When two strangers arrive at night, seeking refuge from a cyberattack that grows more terrifying by the minute, it forces everyone to come to terms with their places in a collapsing world.

The superb script, delightful photography direction, and impeccable acting by the main actors, including Julia Roberts (Amanda) and Ethan Hawke (Clay), who play a couple that decides to take their two children on a weekend trip to Long Island in a luxury house, and Mahershala Ali (G.H.) and Myha’la (Ruth), who portray a father and his daughter forced to live as guests in their own house, rented by Amanda and Clay.

After the internet and telephone lines are completely cut off, surprising events occur, each time adding a layer of complexity to the plot. The forced cohabitation between the two families brings out various tensions.

As the world of the protagonists collapses, we try to understand what is happening to them and wonder what could happen in the real world.

The film is produced by Higher Ground Productions, the company founded by former US president Barack Obama and his wife Michelle, and can be interpreted in many ways.

If we interpret the story from the present social situation, one might think the movie shows the tragic eruptions of destruction of a society that ignored the universal principle to “treat others the way you would like to be treated” and promoted individualism and competition as the highest values.

The film shows the great paradoxes of our time, where mobile phones, the internet, and social networks regulate our communication with the world and others. However, once these forms of communication fail, people are completely isolated and cannot engage in real communication with one another because they come from an individualistic society and have learned not to trust each other.

It is also interesting to notice the lack of fit between the roles the main characters are living in and the new world they are thrown into. Many of the tactics the characters use to navigate their lives are ineffective and generate more problems in this new situation.

But amid apocalyptic events and growing concerns, the characters question themselves and realize that they are not enemies nor in competition with one another, and they start to trust each other.

From the various sites the characters visit, we clearly understand that where there is suspicion between people, things become more chaotic and violent in this new environment.

What’s frightening and captivating about dystopian films is that they are not far from reality.  But today, I believe that the world also needs urgently positive Utopians, utopic images of an open future, utopian ideas that may create new possibilities and new opportunities.

The film is adapted from the 2020 novel of the same name by Rumaan Alam, Leave the World Behind, and is available on Netflix.