Silent Running

Umbrella Entertainment

R4 DVD

"Silent Running" is set at some future time when Earth can no longer support life and existence on earth only exists within select climate controlled domes. This environment is strictly controlled and everything and everyone is much the same. There is no unemployment or disease, but life has been reduced to a bland and predictable existence. In an attempt to save forests and animals, botanical specimens have been sent into space on various space freighters.

On one of these freighters there is a crew of four men, including botanist Freeman Lowell (Bruce Dern), who tends the plants under huge geodesic domes. Lowell is dedicated to his work, having spent the last three years fanatically focused on the survival of the forests he tends. He refuses the readymade artificial food offered onboard and only eats what is grown in the forests and views life as it has survived on earth with some distain.

For commercial reasons the crew is ordered to blow up the domes and return the freighter to commercial use. Faced with the possible extinction of the last of earth’s natural resources, Lowell does the unthinkable. He fights one of the crew and accidently kills him. This sets off a chain of events leading to him blowing up the second dome up with the other two remaining crew on board. He fabricates a tale of disaster which he transmits to headquarters and sets out on a lonely journey into space accompanied by three cute little robots named Huey, Dewey, and Louie. As the journey continues and his mental state begins to deteriorate, we experience his isolation and alienation, the remaining robots (one is lost in an accident) become humanized and he struggles to protect the forest. The climax of the story is when, against all odds, he is located by the freight company; he must make the hardest decision of all.

Silent Running was made on a limited budget by legendary filmmaker and visual effects pioneer Douglass Trumbull (2001: A Space Odyssey), who made his directorial debut with this cult sci fi classic. He later went on to create the effects for Blade Runner and Close Encounters of the Third Kind. It is quite astounding to see what Trumball's was able to do with a small budget, the special effects are very convincing, the acting is superb and the emotional tension created by the film is palpable. For many it is slow film in the sense that it focuses on one man’s experience of alienation lost in space, yet it says so much more if you look below the surface. I must admit I would have liked to see what he could have done with a large Hollywood budget.

For me, Silent Running is a fascinating and thought provoking film. Made in 1971 it does show resonances of the Sixties social revolt with some of the music being rather dated and sounding like excerpts from Hair ! At the same time the strong environmental message and the ethical questions it raises have surprising relevance today.

If you were the custodian of the last remnants of earth’s natural resources, would you kill to protect them?

In many ways this is a sobering film with a powerful sense of alienation and loneliness. Bruce Dern is impressive as Lowell and we can really emphasize with the hard decisions he has to make. Certainly Lowell is portrayed as the “stereotypical” unbalanced environmentalist and vegetarian as one may expect of the time, however, even with this bias, the environmental message is overpowering and startling clear for 1971.

On the whole Silent Running has survived the test of time remarkably well, the models still look pretty amazing and it has a visual style which still commands attention.

I found it a very sad film, showing one lone man’s quest to save the last of the earth’s natural resources even though everyone else seems to have forgotten how significant they are. Comparing it to many other sci fi blockbusters of the period I think it is a surprisingly meaningful cinematic experience.

The edition from Umbrella is a good quality transfer with a theatrical trailer.