6. Moon (2009)
Duncan Jones’ Moon is, first and foremost, a brilliantly conceived and executed film. Starring Sam Rockwell in a dual role as two different versions of Sam Bell, the sole technician on an automated lunar mining facility. The film is almost entirely set within the confines of Sam’s personal quarters, and is largely reliant upon Rockwell’s ability to perform opposite himself.
It’s not Moon‘s story, premise, or atmosphere that makes it unsettling, however. It’s actually more about the implications of the film – there’s a burning question that runs throughout its story that spends much of Moon‘s runtime going unaddressed: which Sam Bell is the real one? How is there two of him?
The reveal that both Sams are clones who exist as property of Lunar Industries and exist for only three years before their bodies begin to decay (and are summarily incinerated). Sam’s slow realization of his predicament and the nature of his existence is dark and haunting, and provides a deeply disturbing subtext to Moon‘s story. This means that though Moon doesn’t contain any overt elements of horror, it still fills its audience with a deeply unsettling feeling of existential terror.