MEANWHILE ON EARTH. Sci-fi reminiscent of “Donnie Darko”

Meanwhile on Earth is an ambitious science fiction film with philosophical undertones that collapses under the weight of stylistic chaos and moral ambiguity.

Elsa lives with her parents and younger brother in the French countryside. Though the twenty-something woman once dreamed of studying at a prestigious art school in Paris and becoming a professional illustrator, she instead chose to work as a caregiver in a nursing home run by her mother. Several years earlier, Elsa’s beloved brother, astronaut Franck, disappeared without a trace during a space mission—a loss that haunts her not only through painful memories but also through the statue of Franck erected on a traffic island by the local authorities. One night, while stargazing, Elsa suddenly hears her missing brother’s voice. Soon after, thanks to a glowing seed-like implant in her ear, she establishes telepathic contact with an alien entity. The bodiless extraterrestrial makes her a chilling offer: she will see Franck again if she helps facilitate an invasion. The task is simple—within three days, she must lure five people to a designated spot in the woods and abandon them to the aliens.

Jérémy Clapin studied at L’École nationale supérieure des arts décoratifs in Paris and worked as a graphic designer and illustrator. In 2004, he directed his first animated short, Une histoire vertébrale. His second short film, Skhizein (2008), premiered at the Cannes Film Festival and was nominated for a César Award. Clapin’s breakthrough came with his feature-length animated film I Lost My Body (2019), a surreal adaptation of Guillaume Laurant’s novel Happy Hand, about a severed hand escaping from a lab to reunite with its body. Unexpectedly, the film became an international hit, earning numerous awards and nominations—including an Oscar nod, though it ultimately lost to Josh Cooley’s Toy Story 4 (2019). Meanwhile on Earth (Pendant ce temps sur Terre) is Clapin’s second feature film and his first live-action work, though it still contains several animated sequences.

Clapin attempts to make his mark on the sci-fi genre, but his film is a patchwork of ideas borrowed from other works. The concept of alien abductions and human replacements with perfect copies echoes Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956) by Don Siegel and its later remakes. Hearing voices, the countdown to a pivotal moment, and themes of self-sacrifice are reminiscent of Richard Kelly’s Donnie Darko (2001). The notion of people being lured to their doom by extraterrestrials brings to mind Jonathan Glazer’s Under the Skin (2013). Meanwhile, the idea of communicating with loved ones trapped in space or another dimension evokes Christopher Nolan’s Interstellar (2014). Clapin blends these elements with family drama, psychological thriller, body horror, and even brutal revenge cinema (complete with a chainsaw!). Yet his genre-hopping feels shaky and unconvincing—less a testament to his erudition than to his indecisiveness.

The film’s plot functions as a dark inversion of the classic trolley problem: Elsa must decide whether to sacrifice five people in order to save just one. At first, she accepts the aliens’ offer, but as the deadline approaches, she begins to have doubts. When she ultimately decides to spare the final “candidate” and offer herself instead, Clapin’s moral stance becomes clear—unlike his perspective on the film’s broader events. If everything truly happened as depicted, the film’s ending is both ethically and emotionally dishonest: Elsa finds inner peace and acceptance of her loss, despite having been complicit in the deaths of four people. But if the entire story is merely a product of her imagination—whether a dream, hallucination, or psychotic episode—then her actions carry no real consequences, rendering her decisions meaningless. Both interpretations are equally plausible, and both undermine the film’s impact. A third option? Nowhere to be found.