Memoirs of a Survivor is a dystopia about a future Britain brought to it's knees by perpetual war with poverty, hunger and lawlessness rending society apart. Based on a novel by Doris Lessing this curious, melancholic film follows the experiences of a lonely women who discovers, weirdly, that she can move in time/space through her living room wall. After a petulant teenager gets billeted with her she's exposed to the more desperate elements in society, the futility of their predicament becomes apparent and she considers an escape to the other side of the wall. Julie Christie's understated performance holds the film together and underpins the strange atmosphere of hopelessness that pervades throughout. Not without it's flaws this is still an interesting, curious film but one that's probably not for everyone.
Another Earth intertwines the discovery of an Earth like planet wandering into our solar system and the tragic tale of a young woman, on the cusp of attending MIT, who causes a fatal car accident. After her release from prison she takes up as a janitor and seeks an escape by entering the contest to make a trip to the other planet but the tentative relationship she's built with the only other survivor gives her second thoughts. Despite the myriad of plot holes and it's slightly self-consciously downbeat atmosphere it's quite a decent watch with good performances, a mature script and the mysterious appearance of our mirror planet is carefully worked and tastefully unexplained. Made me think of Monsters a little and that's no bad thing but, as above, I doubt it'll be to everyone's tastes.
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