Facts

“Prometheus” is a movie released in 2012, directed by Ridley Scott, and starring Noomi Rapace, Michael Fassbender, Guy Pearce, Idris Elba, and Charlize Theron. More about “Prometheus” on Wikipedia and IMDb.

“Europa Report”, released in 2013, stars Anamaria Marinca, Michael Nyqvist, Sharlto Copley, Daniel Wu, and others. It is directed by Ecuadorian director Sebastián Cordero. More about “Europa Report” on Wikipedia and IMDb.

 

Commentaries

If you’ve seen the movie “The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo” (the original version, not David Fincher’s remake), you’ll probably recognize the two main actors from the Swedish film in the sci-fi flicks I’ve chosen for this post. Noomi Rapace plays a space explorer in “Prometheus”, and Michael Nyqvist channels a Russian astronaut in “Europa Report”. Two movies about man’s attempt to find and understand his standing in the Universe.

“Prometheus” started off as a prequel in the “Alien” franchise… Umm, I don’t know… So, let’s talk about it as a stand-alone movie. It is the story of a group traveling through space in search for the origin of human life, or the gods/God/entities that created man.

On the other hand, “Europa Report” is future-oriented. The astronauts in this movie are on a quest to Europa, one of Jupiter’s moons, looking for the essence of life (as we know it), namely water.

There are many similarities as well as differences between these two movies, and I don’t want to give too much away about any of them. None of these movies is a masterpiece, in my opinion, but they are well made and somewhat entertaining. “Europa Report” is more somber and realistic, while “Prometheus” dives more deeply into sci-fi and imagination. And, although I liked them both, I’d still rather watch “District 9” (also featuring Sharlto Copley) or “Gravity” instead.

Bottom line

If you were to watch only one of these two movies, I’d probably recommend… “Prometheus”, only because it is more complex, and has more things going on. But if you were to see them both, I’d recommend you started with “Europa Report”, for the same reason.