With images that recall Marco Ferreri's The Seed of Man, Solveig Nordlund's adaptation of the J.G. Ballard's short story of the same name, is a quiet and haunting science fiction drama that bucks the trend of apocalyptic storytelling by ending on a more hopeful note than some other films dealing with the same topic. In the near future, human civilization has started to collapse, with people unable to give birth to anything other than mutated babies known as "zotes". Europe is under control of the semi-fascist "Federation", replete with its own salutes and slogans ("We believe in the future"). The film follows a low-level Federation bureaucrat Andre, and his wife Judith, as they go on a trip to a remote seaside town to await the birth of Judith's child. Though the doctors have assured that the baby will be normal, Judith begins to have doubts, and becomes increasingly convinced that she is going to give birth to some kind of monster. Shot in an elegant color palate, with smooth, graceful shots, the film movies along at an elliptical pace, almost like the waves washing up against the shore and receding back. There are no overt attempts on the part of Nordlund to be "profound", a problem which plagued her earlier film, Nelio's Story. The lack of bombast and fallback on genre cliches lends Low-Flying Aircraft a rather moody and realistic tone. While watching it I found myself drifting in and out of awareness for my surroundings; imagine Brian Eno's ambient music rendered in cinematic form. Perhaps this is more a film about new beginnings than it is about the end.
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