Ed. Note: This review was originally made in conjunction with. released The colony‘s simultaneous cinema and VOD release. It was updated for the arrival of the film on Netflix.
We have long been destroying the earth, and because science fiction cinema has been distilling and exploring environmental concerns for decades (from Soylene green to Water world to WALL-E to Snow piercer) the climate apocalypse genre has become an echo chamber. In these films our planet becomes uninhabitable. Humanity is traveling elsewhere to start over. Filmmakers needlessly ask, “Have we been the problem all along?” The repetitive presentation of these concerns and a lack of creativity in addressing these concerns lead to films like Tim Fehlbaums The colony.
Optically beautiful, but narrative sluggish, The colony takes off his hat to other genre classics like Aliens and Children of men with questions about reproduction, colonialism and communal responsibility. The protagonist Blake (Nora Arnezeder) is reminiscent of Sigourney Weavers Ripley with her physical strength, her steely gaze and her tenderness towards children. The characters in the film are divided into belligerent factions fighting over who should control the planet’s scarce resources, dismissing the natives of the earth as backward and uneducated. The attraction of the room and its potential are discussed in detail. But for all of the time The colony
Subtitles inform us that due to climate change, pandemics and war, “the ruling elite” has fled the earth to settle on the distant planet Kepler 209. But the planet is not perfect: there are no great bodies of water, but there are is widespread radioactivity making survival difficult. Most importantly, people lose the ability to get pregnant naturally. With the impending end of mankind, the Keplerians begin an astronaut program to return to Earth. The first starship they send back, Ulysses 1, goes missing without ever sending a return back. A generation later, Kepler launches Ulysses 2 and puts all their hopes on the shoulders of this crew of three, including Blake.
Do you recognize a place you’ve never lived before? Does such knowledge exist as an existential inheritance? As Blake wanders a damp, misty beach, picking up horseshoe crabs and prying at jellyfish, Arnezeder exudes both confusion and familiarity. Her expressive face reflects these conflicting emotions well, and her lithe physicality captures a warrior and explorer accustomed to tension and trained to analyze the unknown. But despite all this preparation, Blake is caught by surprise when he is ambushed by the survivors of the planet, led by a woman named Narvik (Sarah-Sofie Boussnina). They speak a mishmash of languages, they carry weapons, live as nomads and, unlike the people on Kepler, have children. Among the teens is a girl named Maila (Bella Bading), whom Blake befriends – and who is kidnapped when this group of survivors is attacked by another heavily armed group who take whatever they want, including any female Children.
Blake’s main job is to send a message to Kepler letting her know that replica is still working on Earth, but when Maila is kidnapped, she becomes Aliens
In his early scenes The colony works as a plaintive visual exploration of what survival might look like if we were on ours ruinous climate path: constant floods and swirling water, nimble cities built on rickety ships, nomads wrapped in outfits that protect them from the elements and allow freedom of movement. Cinematographer Markus Förderer and production designer Julian R. Wagner create a haunting world, but The colony is sometimes too literal. Fehlbaum’s depiction of loneliness is jam-packed with resoundingly obvious images (Blake alone on the beach, Blake alone in a floodwater well), but the first 20 minutes are a disturbing visualization of the loss.
but The colony isn’t nearly as well thought-out in its character development and doesn’t go far enough. So much remains unexplored: since when have the various groups of survivors been at war? What are the effects of the return of the people from Kepler? What is Blake’s view of the social demand for reproduction? How is the rest of the earth? Why is a science fiction film supposedly about exploring a possible future so little curious about details?
The film’s casual descriptions of death, such as “Flood took him” when it comes to describing a missing character, suggest a life of endless hardship. But because The colony holds onto Blake’s perspective so tightly that it doesn’t leave much room for others. The film suggests a class analysis with this subtitle of the “ruling elite”, but doesn’t do anything with it. And while Arnezeder and Boussnina have incredible chemistry, The colony doesn’t allow queer subtext and doesn’t really care about human emotions like romantic love.
His reflections are more sublime: is world peace realistic between people who were able to leave a dying planet and those who had to stay behind? What about “coming home” could trigger physical changes? Especially recently, when we passed the deadline for preventive action to combat climate change – with the August 2021 Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change report calling climate change “spread, fast and intensify“- almost every science fiction film seems to revisit the end of the earth as we know it. But similar to Chaos wandering, Settlers, and traveler, The colony bypasses the hard work required to repair or undo the havoc we have wreaked. These characters move in a world that is breathtakingly visualized but superficially conceived, and The colony embodies a genre that – perhaps like humanity itself – does not seem to be able to imagine any other future.
The colony streams on Netflix and is available to rent or buy on Amazon.