50 Essential Sci-Fi Films of the 21st Century (So Far)

Based on Harry Martinson’s epic poem of the same name, Pella Kågerman and Hugo Lilja’s Aniara is what might have happened if all of High Life’s budget had been poured into the material aspects of its production rather than its big-name stars.

The Swedish-language film focuses on a woman (Emelie Garbers) referred to only by an abbreviation of her job title, MR (Mimarobe; a therapist and conduit for passengers and the Mima experience machine on board), who boards a large, luxurious spaceship for a three-week journey from a dying Earth to colonised Mars. Just one week into the voyage, space debris damages the ship and drives it off course, leaving it without fuel and drifting into open space, for weeks, then months, then years, with hopes of rescue few and far between. 

While at times the picture feels like Ruben Ostlund in space, it spurns humour and irreverence, instead using its doomed voyage to show stages of societal breakdown and reformation, mirroring the themes of the original poem, in which science and poetry collide, leaving so many questions. Kågerman and Lilja also sidestep the obvious class critique by choosing to focus less on hierarchies of wealth and influence, and more on the shifting psycho-social dynamics of the passengers as their journey progresses, they lose hope, and they seek salvation.