Another Earth

I'm fortunate enough to live near a small, independent movie theater that shows a lot of limited-release, generally arty, movies.  A lot of the time I'm not that interested in what's playing, but every so often a movie comes there that catches my interest.  This time that movie was Another Earth.

Another Earth is a "science fiction" (I'll get to why that's in quotes) movie that involves a second Earth, completely identical to our own, even down to having copies of the same people, appearing as a tiny blue dot in the sky one night.  The night that it first appears, Rhoda Williams (played by Brit Marling) is celebrating getting accepted to MIT.  She has too much to drink, is distracted by trying to see Earth 2, and runs her car into the one occupied by John Burroughs (William Mapother), his pregnant wife, and their young son.  Burroughs goes into a coma and his wife and son are killed.  Four years later, Rhoda is released from prison and, not really knowing what to do with her life, she enters an essay contest to win a seat on the first civilian shuttle to Earth 2, which is now much closer and is visible even in the daytime.  She also finds out where Burroughs lives and goes to his home intending to apologize for the grief she's caused him.  Rhoda panics when he answers the door, says instead that she works for a cleaning service offering a free trial cleaning, and winds up cleaning his house on a regular basis.

Now to why "science fiction" is in quotes up there.  The whole second Earth premise doesn't hold up at all if you think about it even for a moment (such as the havoc another planet being that close to ours would have on things like tides, the fact that people generally seem to feel pretty ho-hum about another Earth suddenly appearing, why didn't anyone know about this planet before it suddenly appeared, etc.).  However, this movie isn't actually about Earth 2.  It's about how Rhoda is dealing with her guilt and the relationship that builds between her and Burroughs.  The appearance of Earth 2 is the catalyst for the events of the movie, and is important to the film's resolution, but it's mostly just in the background.

I don't have much to say about the acting or cinematography or any of that, but I thought Brit Marling did a wonderful acting job in this film.  She was very convincing as a young woman consumed by guilt and unable to forgive herself.  I definitely recommend checking this movie out, provided you aren't a real stickler for plausibility in your movies' premises.