Another Earth 2011

Tom Long, Detroit News: The result is an alluring image -- Earth above Earth -- a wrenching story and a wonder-tinged film. Read more

Amy Biancolli, Houston Chronicle: In emphasizing poetry over plot, mood over mechanics, Another Earth fails to answer the most pressing question of all: Umm, why haven't the tides been affected? Read more

Christy Lemire, Associated Press: A pervasive feeling of the unknown is what provides the film with its gripping suspense. Read more

Owen Gleiberman, Entertainment Weekly: How on earth did this arty dud win the Alfred P. Sloan Prize at Sundance? Read more

Manohla Dargis, New York Times: A coming-of-adulthood story that improbably blends a plaintive drama with romantic longing and far-out science fiction... Read more

James Rocchi, MSN Movies: Marling and Cahill's script is short on facts and long on feelings, but they do deserve points for thinking outside the box of their small budget... Read more

Joshua Rothkopf, Time Out: Another Earth is a movie you take home and write your own ending to. Read more

Joe Morgenstern, Wall Street Journal: The acting anchors a tale that might otherwise have spun off, weightless, into realms celebrated by Carl Sagan. Read more

Claudia Puig, USA Today: Another Earth is one of the most low-tech, low-budget, scaled-down and engrossing sci-fi movies ever to hit theaters. Read more

Moira MacDonald, Seattle Times: It's a film that brims with talent and ideas; it stays with you for a while after you watch it, like the way a shadow lingers on a now-quiet road. Read more

Tasha Robinson, AV Club: Nominally speaking, Another Earth is science fiction, but it's more concerned with mood and metaphysics than science. Read more

Kerry Lengel, Arizona Republic: Instead of a fleet of Evil Kirks descending on us in souped-up space shuttles, we get a quietly moving parable of redemption. Read more

Ty Burr, Boston Globe: "Another Earth" is being sold as an indie sci-fi drama, but that does both the movie and its proper audience a disservice. This muted story of atonement, forgiveness, and parallel universes is more of an extended metaphor ... Read more

J. R. Jones, Chicago Reader: Not since Shane Carruth's Primer has a sci-fi movie done so much with so little. Read more

Chris Vognar, Dallas Morning News: A stripped-down sci-fi indie that made waves at the Sundance Film Festival in January. Read more

Kirk Honeycutt, Hollywood Reporter: A gripping, intimate story to which science fiction adds a provocative, philosophical context. Read more

Betsy Sharkey, Los Angeles Times: Director Mike Cahill has woven sci-fi imaginings and quantum physics theories of parallel universes into a provocative meditation on the prospect of rewriting your life history. Read more

Rene Rodriguez, Miami Herald: Ambitious but ridiculous. Read more

Anthony Lane, New Yorker: Anyone who can explain the final shot deserves a refund. Read more

Stephen Whitty, Newark Star-Ledger: Eventually the film reaches the point anyone could see it was heading toward - then blunts it by ignoring one big question and introducing another just for the sake of a twist. And then it ends, as abruptly as it began. Read more

Ella Taylor, NPR: Like many an ambitious novice, director Mike Cahill has stuffed every movie he ever wanted to make, every cockamamie parallel he wanted to draw, into his feature debut. I salute his guts and passion, and his imaginatively careless way with genre. Read more

Elizabeth Weitzman, New York Daily News: Despite the cool visuals, its bold self-assurance remains unearned. Read more

Lou Lumenick, New York Post: Even with a clever final twist straight out of "The Twilight Zone," this crummy-looking two-hander is a tough sit. Read more

Steven Rea, Philadelphia Inquirer: One of the smart, effective things about Another Earth is that it treats the discovery of a parallel planet in, excuse the pun, a down-to-earth manner. Read more

Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times: This is no less than a meditation on the infinite possible variations that a human life can take. Read more

Peter Travers, Rolling Stone: Another Earth offers imagination and provocation to spare. Read more

Colin Covert, Minneapolis Star Tribune: Cahill fails to give the preposterous story even an aura of plausibility, and the unforgivable subplot involving a dotty/enlightened old Indian school custodian is gallingly sentimental. Read more

Joe Williams, St. Louis Post-Dispatch: I was hoping that everyone involved would get hit by an asteroid. Read more

Dave McGinn, Globe and Mail: The metaphysics function as a metaphor in what's an affecting -- if slow-moving -- drama about having to live with the choices we make and our need to find redemption. Read more

Leah Rozen, TheWrap: Read more

Mary F. Pols, TIME Magazine: A metaphysical treat, with influences that range from Krzysztof Kieslowski's The Double Life of Veronique and Blue to Andrei Tarkovsky's Solaris. Read more

Nigel Floyd, Time Out: Cahill's visually inconsistent first feature tries to beam epic sci-fi concepts into a micro-human drama, refracting its thought-provoking ideas through the prism of the central emotional relationship. Read more

Peter Howell, Toronto Star: It's one of the year's best indie releases. Read more

Justin Chang, Variety: Out there, to say the least, but rescued from risibility by its well-matched lead performances and crazy low-budget ambition. Read more

Karina Longworth, Village Voice: Unable to organically incorporate their Big Ideas into the narrative, the filmmakers lazily lay them on top, leaving the exposition of Another Earth's structuring fantasy to a blanket of background voiceover. Read more

Michael O'Sullivan, Washington Post: There are a number of astronomical impossibilities here. What about gravity? What's orbiting what? And where exactly did it come from? Read more