• Neil@lemmy.ml
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    1 year ago

    Annihilation staring Natalie Portman. The wife and I went and saw it in theaters. A few people straight up walked out after a while and I heard an audible “what the fuck?” After the movie was over from someone in the theater.

    On a rewatch after reading that the movie was about cancer I appreciated it a lot more, but it’s a weird one for sure.

    • canthidium@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      It’s probably my favorite scifi movie that made me really feel something. I think you can find a lot to relate to, grief, depression, loss. I really think the main theme is self destruction, specifically resulting from some kind of trauma. Everyone had their own issues and they were all basically destroying themselves and finding solace in the shimmer.

      • Uranium 🟩@sh.itjust.works
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        1 year ago

        Quite literally self ‘Annihilation’, I think the shimmer itself is more analogous to cancer (continuously expanding, with random distorted outcomes, most of which are agressive towards anything untainted by the shimmer), but fundamentally each of the characters are there for their own different reasons for self-destruction with the hopes that it benefits others, as they effectively know it’s a suicide mission).

        The bit that I cannot recall if it was explained is why did the special ops guy go if he had a loving wife at home; what was his reason for self destruction?

        • canthidium@lemmy.world
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          1 year ago

          The bit that I cannot recall if it was explained is why did the special ops guy go if he had a loving wife at home; what was his reason for self destruction?

          I don’t remember an explanation for it aside from it was just his mission as part of being in the military. But he didn’t really have a “loving” wife at home. She cheated on him. Maybe he knew and volunteered for the mission because his marriage was over.

    • Frater Mus@lemmy.sdf.org
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      1 year ago

      The book is better IMO (other than no Portman :-) and one of the most disturbing things I’ve ever read. Highly recommended.

        • Frater Mus@lemmy.sdf.org
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          1 year ago

          Yes, I read them all the same week (bad weather kept me inside). Yesterday I read the Silo Stories (3?) in his Machine Learning anthology. I liked the first book and the short stories the best.

    • cloudless@lemmy.ml
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      1 year ago

      The movie was about cancer? Where did you read that?! The movie is the closest movie approximation of the book Alex Garland could make, considering how dense and intertwined the whole Southern Reach Trilogy is.

        • cloudless@lemmy.ml
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          1 year ago

          Sorry if my question sounded like an attack 😬 Vandermeer’s writing style deliberately opens his work to different interpretations and it’s rather interesting to see the same happening with this movie adaptation. Another interesting angle I’ve read is environmental: either in a way that Area X is return to nature (purification) or it’s the opposite (our own destruction of the planet) Getting ready to re-read the whole trilogy, will definitely include this guy’s cancer perspective as I am going through to see how it fits.