Spoiler Alert! Please watch the movie before reading this as it will divulge critical details about the plot, characters and film.

All images courtesy of Netflix

This post highlights my opinions of the film and isn’t considered a review as I am not a “professional movie reviewer” and I find movies to be more like art that may or may not appeal to different audiences.

Overview

Stowaway was released in April 2021, produced by Netflix and released on Netflix and Amazon Prime Video depending on the region that you live. I live in Canada so it was only available on Amazon Prime Video. It stars Anna Kendrick, Daniel Dae Kim, Shamier Anderson and Toni Collette who all gave accurate representations of the behaviors I believe persons with similar personalities in similar situations would manifest. I am a big fan of Sci-Fi shows and movies and this would technically fall in that category but it does touch heavily on issues of morality, self-preservation and sacrifice in ways that a documentary of an underwater or mountain climbing disaster could have. The earlier parts of the film are somewhat slower at the focus is on story building and setting up the characters for the faster pace that occurs towards in the latter parts.

Character Development and Storyline

We are presented with snippets of each character’s past to give us an idea of who they are. When Marina is brought to tears while on calls with the persons on earth because of the options available, it helps to create the sense of a tough leader forced to make a hard call as opposed to a heartless individual that cares only about herself. While it is uncertain if she would have allowed Zoe’s plan to occur if the second half of David’s “stash” had not died, we do know that she cared about the crew as a whole and was trying to have as many return to earth as possible without taking risks that could result in no one returning.

The film did a great job of showing the grief that David felt when his research has to be destroyed to help the crew to survive. The priceless expression shown when he understands that there are no other options, the previous few years of work along with the next two years would all be in vain but that survival of the immediate crew was a more important cause will be difficult to forget. It also highlights the logical but harsh thought processes you would expect from a scientist when he hands Michael a way to end things quickly. This also highlights the painful truth of the human psyche and the idea of choosing someone to sacrifice if a sacrifice must be made. The thought of sacrificing himself doesn’t occur to him but the film also didn’t appear to address if he would have been critically needed for the rest of the crew to return to earth. However, this is realistically expected from a man that left his wife alone for two years to pursue a great cause while also knowing that he would have had challenges with the nausea the spinning required to create artificial gravity.

Michael appears to have been given a fairly raw deal as the premise for the film. We learn of the history he has growing up with his sister and the loss of their father. The film repeatedly addresses the question “Did he stowaway intentionally?”. Given that he immediately wanted to return to earth and would also not want his sister to re-enter a foster home if he were to no longer be her legal guardian, it is highly unlikely that stowed away intentionally. A paid caretake was arranged for his sister which addresses the though of “does he actually have a sister?”. His immense grief on the discovery that he will likely need to be sacrificed for the others was expected and did not turn into a hostile threat to the crew. This behavior would not have been believable if the background was not previously setup. That background also made the sad but logical willing to sacrifice very believable.

Zoe’s history with the beach incident goes a long way to establish the optimism that she has throughout the film and Anna Kendrick does a brilliant job portraying the despair and loss of that optimism when the air canister is lost returning to the ship. Her willingness to sacrifice is not unbelievable as her character is portrayed with quite a bit of compassion and while we assume she has living family members on earth waiting for her return, they are not in any way mentioned to create confusion. Marina does hint at the guilt that the crew members could feel which would affect their function as a crew member and Zoe likely concluded that the pain of the guilt associated with sacrificing a crew member would far exceed the anguish of sacrificing herself.

Technical Accuracy

While watching the scenes of retrieving the oxygen canisters, I at first could not grasp why they were dealing with “gravity “while on a space walk but it was established earlier in the film that the spinning of the ship created the artificial gravity. While this is logical, space or Sci-Fi films rarely portray gravity out in space and given that I never completed physics in school, I am unable to comment further.

I do get the impression that space launches and the preparation required are highly organized so it is difficult to understand how a staff member could accidentally be stowed in the ship with no one realizing he was missing and someone screwing the panel shut with him inside given the tight fit. I suspect these are the reasons why the film steered away from attempting to provide a logical reason.

Cinematography

I am a great fan of cinematography in general and “good cinematography” can be debatable. The directory of photography was Klemens Becker. He has done many projects including United 93 and the Bourne Supremacy. I sometimes find that with low budget films, I notice issues in camera movement or lens selection that either come across as mistakes or a highly distracting choice. This is not a low budget film and as expected I found the cinematography non-distracting, shots appropriately framed and camera movement was smooth or nervous to be in line with the nature of the scene.

Conclusion

I found the film quite enjoyable, but I will be the first to say I am biased towards Sci-Fi related films in general. However, I do wish a logical reason for Michael being stowed away was presented. I guess we could consider the ending ambiguous, but if you have watched enough Sci-Fi films, Zoe’s death is certain and actually showing it would have been graphic and potentially created an ending similar to that of a graphic satiric horror film. This would have distracted from the emotion that was created by the idea of the sacrifice Zoe was making but I can’t say with any certainty if that was the reason the film concluded with what may have been considered an anti-climatic end.

Opinion rating: 8/10

If you have watched the film, let me know what you thought and if you have a different perspective or completely disagree, please feel free to leave a comment below: