365 Movies Day #93 "Sunshine"

What happens when you take an amazing director with a fantastic cast and a solid sci-fi plot...apparently not enough to excite people to watch it in theaters. What happened to Danny Boyle's ("Trainspotting"/"28 Days Later", "127 Hours", "Slumdog Millionaire") "Sunshine"? Using a particle physicist and professor at the University of Manchester as an advisor who also is a member of the team on the ATLAS experiment at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC), CERN in Geneva, Switzerland helps make this one of the smartest films around (Dr. Brian Cox).

This is also the first movie that made me think Chris Evans rocks as an actor. Before this it was just his role in "Fantastic Four" (which I didn't like) and the abominable "Cellular" that I had to judge him on. Since, I really enjoyed him in "Push" and though he technically beat me out for the role (by a long shot I'm sure), he'll be great as Captain America (the bastard). Cliff Curtis (Uncle Bully from "ONCE WERE WARRIORS" deserves a special mention as well. He was remarkable as Searle and needs more parts with substance like this one. Mark Strong, who I first noticed in "RockNRolla", but many will recognize from "Sherlock Holmes", "The Green Lantern" (as Sinestro), "Stardust", "Kick-Ass" and Ridley Scott's "Robin Hood", plays a stunningly psychotic villain. Cillian Murphy is the lead in this one and he's always a joy to watch. A favorite of Boyle (working on "28 Days Later" as well as "Sunshine") and Chris Nolan (both Batman films AND "Inception"), he's definitely hanging with the right people.

If you haven't seen it, this film is an eerily scary tale about a team of scientists on a mission to reignite the sun. I'm terrified of stuff we have no control over, like car accidents and the like, and the sun burning out or exploding definitely ranks up there. The crew is pushed to its limits and encounters unexpected events that complicate the mission, adding a horror element and some philosophically brilliant elements. One of Boyle's best and deserves more credit as a great film!

SUNSHINE ON IMDB