Have you ever awakened on the floor and wondered: “How did I get here”?
That’s what happened to Riya (Eiza González – “Fountain of Youth”) in an outpost on the planet “Ash.” She’s suffered a head wound and has lost her memory.
Getting up, she wanders through the structure, finding a dead man with a knife in his chest and venturing outside, another man with a rock where his face should be. She discovers the air, filled with volcanic ash, is toxic and returns to the structure, only to have yet another man, Brion (Aaron Paul – “Breaking Bad”) pounding on the door. She lets him in and together, they begin putting the recent past together.
Brion is from a “mother craft” circling the planet, and wants Riya to abandon the surface of ASH and depart the planet with him. She resists. So much of her memory is gone, but something makes her want to stay and figure out what happened. Medical diagnostics indicate the head injury has caused her amnesia, but she begins to get back portions of what happened as she and Brion explore the outpost.
As the narrative progresses, through Riya’s recollections, we meet the crew and then, one by one, see their destruction – not by Riya alone, but by a creature that comes to possess them, moving from one body to another. This is truly terrifying as is Riya’s recognition that she herself is responsible for their deaths due to her breaking security protocols when an alien life form is discovered infesting their communications equipment. This life form is particularly interesting and is given a motivation different from the usually encountered alien enemy.
Director Flying Lotus (“V/H/S/99”) and writer Jonni Remmler (“Das Quartette”) have teamed up to provide a roller-coaster ride of exoplanet horrors. There are plenty of elements here that can be traced back to earlier sci-fi features, but Lotus and Remmler combine them in robust, new ways to give us a different take on what we might find…”out there”. And, the two creators don’t hesitate to recognize their debt to others, as is stated in the credits.
The acting is solid (especially important since there really are only two characters for the bulk of the film), the musical score by Lotus is supportive, and the graphics, with the exception of the outpost interior, are excellent. Pay attention to the unique style of the environment suits the explorers wear.
All in all a fun flick with considerable gore at times and a familiar, yet twisted, take on interstellar tropes.
Runtime: One hour 32 minutes
Availability: After a theatrical run, it is currently streaming on Prime and other streaming services.
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