The Bearded Trio

ANNIHILATION Starring Natalie Portman, Jennifer Jason Leigh,  Gina Rodriguez, Tessa Thompson, Tuva Novotny  and Oscar Isaac based on the novel by Jeff VanderMeer Screenplay by Alex Garland Directed by Alex Garland Reviewed by Patrick & Paul Gibbs  Out of Four Despite the cerebral, Kubrickian, hard core science fiction feel of writer-director Alex Garland's brilliant thriller  Ex Machina , it's hard not to go into a science fiction film called Annihilation  that is marketed with images of people walking into the jungle with machine guns and not expect something more in the vein of Aliens than 2001: A Space Odyssey. Consequently, some audiences are going to be pretty unhappy with the cerebral, deep science and existential nature of this film, and that is understandable. But if you're prepared for something different and you don't mind a movie a movie being more than a little weird, there's a lot to be said for Garland's adaptation of ...