I imagine what the “me” would be like if there was another Planet Earth. A me that has the same looks, the same familial background, the same set of skills, inclinations, encounters, maybe even opportunities. Basically the same everything, only leading a different life because at some distinct point in our parallel lives, she made a different decision.
I think about all the turning points in my life, all the forks in the road that I faced, all the paths that I chose over the other based on sheer instinct. I think about these and I wonder which paths did she not take, and if the decisions she made led her to a different outcome. I wonder if her life is better or worse.
“Another Earth” is a story about a bright and ambitious teenage girl living at a time a duplicate planet Earth was discovered. On the night she got accepted at MIT for college, in her euphoria and drunkenness, she crashed into another’s car, killing a man’s pregnant wife and their son. Four years after she got out of jail, without much of a plan and with very little options available for convicted felons, she pretended to work for a housecleaning service company “Maid in Haven” and offered to give free house cleaning services to the man she injured, whose life had rapidly deteriorated after he lost his wife and kid. Just when she felt love and retribution from the man whose life she nearly destroyed, she won a highly coveted ticket to Planet Earth 2.
If you’re looking for answers, you won’t find one in this movie. (And no, you won’t see any cool intergalactic computer graphics.) On one side, the movie seems to be about regret, about wondering what life would have been if at one point in your life, you made the right decision. But more than regret, the story is about second chances, what it takes to get it and what would you not give to get it. It’s about forgiveness, whether it’s worth asking for even if you know you won’t get it. It’s a story about salvation, whether it’s here, in another life, or perhaps, if possible, in another planet.
