Alex Garlandhas had an impressive career as a writer so far, but his directing feats don’t fall short, either.His imagination brought some of the most interesting blends of science fiction and horrorinto the world, including novels likeThe TesseractandThe Beach, which later became movies (one highly successful and the other not so much). The Beach was his first novel and the propelling force that pushed Garland into writing more excellent stories.
But Garland was able to leave a legacy in more than just the film and literary world. He also co-wrote the story for the 2010 video gameEnslaved: Odyssey to the Westand was story supervisor for the 2013 gameDmC: Devil May Cry.What makes Garland’s stories unique is the detail invested in each; more often than not, his movies are highly rewatchable, whether for the interesting theme, a shocking plot twist, or for noticing something different upon each rewatch. Since video games can only be replayed and novels re-read, here’s what film fans can expect from each of Alex Garland’s movies.
8’Never Let Me Go' (2010)
Directed by Mark Romanek, Written by Alex Garland
As one of the saddest sci-fi movies of all time,Never Let Me Gois a direct punch in the gut that questions mortality and purpose. Based onKazuo Ishiguro’s novel of the same name, directorMark Romanekrecalled in an interviewthat Ishiguro is “much more fascinated in his whole body of work, not just this book, about the ways that people tend not to run and accept their lot in life.”
Never Let Me Gois a love story revolving around Tommy (Andrew Garfield), Kathy (Carey Mulligan), and Ruth (Keira Knightley), three close friends growing up in a boarding school called Hailsham. They seemingly spend their entire lives there, learning later on that they’reclones that exist solely for the purpose of organ harvesting. In so many ways, the movie celebrates life as much as it questions it; Alex Garland’s heartbreaking script adaptation perfectly capturesthe intensity of the story’s message. However, due to the movie’s existential nature, it can be tough to rewatch often. Many who have seen it when it came out still claimNever Let Me Gois stuck in their minds.
Never Let Me Go
Never Let Me Go shows the growing up and lives of friends, Tommy, Kathy, and Ruth. They meet and bond in a traditional boarding school called Hailsham, but their lives are upturned when they realize Hailsham’s dark secret.
Watch on Apple TV
7’Sunshine' (2007)
Directed by Danny Boyle, Written by Alex Garland
The third collaboration betweenDanny Boyleand Alex Garland is the sci-fi thriller/mysterySunshine. Garland’s affinity for depicting dystopian reality is perhaps best seen in movies likeSunshineand28 Days Later. InSunshine,the story is set in 2057, when a group of scientists travel to reignite the dying Sun; it focuses on the mission as much as the scientists' mental states during their long stay in space. The talented ensemble cast includesCilian Murphy,Rose Byrne,Michelle Yeoh, andHiroyuki Sanada, among others.
Garland’s unending interest in uncovering how humanity impacts and depends on nature is best seen inSunshine, where his story literally depends on a group of experts trying to save the sun. Though there’s no direct human impact on the sun,people’s fight to save it to survive is an innate will to live and never give up. This can be terrifying and inspiring all at the same time, thoughSunshineoften toys with being the former. A heavy but also heavily entertaining thriller,Sunshineis worth the second and third rewatches.
A team of international astronauts is sent on a dangerous mission to reignite the dying Sun with a nuclear fission bomb in 2057.
Watch on Disney Plus
6'28 Days Later' (2002)
The second collaboration between Danny Boyle and Garland afterThe Beachwas the highly successful post-apocalyptic horror28 Days Later.Inspired byGeorge Romero’sNight of the Living Dead, Garland pitched Boyle with a zombie horror script, and the two collaborated oncreating the movie that seemingly propelled zombie horror back to popularity. The movie stars Cillian Murphy as Jim, a bicycle courier who wakes up from a coma after a traffic accident and realizes the world’s been overcome by a highly contagious rage virus.
Jim needs to find ways to survive while being hit with the sudden realization that nothing will ever be the same. He encounters other survivors along the way, joins forces with them, and they learn that there’s a safe zone all the way in Manchester. The beauty of28 Days Lateris just how quickly it grabs viewers' attention;it’s meant to completely put them in Jim’s shoes, who is just thrown into this new, infected worldwithout preparation or knowledge of what to do. As the reawakening feature of thezombie horror genre, this thrilling movie has a massive rewatchability factor (and because it can be relatable in a current, post-pandemic world). Together with the sequel,28 Weeks Later, this could also be excellent prep for the upcoming Boyle/Garland threequel,28 Years Later.
28 Days Later
Four weeks after a mysterious, incurable virus spreads throughout the UK, a handful of survivors attempt to find sanctuary.
5’Dredd' (2012)
Directed by Pete Travis, Screenplay by Alex Garland
Dreddsuffers from a triple problem: it’s the most underrated Alex Garland screenplay, the most underrated comic-book adaptation, and generally, aheavily underrated action movie. Ask any fan, and they’ll sayDreddis one of the best movies they’ve seen;Garland’s beautifully crafted script followed the comic book story faithfully, adding his own spin on some of the more flexible details. Paired withKarl Urban’s stellar performance as the honorable, stern, and closed-off Dredd, few people can actually find flaws in it.
Dreddis set in dystopian America, sometime in the 2080s. The East Coast is now Mega City One, a metropolis with a lot of violence.The people who can prevent and decide what to do with violent individuals are so-called judges.Dredd, as a judge, needs to train a newcomer, watch over her, and solve the violent crimes of adrug lord called Ma-Ma. Garland’s interest inDreddfirst came from the idea of writing a movie about one of the judges in the comics,Judge Death. But he realized Dredd has lots of potential, and with the help of the comic book’s creator,John Wagner, he developed a script and, according to Karl Urban,ghost-directed the movie. RewatchingDreddcould be considered a hobby for most of the comic’s fans.
Based on the comic character created by John Wagner and Carlos Ezquerra, Dredd is a sci-fi action movie that stars Karl Urban as Judge Dredd, a law enforcement officer who can commute sentences as quickly as he issues them. Set in a dystopian New York-like city called Mega-City One, Dredd is tasked with hunting down a drug lord who controls a massive 200-story apartment complex named Ma-Ma, pushing a new addictive drug called “Slo-Mo” that has become widely used in the slums.
Watch on Amazon Prime
4’Annihilation' (2018)
Directed and Written for the Screen by Alex Garland
Jeff VanderMeer’s first installment in theSouthern Reach series,Annihilation, is Garland’s sophomore directorial success.Annihilationfollows a group of all-female scientists led by the biology professor and Army soldier Lena (Natalie Portman) entering a mysterious quarantined zone called Shimmer.Shimmer is a zone where various plant species thrive and animals are heavily mutated, seemingly showing that time passes differently within that area. The group consists of various experts, from a physicist to a geomorphologist, and their goal is to reach the zone’s epicenter, a lighthouse near the coast.
Annihilationis a visual spectacle, led by a cohesive and extremely talented ensemble that, besides Portman, includesJennifer Jason Leigh,Tessa Thompson,Gina Rodriguez, andTuva Novotny.Garland’s strengths lie in spectacular world-building, bold use of color and juxtapositions, and, simply, the ability to tell a great story. Pair this with the fictional zone the Shimmer being full of secrets, andAnnihilationis better when watched again and again. Maybe evenright after reading the Southern Reach books.
Annihilation
Lena, a biologist and former soldier, joins a mission to uncover what happened to her husband inside Area X – a sinister and mysterious phenomenon that is expanding across the American coastline. Once inside, the expedition discovers a world of mutated landscapes and creatures, as dangerous as it is beautiful, that threatens both their lives and their sanity.
Watch on Paramount+
3’Civil War' (2024)
Directed and Written by Alex Garland
Garland’s latest feature film,Civil War, garnered praise and attention for a controversial storyline; its central theme is the civil war between the Eastern states led by Washington D.C., and the Western states led by Texas and California. Though this topic may not resonate with viewers outside the US,its American viewers felt the weight of a potential division between the East and Westof the country. The story isn’t told from a military or political point of view; it’s mainlytold from the perspective of war photographersand journalists covering the conflict.
Lee (Kirsten Dunst) and Joel (Wagner Moura) decide to travel together to interview and photograph the secluded US President; they’re joined by an older reporter, Sammy (Stephen McKinley Henderson),and an aspiring war reporter, Jessie (Cailee Spaeny) on a road trip through the war-riddled country. Like all the features where Alex Garland held the director’s baton,Civil Waris also visually poetic,depicting a lot of its terror and weight through captivating photography. Besides the stellar directing, the movie’s storyline is worth revisiting and studying as a parallel to current times.
In a near-future United States on the verge of civil war, a group of war journalists faces the challenge of surviving and reporting the truth. Navigating dangerous territories and conflicting agendas, they strive to reveal the complex realities of a nation divided while questioning their roles in the unfolding conflict.
Watch on Max
2’Men' (2022)
Menis Garland’s most ambitious project, story-wise. A perfect blend of folklore, horror, paranoia, and grief,Mendives deep into a woman’s psyche while depicting all the men as the same, unknown, brutal force that attacks her. The movie has several, more than interesting, moving parts, fromRory Kinnearbrilliantly portraying every single male presence in the movie to the body-horror climax that might make a viewer or two look away from the screen. It proudly carries the title of one ofthe most divisive movies of 2022, though Garland’s fans would call it on-point forhis brand of existentialismand not divisive at all.
The story revolves around Harper (Jessie Buckley), a recent widow having trouble dealing with her husband’s sudden passing. She rents a gorgeous house in a remote English villageto clear her head and seemingly get away from the trauma she’s been through. But though she runs, the trauma can’t just stay behind, and Harper is, throughout most of the movie, grieving and riddled with guilt. The visual beauty ofMenand the dozens of themes stretching throughout its duration make it a highly rewatchable film. Though critically not that well accepted,Menis still a force in folk horror that islikely to get interpreted differentlyupon every watch. In that way, Garland’s creation is more than successful—it’s eternal.
Men (2022)
A young woman goes on a solo vacation to the English countryside following the death of her ex-husband.
Watch on Hulu
1’Ex Machina' (2014)
Garland’s most famous movie is surelyEx Machina, the sci-fi thriller that took the world by storm in 2014. It washis directorial debut after nearly two decades of being a novelist/screenwriter, and it was one of A24’s biggest global hits at the time. The story follows a programmer, Caleb (Domhnall Gleeson), who wins an in-office contest to visit the secluded and secretive CEO of his company, Nathan (Oscar Isaac). Nathan’s home is an underground fort, where he lives only withhis housemaid Kyoko(Sonoya Mizuno), and where he’s developed a humanoid robot, Ava (Alicia Vikander); Nathan wishes for Caleb to perform a Turing test on Ava to see if she can speak to him with consciousness.
Caleb relates to Ava perhaps a little too much;he develops romantic feelings for her, which doesn’t suit Nathan and his further planswith Ava. Much like in Garland’s TV seriesDEVS,Ex Machinafurthers his obsession with AI; though movies about the dominance of robots have been made since the 1960s, Garland’s penchant for research and attention to detail makeEx Machinaa special, elaborate, and terrifying feature. Spotting Ava’s tells, Nathan’s strange behavior, orall the scientific experimentsandpossibilities referenced in the movieare just some of the motivators for rewatching this movie over and over again.
Ex Machina
A young programmer is selected to participate in a ground-breaking experiment in synthetic intelligence by evaluating the human qualities of a highly advanced humanoid A.I.
Watch on Prime Video
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