Moon

I enjoy a brooding tone in my science-fiction films. Throw in an actor known for playing brooding characters, and you have a movie environment that I can get into. Sam Rockwell plays Sam Bell, an employee of a mining company who works on a space station that is based on Earth's moon. He is the only man up there and only gets to speak to his family every so often but at least he is accompanied by the ship's computer Gerty, (voiced by Kevin Spacey) that functions as the Hal of this trip (just take away the "evil" factor). This whole film pretty much functions as a performance piece for Rockwell, and he certainly delivers. Similar to Will Smith in I Am Legend, Rockwell is well aware that it is completely up to him to add as much emotion into his performance as possible because there aren't any other actors on board the ship with him to pick up the slack. 

However when another person shows up on the moon, and it turns out to be another Sam Bell, our Sam Bell isn't sure if he has been cloned or if he is going crazy. Similar to how Danny Boyle's Sunshine suddenly developed into the cliches of a slasher film, Moon goes from a more hardened realistic science-fiction and instead crosses into the more unreal for the reality that this film has set up for itself. Rockwell works well with the double role (and once again, it speaks to his underrated talent as an actor that he can pull off such interaction when he is the only actor on the set). However, Rockwell does go at times from a morose and saddened man to that sparkling energy that you will often find in his characters which is partly misplaced amongst the dark and sterile look of the space station. The film still has enough creativity placed in all of its aspects to hold your attention, despite boiling down to a performance piece. This film was the debut feature for director Duncan Jones and for such an audacious project, he handles it all with grace and one can't help but wonder what further heights he will launch to given more time.