Settlers (2021)

Settlers is the kind of science fiction that earns its wonder through restraint: a small patch of Mars, a fragile pocket of air, and the unnerving realization that civilization is just a thin membrane stretched over human need. Wyatt Rockefeller stages this frontier nightmare with austere, confident visuals and a slow, tightening tension that makes every silence feel loaded, while Sofia Boutella and Ismael Cruz Córdova bring bruised, believable complexity to characters who can’t afford easy choices. Told in three chapters, it becomes less about gadgets and more about what survival does to a family when the horizon offers no help and trust is the rarest resource. Fair warning: it’s bleak and includes disturbing threat and violence, but if you’re drawn to intimate, idea-driven sci-fi that lingers in the mind, this one sinks in like Martian dust and doesn’t shake off easily.

Settlers is clearly aiming for a grim, intimate survival story on Mars—more psychological pressure cooker than sci-fi adventure—and it does create an eerie sense of isolation with a strong central setup. The problem is it moves at a stubbornly slow, solemn pace, and the storytelling can feel thin and frustrating, asking you to fill in emotional and narrative gaps that the film doesn’t always earn. Characters are kept at an arm’s length, so if you need clear motivations, momentum, or catharsis, this may feel like two hours of simmering tension that never fully boils over. If you’re up for a bleak, unsettling slow-burn with disturbing threat (including sexual violence) and can appreciate atmosphere over plot, it has its moments; otherwise, it’s likely to test your patience.