Crater (PG), on Disney+
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Caution: potential spoilers.
Sometimes when I'm watching something, I think to myself, "It all depends on how it ends" with regard to how I'm going to rate it. And that certainly turned out to be true with this one. I think for the early part of the movie I would have rated it one and some fraction smileys, but for most of the movie I thought probably two smileys. By the end, though, my estimation of the movie's merits was up to three smileys. But then, I'm just a bit of a sucker for... well, the kind of plot point this movie had as an ending.
It's set on the Moon in 2257. There have been mining operations there for generations, and many people who live and work there have never been to Earth. People sign 20-year contracts to work in the mines before being sent to a colony planet called Omega, in another star system, but the company keeps adding time to the contracts so that most miners live their whole lives on the Moon. (And it seems like if you were born there, you have no choice but to sign a contract when you turn 18.) The trip to Omega takes 75 years on a sleeper ship, during which passengers will be in cryogenic suspension, and not age. Anyway, the story focuses on four teenage boys who have lived their whole lives on the Moon, and one teenage girl who only recently moved from Earth to the Moon. The central character is Caleb, whose mother died seven years ago, and whose father died just recently, apparently in a mining accident. Because of this, he is going to be sent to Omega, even though he doesn't want to leave his friends and the only home he's ever known. Before he can leave, there's a lockdown due to an impending meteor shower, which is supposed to last like three days. He and his friends Dylan, Borney, and Marcus decide to use that time to steal a rover and go to a crater that Caleb's father always wanted him to visit (though he never told Caleb what he would find there, so it's a mystery). In order to get the rover, they need some security codes, so they ask the new girl, Addison (Mckenna Grace), to get them from her father. (How she actually gets the codes, I have no idea. It doesn't seem like he'd have any reason to tell her what they are, but whatever.) But she helps the boys only on the condition that she get to go with them on their excursion.
I don't want to spoil any details of the trip, or what they find in the crater. But over the course of the next couple days, we get to know more about all the kids. And Addison becomes friends with them. Borney was hoping to find treasure, and what they find is a sort of treasure, I suppose. It's a treasured experience, that makes the whole trip worthwhile. In fact the whole trip was a treasured experience, despite a few dangers. But what they found in the crater was some pretty neat icing on the cake, with an extra poignant discovery for Caleb. And then... the meteor shower finally hits. (That's one of the dangers I mentioned.) It's unclear if they'll make it back to the dome alive, but spoiler alert! They do. We don't actually see them get back, but we do learn of their survival in a dramatic way, the nature of which which I won't spoil. I'll just say I liked how the movie ended. I liked it a lot, and I think it helped increase my appreciation of all the events that preceded the ending. So I'm really glad to have seen the movie.