Meanwhile on Earth makes no secret about its role models. The French science fiction film, which premiered in the Panorama of the Berlinale 2024, quoted from the first minute well-known greats of the fantastic genre. It takes us into the infinite expanses of space or lets us experience exciting future adventures on earth. One name in particular hovers over the film: Steven Spielberg.
Like no other director, Spielberg has shaped science fiction cinema over the past five decades, starting with Close Encounters of the Third Kind, which appeared in 1977. In it, people take over five tones makes contact with an alien spaceship that settles on a mountain in Wyoming. These five tones also sound in Meanwhile on Earth, but with much less success.
Science fiction in the Berlinale panorama: Meanwhile on Earth bows to Steven Spielberg
Where Spielberg stages the first contact with astonished and hopeful looks and refrains from destroying the world à la Independence Day, the five tones of making contact in Meanwhile on Earth become Signal of loneliness. Elsa (Megan Northam) sits outdoors in the middle of the night, looking at the stars and wanting nothing more than a sign of life from her brother Franck (Sébastien Pouderoux).
Franck, an astronaut, disappeared without a trace during a space mission three years ago. Since then, Elsa’s family has never been the same and neither has she. The life feels empty and lost. But then there is a second Spielberg film that comes to mind quite early in the first act of Meanwhile on Earth. He tells of the unexpected encounter with an alien.
ET – The Extra-Terrestrial can also be seen as a major inspiration for Jérémy Clapin’s feature film debut. So far, the French director has worked in the field of short films and animation art. Now he dives into the Sci-Fi mythologies from Spielberg and evokes a similar feeling to the coming-of-age adventure in which young Elliott meets ET in the forest.
Meanwhile on Earth: A Spielberg tribute that turns into a body-sucking nightmare
An alien who fills the void in a lonely person’s life: Where ET can be to Elliot everything his mother and father are not, Elsa is less fortunate. Although she manages to to reach an extraterrestrial species. But she just drills into her head and makes a demand before she causes a miracle. If Elsa wants to see her brother again, she will have to pay a high price.
Suddenly the gentle Spielberg homage takes a sinister turn and we find ourselves in a sci-fi nightmare of the type The demonic and the body eaters are coming. The trauma that Elsa carries with her leads her down a dark path where she becomes an accomplice to an alien force and drifts even further into loneliness – exactly the opposite of what she wants.
Ultimately, Clapin decides against the great horror abysses that lie dormant in the story. It moves in the direction of transcendent sci-fi experiences like Solaris and Interstellar. Both role models ignore logic and see the genre above all as a bridge to express strong feelings. For example, in streaming lights or cathartic montages that connect everything and nothing.
Clapin emulates his sci-fi role models on a small scale. The moments when he thoughtfully strolls through the forest with Elsa, where the astonished Spielberg faces appear, are powerful mysterious Tarkovsky crackles give way in nature. What Clapin fails to do is bring all of these individual elements together convincingly in a finale. Nevertheless, Meanwhile on Earth is definitely worth a look.
Meanwhile on Earth is screening in the Panorama of the 74th Berlin International Film Festival. The film celebrated its premiere at the Zoo Palast on Friday, February 16, 2024. A German cinema release has not yet been determined.