I’ve recently become aware of something terribly obvious in the realm of storytelling. All you need to tell a good story is a good story. Plain and simple. I’ve gotten caught up in new-age concepts, explosive set pieces and kitschy dialogue. It’s easy to do that when you’re working in the sci-fi genre. At the root of it all, there needs to be something compelling that latches onto human emotions, an internal conflict as much as an external conflict. Whether your fictitious science dishes out aliens or superpowers or evil-doing spirits, the situation needs to propel the characters to some sort of understanding of themselves and their lives.

With that, I present to you the trailer for Mike Cahill’s “Another Earth”, a film I believe accomplishes this very idea. Sure, we’re dealing with something very science-fiction-y in the fact that humanity discovers another planet in our solar system exactly like our own. But, the basis of the entire story rests on the very human conflict that arises between the two protagonists. I can’t wait to see it. Moreover, I can’t wait to get back to telling stories of my own.