Life is a sci-fi horror movie about six people on an international space station, including Jake Gyllenhaal and Ryan Reynolds, orbiting Earth. They recover a space probe. The space probe contains a microbial size life form from Mars, whom they resuscitate. They do not watch movies so of course, things go wrong, and everyone on Earth is threatened. How will they stop it?
A reviewer asked in a world with Arrival, Gravity, and Interstellar, is there a need for Life in the world of sci-fi films? Yes, I cannot have my mind blown with deep meditation on the human experience every time that I go to the movies. Sometimes I need a palette cleanser. I would sacrifice Contact, I mean Interstellar, for eight movies like Life if I get to have a cathartic guilt-free experience to simultaneously root against stupid humanity and have guilt-free kill the monster blood lust while watching the monster find new and exciting ways to kill people (the rat never asked for this life and told y’all). Real talk: there would be no movie if I existed in this story. “Let’s experiment with Life from Mars.” “Nope.” “But…” “Nope.” Or let’s say somehow it got on the ship. “Why are you using that tool to revive it? That could be interpreted as hostile. Oh, what did I say! Don’t help him. Shut it down! Bye, buddy.”
Life is extremely derivative, but it knows it. Life is Alien meets Little Shop of Horror’s Audrey’s Martian cousin. Life drops a few key clues to let us know that Calvin, the name of the Martian (it is explained in Life) is not a monster, but a life-form although I have no idea how it can be killed. Calvin is all muscle and brain and a carbon-based life form that needs oxygen, water and food, but can also survive extremely harsh conditions. If you remember those key characteristics and watch eagle-eyed at every beep and shadow, you will not have any questions when Calvin turns up in the most unusual, some may say unrealistic, places.
Life does not get enough credit for doing two things. First, Life gives us tentacle horror and really goes there. I have to say that Life deserves kudos for the first kill and throwing down the gauntlet in dismissing the trope of how to kill the monster. The second kill is also clever although there was a missed opportunity for Calvin to show how quickly Calvin learns and would have solved a credibility straining moment that follows soon thereafter. Second,
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Life is clearly inspired by one of the early passages in Bram Stoker’s Dracula when a ship’s entire crew is dead, and one of the dead men is strapped to the helm to maintain the ship’s course. Dracula uses the ship to arrive on the shores of England. How germane is it that a metaphor for horror of immigrants from the East being introduced into the civilized world is reappearing in some form now although this metaphor is not what Life was aiming at.
Calvin clearly disabled the communication system. Hugh is a Renfield type figure who essentially serves Calvin and snuck him into the sealed up area when Hugh saw Calvin reenter the ship. When Gyllenhaal was saying trust me to the security officer, I just thought, “How are you going to override the pod’s system if Calvin is eating you,” but because Calvin was going to end up on Earth when the space station crashed anyway, so I will sign a waiver.
The luring Calvin into the pod sequence provides perfect tension with Calvin momentarily grabbing each flare and shivering from the deep space cold while intensely focusing on Gyllenhaal, his future snack. I am going to say that if I saw a man screaming no who seems trapped in some weird web in a capsule from space, I would probably not try to open it even if I did not speak English. No and head shaking are universal. The overhead shot of more ships coming to the rescue is a deliciously bleak ending. I have heard rumors that Life may be a prequel to introduce Venom in the upcoming Marvel reboot of the Spider Man franchise. Standalone or prequel, I don’t care because I got an apocalypse by Martian Dracula.