Un-Bio-lievable! Why ‘Biosphere’ is the Most Wildly Unconventional Climate Movie Ever
You might think that two guys stuck inside a dome for a whole movie would get pretty old, pretty quick. But you’d be wrong.
good.film
2 years ago
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Why should I see Biosphere?
It skewers male relationships in a thoughtful way - but strap in for one of the most bizarre twists you’ll ever see at the movies.
What social causes does the film explore?
Earth & Environment, Science & Technology, Female Empowerment
We’re no doomsday preppers, but there’s something appealing about “end of the world” movies, no? You can’t help but think, what would I do in this situation, fighting a plague… or the apocalypse… or that weird zombie fungus? What would I do to survive?
The best ones are driven by just a handful of characters; sometimes just a heroic pair that we instinctively want to see succeed. In The Road, it was father and son on the run from cannibals. The Last of Us had a father-figure protecting his teenage ward from a catastrophic biohazard. And who could forget the relationship of the Avalon’s only two Passengers? Strangers, turned lovers, turned “EWWW, you woke me up on purpose, you creepy sex pest?!?!”
Now it’s Biosphere’s turn. It’s the feature length debut of female writer-director-producer Mel Eslyn, who managed to shoot the entire production in a mindblowing 14 days. “Mel ran a tight ship,” confirms This is Us lead actor Sterling K. Brown. “It was 100 pages, so we were flying. We shot it real real fast.”
If you like SKB and The Morning Show’s Mark Duplass, you’re in luck, because they’re the only faces we see in the entirety of Biosphere (unless you count their fish - do fish have faces? - or a fun throwback to Mel Gibson and Danny Glover bickering on the dome’s DVD player).
Don’t let that “only two actors” thing put you off, though, because both are outstanding in roles that see them run the gamut from joyous to drained, hopeful to terrified, and very, very sexually confused. No matter what you think happens in Biosphere, we can promise you this: it doesn’t turn out the way you expect.
What is Biosphere about?
As you might’ve gathered so far, childhood pals Billy (played by Duplass) and Ray (Brown) live in a dome. Like, full time. Sealed shut. One of those “never popping out to the shops” kind of domes. Because an unnamed apocalypse has ruined the atmosphere and wiped out nearly all of humanity - and it was kiiiinda Billy’s fault.
Billy just happens to be the ex-President of the United States, and we guess you could say he made a few rash decisions. But his life-long mate (and former Presidential science advisor) Ray doesn’t hold it against him. Well, much. They've hunkered down together in a drab but fully self-sufficient biosphere, engineered by Ray to keep them alive. Stuck with each other, processing their trauma together, forever - but alive.
“Biosphere is hilarious and earnest, a thought experiment about gender and masculinity and (straight) male relationships in microcosm, tossing two cis Western men in the pressure cooker of environmental collapse.” ~ IndieWire
They play Super Mario. They read Shakespeare. They tend to their hydroponic crops and recirculating fish pond. They play-fight over who gets the first shower and the rules for masturbating without grossing each other out. Life in the dome is pretty mundane… until their last female fish dies of old age, leaving behind just two dude fish. With no ability to procreate, Billy and Ray’s delicate ecosystem (and only source of protein) teeters on the brink of collapse. Panic mode: initiated.
Then, something wondrous occurs. One of the male fish undergoes a surprise transformation. Ray pulls an all-nighter, fueled by curiosity (and awful coffee), and hits upon sequential hermaphroditism. Translation? In a crisis, some species can completely flip their sexuality in order to breed. It’s a ‘break glass in case of emergency’ way of keeping their species going.
The next morning, Ray’s beyond excited to share the news to a shellshocked Billy - but it turns out Ray’s not the only one who’s made a surprising biological discovery. And Billy’s not just the ex-President anymore.
The rest of our Guide contains MAJOR SPOILERS for Biosphere, so only read on if you want to break the seal!
So what’s the big twist in Biosphere… and what does it mean?
To his horror, Billy finds he’s got more in common with their fish than just their living arrangements. He’s undergoing sequential hermaphroditism too. His penis shrinks, his breasts swell up and his scrotum begins to separate along the perineal raphe (“it’s the seam on your sack”, Ray helpfully explains, after examining Billy’s transformation with a blend of scientific precision and utterly human wonder).
Forgive us for the spoiler, but really, there’s no way to discuss the territory that Biosphere delves into next without sharing Billy’s beautiful blossoming. Because all kinds of questions and themes arise from it, and their close relationship is both tested and grows far deeper as a result.
What does Biosphere have to say about male bonding and sexuality?
Part of Biosphere’s great “just go with it” rationale is that Billy’s sudden transition isn’t explained, nor does it need to be. This isn’t Spider-Man or The Incredible Hulk; there’s no radioactive spider bite or accidental blast of gamma rays behind this thought exercise.
It’s also not played for cheap laughs, like an old sketch show might, with Billy suddenly skipping through meadows in lipstick and heels (for background, director Mel Eslyn is queer; producer Zackary Drucker has a long history of trans activism). Sure, the film presents us with a “what if?” that’s preposterous - but if you simply accept it, the questions that bubble up are wonderfully thought-provoking.
“Originally, Mark came to me with a very simple idea… My first thought was ‘Of course the last two people on Earth are men’! I loved the idea and I wanted to put the female spin on that, and really analyse all you could do with the last two men on Earth. We dove deep into male toxicity, gender politics and the science of it all.” ~ writer/director Mel Eslyn
Is Billy now a woman? He confesses that he “still feels like a man” but with an added dimension. Ray asks Billy how he feels when he gets his first period, and he replies, “It felt powerful.” He’s not taking the piss - it’s played straight, and it lands.
The pair are soon forced to confront how the subtle changes that happen in their lifestyle have big impacts on their relationship. They usually jog in circles or wrestle to keep fit and maintain their emotional bond, but Billy’s new breasts make jogging painful - and it’s not as if there’s any sports bras lying around (or a Lorna Jane around the corner). When Ray inadvertently touches Billy’s breast and gets an erection, he’s freaked out by the implication that his best buddy’s body could turn him on.
Again, this all might sound like a recipe for a stupid fratboy locker-room movie. It’s not. Credit definitely has to go to Duplass and Brown here, who really nail conveying the storyline with a surprisingly heartfelt gravity when it could’ve easily come across as silly - or worse, disrespectful and offensive.
“We're not invited to gawk at these men under glass and laugh at them; we're invited to be embedded with them, sharing in their joys, sorrows, and their evolving, remarkable reality. Together, they are deeply committed, and so pull us in to marvel at every moment of its tale of fragile hope.” ~ Mashable
With Billy seemingly fertile, a new conundrum arises: shouldn’t they attempt to procreate? That’s why their fish changed, after all. Is this their chance to continue the species, even in the smallest of ways? As a friend (and straight male), Ray is revulsed by the idea of impregnating Billy. But as a scientist, he’s forced to admit that the idea is too fascinating to pass up.
There’s a whole string of variables that, if you’ll excuse the pun, are born out of this idea. Assuming a pregnancy could even flourish, is it ethically sound to bring a child into a world they could never explore? (This writer’s head went straight to Room, the heartbreaking Oscar-winner about a young mother held captive, raising her son entirely in a bunker).
Could Billy even give birth safely, Ray wonders? Billy says he thinks the baby would be fine, but Ray prods back with “It’s not the baby I’m worried about, dummy.” It’s a reminder of the 30+ year relationship they share, and the existential dread that Ray would face if he was forced to live out the rest of days in the Biosphere alone.
“Biosphere takes a gentle axe to the idea that transgender identity is something new… it dodges the emphasis on pain in so many trans narratives by using genre to tell a far more ambiguous and fanciful story.” ~ Gay City News
Before all that, though, comes the… uhhhh, logistical question of how a pregnancy would be conceived in the first place - and it provides the true dramatic crux of the film. Billy is open-minded enough to suggest (even though he’s also straight) that they conceive the baby naturally, to which Ray reacts with anger and a flash of violence.
It emerges that Ray was raised with a strict, homophobic father who ingrained a lasting trait of latent homophobia in his son. It’s a fascinating emergence of the theme of toxic masculinity that, up to that point, Biosphere had sweetly managed to avoid with two progressive characters. So, while Billy is the one experiencing a profound physical transformation, it’s Ray that is forced to confront an emotional one.
What are critics saying about Biosphere?
- “The best 2023 movie you just might overlook.” | MASHABLE
- ”Weird and unconventional and literally like nothing like you’ve seen before. Its exploration of masculinity is authentic and hilarious.” | BLACK GIRL NERDS
- “Wildly funny, inventive, and thoughtful, ‘Biosphere’ is one of the best original comedies in recent memory.” | DEEP FOCUS REVIEW
- ”Smart, different, creative and with a twist that no-one will see coming. Brilliant springs to mind.” | SUBCULTURE ENTERTAINMENT
Fully on board, or disagree big time? We’d love to hear your take. Leave a review to share your thoughts with the good.film community!
So what’s the takeaway from Biosphere?
For all its layered messaging, you can bet that in years to come Biosphere will colloquially go down as “that dome movie where the guy flips genders.” But to squeeze the movie down to that overly broad nutshell does an injustice to the poignant points it has to make.
“It felt right, telling this story about two men dealing with their own toxic masculinity,” writer-director Mel Eslyn said in a recent interview. “I loved the idea of a female voice being the driving storyteller there. My hope for Biosphere is that people have an eye-opening experience and find a little more comfort in exploring how they define themselves.”
Producer Zachary Drucker echoes that thought, saying “I wish there were more men in a state of imagination of what it would be like to carry a child. This space has been addressed in film in comedic ways, but not in thoughtful ways.”
“Biosphere is about transformation and hope. Whether or not you consider it to be an allegory about facing down the existential threat of climate change from fossil fuels, this film ends with an ambiguous yet optimistic resonance.” ~ Collider
We love to shine a light on lesser-seen movies at good.film - so often, it’s the independent stories that have something truly new to say. Having said that, there’s certain concessions Biosphere makes that a production with more cash to splash could probably have avoided. But then again, if this were a Hollywood studio film, would they have dared to push the story into such surreal territory?
While its bizarre baby-daddy biotwist might share DNA with Schwarzenegger’s 1994 romp Junior, the probing questions that underpin Biosphere put it in a different league. Placing a far-fetched scenario into the hands of grounded characters, Mel Eslyn gives us permission to ponder the unthinkable. We might be locked into one location, but our minds are free to roam.
