientists, and not action-movie heroes," and also that the film "is strongest when it focuses on the sheer enormity of the mission and its consequences."[72]
Slow motion during weightlessness was inaccurately portrayed; the director had discovered this when riding the Vomit Comet, but he kept the slow motion to meet audiences' expectations. The film's premise of the Sun dying out is also inaccurate, since the Sun is estimated to die out in five billion years. Part of the film's back-story included the Sun's death being caused by a Q-ball caught in the solar body, but realistically, the Sun would not be dense enough to trap a Q-ball.[73]
The film's scientific content has been criticized by specialists with arguments often found contradicted by statements pertaining to the film.[74] For example, the science periodical New Scientist claimed that the nuclear device used by the crew would be woefully inadequate to reignite the dying Sun (billions would be required).[75] The periodical found the film to be confusing and disappointing. Similarly, solar physicist Anjana Ahuja, a columnist for The Times, commented on the lack of source of artificial gravity onboard the spacecraft, claiming "Danny Boyle could have achieved the same level of scientific fidelity in Sunshine by giving a calculator to a schoolboy". (The device or methods used by the crew and ship to generate artificial gravity were shown but never mentioned or explained). In the deleted scenes on the DVD it is explained that inside the cube structure was compressed the mass of a small moon, thus generating the artificial gravity, and the reason why they didn't fall to their death when pushed off the edge of the cube.) Ahuja was, however, more positive about the psychological aspect of the film, joking that "the psychology of extended space travel is covered well, although we could have done with a space bonk".[76]
The DVD for Sunshine was released in the United Kingdom on 27 August 2007. Extras include separate commentaries by Danny Boyle and Dr. Brian Cox, an alternative ending, eleven deleted scenes, web production diaries, and the short films Dad's Dead and Mole Hills.[77] A Blu-Ray version was released in the UK in October of the same year. In the United States, Sunshine was released on high-definition Blu-ray Disc and standard definition DVD on 8 January 2008.[78]. As of February 17, 2008, Sunshine has grossed $15.83 million in rental sales. [79]
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