This movie is truly something special. I haven't really seen anything as trippy and frightening. Despite the horror I feel like I want to return. Portman does a great job aswell as her co-actors and the all female setup is great for many reasons. The action is really well weighted.
As a medical doctor, thinking a bit, I came to the conclusion that this movie is a metaphor for cancer.
In my opinion, the border of the shimmer represent the outer border of a tumor. The meteor hitting earth giving rise to the shimmer could represent how ionizing radiation can hit us and give rise to cancer. A tumor is slowly growing, so is the shimmer. Inside a tumor everything is constantly changing and mutating as in the shimmer. Cells in a tumor acquires new abilities and functions in a lot of biological mechanisms to survive "attacks" from ex chemoagents or defense mechanisms from the host, just as in the shimmer where the different human groups entering the shimmer would represent immune system responses trying to understand and fight it. The plant-woman succombing to the shimmer right after she accepts her fate would represent how people with cancer at some point often accepts death and often soon after passes away. Finally the clone-Kane would represent metastasis, cancer cells from the tumor popping up in a completely different place/organ, and changed-Lena (w tattoo) escaping the shimmer as it is destroyed would be a metaphor for how when a cancer is eradicated there are often cancer cells left that in time can create a relapse.
As a medical doctor, thinking a bit, I came to the conclusion that this movie is a metaphor for cancer.
In my opinion, the border of the shimmer represent the outer border of a tumor. The meteor hitting earth giving rise to the shimmer could represent how ionizing radiation can hit us and give rise to cancer. A tumor is slowly growing, so is the shimmer. Inside a tumor everything is constantly changing and mutating as in the shimmer. Cells in a tumor acquires new abilities and functions in a lot of biological mechanisms to survive "attacks" from ex chemoagents or defense mechanisms from the host, just as in the shimmer where the different human groups entering the shimmer would represent immune system responses trying to understand and fight it. The plant-woman succombing to the shimmer right after she accepts her fate would represent how people with cancer at some point often accepts death and often soon after passes away. Finally the clone-Kane would represent metastasis, cancer cells from the tumor popping up in a completely different place/organ, and changed-Lena (w tattoo) escaping the shimmer as it is destroyed would be a metaphor for how when a cancer is eradicated there are often cancer cells left that in time can create a relapse.