You’ll definitely be watching this when it lands.
Sci-fi has always been a genre that asks questions, pushes the boundaries and engages with the weighty issues of humanity, but there are moments when it incorporates horror elements to create something that’s truly classic.
Films like The Thing, Alien, The Fly, and Predator have all received cult status and after the overwhelmingly positive reactions to Annihilation came through, the reviews are equally as glowing.
You may already know that the film’s director, Alex Garland, was the man who directed the wonderful Ex Machina and he’s also one of the most prolific screenwriters alive – 28 Days Later, The Beach, Sunshine, Dredd and Never Let Me Go are just some of his previous work.
Based on Jeff VanderMeer’s best-selling Southern Reach Trilogy, Annihilation kicks-off after a group of soldiers enter an environmental disaster zone with only one soldier coming back alive, although he’s seriously injured. In an attempt to save his life, his wife Lena (Natalie Portman), a biologist, volunteers for another expedition into the zone to figure out what happened to him.
What’s unique about Annihilation though is that it’s not getting a cinematic release in the UK.
Despite the fact that it stars Natalie Portman and Oscar Isaac, THR reports that David Ellison, the head of Skydance Productions, was worried that the film was “too intellectual” and “too complicated” for paying audiences to understand.
