The great works of science fiction often use the genre to explore deeper philosophical and theological questions. With his film debut, ANOTHER EARTH, director Mike Cahill picked up on the themes of guilt, cosmic fate and second chances. In the film a young woman responsible for the death of a composer’s wife and child enables him to travel to the other Earth to see if his family is alive in an alternative reality. In I ORIGINS Cahill uses the genre to tackle questions of evolutionary theory and reincarnation by way of a meticulously constructed case study. The young scientist Ian Gray (Michael Pitt) falls in love with the eyes of Sofi, a model (Astrid Bergès-Frisbey). They start a passionate affair. In the lab he and his assistant Karen (Brit Marling) are working on the evolution of the eye when Sofi suddenly dies in an accident. Years later Gray and his team discover an eye scan in their vast database of a young Indian girl whose iris is an exact replica of his former lover. Ian is confronted with the scientific evidence for universal human connectivity via transmigration of souls and has to come to terms with this very spiritual question. He travels to India to find the eyes of his big love. Mike Cahill presents a convincing film built around scientific theories to explore conflicts between religion and science, fact and faith. In the end Cahill’s resolute consequences make the film both polemic and enriching.

Jens Mayer