We’ve been speculating about extraterrestrial life for nearly as long as we’ve been studying the stars, so it would certainly be convenient if proof suddenly appeared out of thin air. When this happens in a movie, it’s usually dramatic and definitive — aliens appear to conquer us, or work with us, or maybe just seek our help getting home. But every now and then, science fiction uses alien life to further muddy the waters and question our assumptions about our little place in the cosmos.
That’s certainly the case in Another Earth, which was released 15 years ago today and sees the sudden and dramatic appearance of a second Earth-like planet within cosmic spitting distance. Rhoda Williams (Brit Marling, more recently the co-creator, co-writer, and co-star of A Murder at the End of the World) is as interested in this revelation as anyone would be, but she soon has bigger issues. Moments after the existence of Earth 2 is announced, the 17-year-old, intoxicated after celebrating her acceptance to MIT at a grad party, slams her car into another vehicle, putting its driver in a coma and murdering his wife and young son.
