The Last Days on Mars is a new science fiction thriller and the debut feature film of Irish director Ruairí Robinson, whose animated short Fifty Percent Grey was nominated for an Academy Award® in 2002.
Liev Schreiber, Romola Garai and Olivia Williams, in a scene-stealing supporting role, are crewmembers on the first manned mission to Mars, which was all going according to plan until the final day, when an exciting discovery is made a few miles from the base camp. A science officer goes missing while attempting to collect what appears to be evidence of Martian life and the crew’s hopes of a safe home journey to Earth
are dashed.
Reminiscent of Duncan Jones’ recent contribution Moon and bowing its head to seminal works of the genre, Alien and 2001: A Space Odyssey, The Last Days on Mars is both a moody and stylish exploration of group psychology in space, and a tense and poundingly violent account of the battle to remain alive on our mysterious neighbouring planet.
David Mullane
Jameson Dublin International Film Festival
