Dark Ecology In Annihilation
Annihilation(2018)
Director: Alex Garland
Screenplay: Alex Garland (adapted from the novel by Jeff VanderMeer)
Cast: Natalie Portman, Jennifer Jason Leigh, Tessa Thomson, Oscar Isaac.
Studio: Paramount
Genre: Sci-Fi
Runtime: 1 hr. 55 min.
Dark Ecology In Annihilation
In the movie Annihilation, directed by Alex Garland, a group of women enter a place called the Shimmer. Initially the audience sees the Shimmer as a harmful place, but as the women get deeper in the Shimmer, we see beautiful creations that seem unreal. It’s ironic that such a gloomy place, like the Shimmer, can be so colorful and beautiful. The irony in Annihilation can be related to the definition of Dark Ecology- “The irony, ugliness and horror of ecology.” The movie also seemed like dark ecology when humans were being manipulated by the Shimmer. The creatures in Annihilation were very easily connected to dark ecology through one of Tim Mortons dark ecological theories.
Tim Morton says that Dark Ecology expresses the “irony, ugliness and horror” of ecology(Morton). Dr. Ventress tells Lena that many people entered the Shimmer, but never came out, with the exception of her husband. With this information, the audience gets the impression that the Shimmer is an unpleasant area. Later in the movie, the audience finds out that the Shimmer scrambles the DNA of everything that enters it. Because of this DNA scrambling, everything inside the Shimmer becomes physically different . Some things turn beautiful, like the flowers that grew from one stem, in different colors and sizes. The animals either look really neat or horrifying, for example some deer grew antlers of glowing branches which made them look magical. On the other hand a huge bear, that ended up killing two of the girls, looked horrifying. Morton’s definition of dark ecology, as stated earlier, can be seen in the irony of the Shimmer and the horror of the creatures that were created.
In Annihilation, the characters commonly have crazy thoughts that turn them against each other. We realize a force must be making everyone go crazy, and the force is quite obviously the Shimmer, but what does this mean? Mainly, it means the Shimmer has a lot of power, because any living organism that enters the Shimmer will be modified over and over. If some force can change anything at any time, it has power! Therefore the shimmer is more superior than anything that enters it, including humans. At the end, Lena burns down the lighthouse and it seems that she defeats the shimmer. But does she become truly stronger than the Shimmer? Personally at the end I think Lena still has a part of the Shimmer inside her, the biggest hint is when her eye glows a little. This means everyone that entered the Shimmer either died or has part of the Shimmer still inside them. Therefore, any living organism in the area of the Shimmer, are non-superior to the Shimmer. Which reminds me of a statement Paul Kingsnorth made, “‘dark ecology,’ a philosophy that insists on the non-superiority of humanity”(Kingsnorth). If humans are seen as non-superior to the Shimmer how are the animals seen?
The animals in Annihilation are more-so creations than animals. In the Shimmer animals that are very different from each other, come together and create individual organisms. Like the alligator with multiple rows of teeth (normally only found in sharks). Another monster created by the Shimmer was the huge bear. The first time we saw it was on the first night, the bear drug Sheppard off into the woods leaving everyone to think that she was dead. The next night the bear appeared again, but this time it made a noise that sounded like Sheppard’s scream, when she was being pulled away. This leaves Lena, Tessa and Ventress to assume that some part of Sheppard fused with the bear when it killed her. The bear and all other genetically modified animals, are seen as Dark Ecology. Tim Morton stated “All organisms are monsters… made from pieces of other creatures”(Morton 66). Which is exactly what the bear was, multiple creatures put into one.
All in all, Annihilationresembles Dark Ecology very well in. First, because of the horrifying creatures and the ironic beauty found inside the Shimmer. It is also seen in the film, anytime humans are not superior to the Shimmer. Finally the creatures in the movie are “made from pieces of other creatures,” which expresses Dark Ecology in the eyes of Tim Morton. I think the movie shows that the world is not a perfect place and we have to look for the dark and horrifying side of ecology.
Works Cited:
Garland, Alex, director. Annihilation.Paramount 2018.
Morton, Timothy.Being Ecological. Mit Press, 2017.
Morton, Timothy. Dark Thoughts.(Could not find publisher or year)
Berry, Michael.Paul Kingsnorth Ditches False Hope for “Dark Ecology.”The national magazine of the Sierra Club. https://www.sierraclub.org/sierra/2017-5-september-october/books/paul-kingsnorth-ditches-false-hope-for-dark-ecology