Annihilation (2018) Review

THE FOLLOWING REVIEW CONTAINS SPOILERS OF THE DISCUSSED FILM. READERS DISCRETION IS ADVISED.

When finding important answers you’ve been looking for, it doesn’t guarantee satisfaction.


PLOT


Based on Jeff VanderMeer’s titular novel, Annihilation follows cellular biology professor Lena who deeply misses her husband Kane that has been absent for a year due to an undisclosed mission. When he comes home, he is incapable of explaining his experience before his condition deteriorates. When being taken to a hospital, they get intercepted by security forces and are taken to a secret facility. Lena meets Doctor Ventress, a psychologist who explains Kane’s mission was about a meteor that crash-landed in Florida three years prior and has expanded to an anomalous zone dubbed ‘The Shimmer’. With Kane in intensive care, Ventress invites Lena to a new expedition to figure out what happened to him. They are accompanied by paramedic Anya Thorensen, physicist Josie Radek & geomorphologist Cassie Shepherd. As they enter, communication equipment is proven to not function within Shimmer territory. They see a fair share of mutated plants, but also animals as they survive an attack of an albino alligator that concentric rows of teeth. At an abandoned military base, they find a camera left behind by Kane’s group, with a video showing him cut open another soldier’s abdomen and reveal to have grown slithering intestines inside. Lena’s group goes find soldier’s corpse, only to see it have turned into an overgrown colony of lichens. By night, Cass gets dragged away by a mutant bear and her body would be found by Lena the next day. Josie would study the plants near an abandoned village to theorize the Shimmer functions as a prism, where it can distort & transform everything in its boundaries that include human dna. When Anya gets paranoid of their fingerprints changing, she ties the rest of her group down to chairs and accuses Lena of killing Cass since & Ventress kept it to themselves that Kane was her husband. She would be proven wrong when the bear returns and lures Anya by emitting Cass’ cries before killing her. Josie is able to kill it as soon as she breaks free. By the next morning, she shares that Shepherd’s dying mind must have been fractured with the bear and what was left of her was her fear as she died, which explains why it emitted her cries. Before she succumbs to refract into a humanoid plant, Ventress quickly goes to the center of the Shimmer that is a lighthouse where the meteor landed. Lena catches up and finds another camera with footage of Kane. It turns out that he took his life with a grenade as a result of the Shimmer already killing him within. However, a doppelgänger of him stood out of frame meaning the Kane that came home was not him. Lena then follows the hole made by the meteor where she meets with Ventress again, who has discovered the Shimmer will eventually swallow everything of this planet, before she disintegrates into a shimmering cloud. That same cloud would absorb a drop of Lena’s blood and begin mimicking her movements as it transforms into a humanoid. Lena is able to escape its wrath by throwing another grenade into the lighthouse that dissipates the Shimmer. When she returns to base, she is under interrogation and explains exactly what happened. The end of interrogation ends with officer Lomax (Benedict Wong) revealing Kane stabilized after the Shimmer fell. When she sees him, she asks if he is really her husband only for him to respond with being doubtful. When he asks if she is his wife, she doesn’t answer. As the film ends with the two embracing, their eyes shimmer implying they aren’t human anymore.


THOUGHTS


I knew I was in for a big mind trip off of the fact Alex Garland was involved in writing/directing, and boy did it deliver on that end. Not having read the book myself, it’s very impressive that all the changes & additions he brought to table actually made the narrative all the more intriguing. The visual effects are already captivating on how the Shimmer itself looks and the humanoid that appears after the cloud was visceral, but the new things added for suspense like gator were surreal. You follow that up with the mutant bear, you got yourself top tier suspense to behold. From start to finish, this is a different kind of alien invasion because their functions differ from past movies. They live up to the name of this picture, but the how is where it gets intriguing, because they want to evolve and know what they absorb is what gets it done. Just knowing they have to absorb our world to better themselves is where it feels scary. In a way, this story is a twisted exploration on how grief is self destructive and the importance of maintaining identity when at our lowest. You pick up on this when following Natalie Portman in one her many grounded performances. Lena hits different from previous roles because she doesn’t know what to believe and is desperate to find all answers in order to be content again. She was so lonely without Kane that she slept with a colleague hoping to fill a void that couldn’t be filled until her husband came home. What we get out of Oscar Isaac in his given time is so captivating because you get to feel all the coldness he carries after such a life alteration, only to be in shock he’s not who he thought he was. Even when not being sure she’d have the same effects, Lena still went into the Shimmer because that was how determined she was to get answers; And that determination of course came from her own experience in the military where she met Kane in the first place. And she chose to take Ventress’ advice in not telling the others of her reason in joining the expedition because she didn’t want to come off selfish about it. It is a shame she had to lose herself to be whole again because no one should ever need to go that far period. It doesn’t feel worth it when this means extraterrestrial are going to move forward with their plans in the disguise of her & her husband, so we can only hope characters like Lomax can figure it out soon before it’s too late. Besides him, it was interesting to see other characters take part in an expedition that would also change them for the worst. If Lena represents acceptance, then the rest of her group take part in the five stages of grief. Jennifer Jason Leigh showed Ventress to be the most distant which would be ironic in the character’s line of work. Shes so somber in the quest because there is nothing for her to do as her diagnosis of cancer has made her act so deadpan she represents depression; It is a shame she chose to let that define her before it was over for her. As for Radek, Tessa Thompson makes her most reserved of an introvert because she is overly focused on what she is observing. 
This was a way to say she represents bargaining because she was willing to surrender rather than fight a painful fate. On the other hand, Gina Rodriguez has Anya represent anger because she was most outspoken and was more willing to be rash when the opportunity was given. I don’t blame her for mistaking Lena as an enemy because not everyone had clear answers on what they were experiencing. If she had better temperament, I’d bet she would’ve lasted a little longer. Last but not least, it would be safe to say Cass represents Denial because Tuva Novotny showed her to be most pensive as a result of losing her only daughter to leukemia. She misses her deeply if she’s still willing to talk about it. And she was so focused for the most part on wanting to explore the unknown that she didn’t see her fate was already sealed. The saddest part about her death is only remembering how scared she was and the bear used it as a tool to lure out prey. Had she accepted her loss sooner, maybe her guard would’ve been stronger than she had in mind. This movie is well made on its own, but there are a few things that don’t make much sense to me upon rewatching. From the top, it’s a big continuity error for the primer Lena is using when painting the house. One take shows she’s halfway done with one wall only for another take to show she’s less than half by the time she’s hugging Kane. Going into the story, does it really make sense for the government to put Lena in a prison outfit? She didn’t commit any crimes, she just reunited with who she thinks is her husband. If they want her to trust them, that should’ve not happened. And in all honesty, it’s kinda crazy that anyone would want to eat outside where they’d be near the Shimmer no one’s gotten out of. That’s dumber than leaving the zipper door open for Lena to walk in without a fuss. Even if we know she’s not gonna be reckless, it’s a surprise they stopped being restraint just because she agrees to join the mission. Also, how come nobody has gloves when in the shimmer? I understand hazmat suits would be a hassle, but that would’ve been useful to avoid possible contamination. Moving on, I don’t blame Anya for being so creeped out of the camcorder footage of Kane’s amateur surgery that she would avoid rewatching it, but any paramedic like her or any average scientist would have to get data off of that content for multiple viewing experiences in order to get the answers. Continued observation is way more useful than a single look. And is going back really an option once Josie thinks they should? Lena only goes in alone because Ventress ditches the others that died. So if anyone has even done a return test mission, that should’ve been clarified from the get go. And there’s no reason for Lena to be alone when searching for Sheppard because it’s too suspicious to be on your own in an environment you’re far from familiar with. Lastly, it was totally on her to further explore the insights of the lighthouse before finishing the camera footage left behind. Had she done that, she would’ve found some kind of alternative to survive. Ignore this, then you’ll still enjoy what’s done as a whole. In conclusion, Annihilation is a bold sci fi flick for constantly leaving you guessing on how the journey is gonna go. If you’re into thought provoking stories, check this out.