The story idea of The Last Days on Mars is superficially similar to this year’s Europa Report: a manned mission to another planet runs into complications. But Last Days on Mars is a much more artistically limited film, possessing none of the depth of ideas, the sense of exploration and history, the masterfully efficient character development, or the realism of Europa Report.

Instead, Last Days on Mars is more of straight horror film, set in space, kind of like Ridley Scott’s Alien. But I liked Last Days on Mars a lot better than Alien. It’s one hell of an exciting movie, and even though the “monster” part of the narrative didn’t make much sense, the rest of the movie actually seemed pretty realistic. All the acting is quite good (it’s great to see Olivia Williams getting some work!), the film is paced well, the dialog is not bad, and the narrative is consistently interesting.

If you want an edge-of-your-seat thriller that is fairly intelligent, well-acted, and not too much of a “gross out,” I would give Last Days on Mars a whirl. I found it a lot of fun.