Mark Reviews Movies: SETTLERS

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Review by Mark Dujsik | July 22, 2021

Humanity has made it to Mars in Settlers, but the achievement no longer matters. Human beings are capable of such tremendous accomplishments, only for them to be taken for granted. They are also capable of tremendously worse things in the name of development, expansion, or survival, and that's where civilization on the red planet is at when this story begins.

Writer/director Wyatt Rockefeller's feature debut creates an impressive world of isolation and bleakness. The story is primarily set on a Martian ranch at an unspecified point in the future. Earth has been devastated by untold disasters, either involving the climate or scarcity of resources or war or any number of other things. If life on Mars is any sign, the fate of Earth is likely some combination of some or all of those things—and more.

What we know, though, is that a family of three—made up of husband Reza (Jonny Lee Miller), wife Ilsa (Sofia Boutella), and the couple's daughter Remmy (Brooklyn Prince)—had to leave humanity's home planet. As Reza and his daughter look up at the constellations, she spots the dim, blue dot in the sky, and the father explains the parents came to Mars, because conditions on Earth had become untenable.

Remmy knows nothing of that world, except what she has learned from books and her parents' stories. She's curious about animals like whales and owls (Neither parent ever saw either of those species, and one wonders if that's because those creatures and others have gone extinct by this point), but they don't matter to the only life she knows and has to live.

Remmy was born on Mars. Her family's life consists of maintaining the few animals on this farm, conserving resources, and being careful of strangers.

If there's a noteworthy mode of and method to Rockefeller's storytelling here, it's of establishing this world and these characters through the little details of what we see—and, more significantly, the larger details that we do not know. There's a thick air of mystery to this farm and its current inhabitants, as opposed to the constantly thinning artificial atmosphere on the planet, which is essentially burning away on account of a lack of maintenance. There's doom in this place, either in the future, for certain, or much sooner, as the farm occasionally comes under attack by a trio of strangers.

What do they want? Why is the calm and confident Reza worked up into such fear and rage whenever there's a hint or a direct sign of the strangers' presence? Is this the case of scavengers or raiders looking to survive, in the same way but by different means as the family is attempting to endure on this planet, or do they have a completely different, more personal motive for terrorizing and attacking the secluded family?

Too much cannot be revealed here, not only because Rockefeller so gradually and strictly doles out information about the family's past and the strangers' goals (more specifically, one stranger), but also because there simply isn't that much information to reveal. One attack causes irreparable damage to the family and the group of apparent outsiders. The family—or what's left of it—finds themselves with a new member of the household.

He's Jerry (Ismael Cruz Córdova), a man who insists he has a right to this farm and who also assures Ilsa and Remmy that he means them no harm—unless some harm or attempt at it should come his way from the family. Jerry is stern, with a hint of the sinister, but seemingly upfront about his intentions. He can be charming, as he explains his troubled past (offering that there is more to civilization on Mars—or, better, was more to it, until human nature followed its course), and could be more so, if not for what he has done and vaguely threatens to do, should matters turn against him.

The story is divided into three, distinct acts, and for the most part, we watch events unfold from Remmy's perspective. It's the right move in a certain way, since the young girl is as much in the dark about this world, its history, the past of the farm, and what the adults around her really want as we are. What we know is that Jerry makes the family a deal: In 30 days, he'll leave his gun on a table and let Ilsa decide his fate. As the deadline approaches, Remmy is confused and angry to see the stranger and her mother seeming to arrive at a peaceful, domestic compromise.

There's a lot to admire about the slow, relaxed pace of this story. It suggests that Rockefeller is actually concerned with developing this world and examining the behavior of these characters, instead of worrying about plot conventions and contrivances. Beneath all of the world-building and mysteries involving the characters, there's something of a parable here, about what we can and do become accustomed to and/or accept—and the things that we cannot abide, no matter how desperate the situation or how dangerous the consequences may be.

In general, though, Settlers doesn't quite succeed—not because of the way Rockefeller tells this story. The story itself is simply too broad and stretched so thin that, beyond this world, it never creates a real sense of specificity.

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