The Island

            From Michael Bay (Dir. Bad Boys) comes this sci fi adventure rich in texture and depth, and yet relatively dependent on all that sci fi has already put forth. We find ourself in a Logan’s Run like world, maintaining civilization after the outside world has been “contaminated”. It’s peaceful, where all the inhabitants wear white, and live in innocence, awaiting a lottery that sends them to a marvelous island paradise. All they know is a base existence, exercise, work, and recreation. Lincoln Six Echo (Ewan McGregor, Shallow Grave) has lived here for three years and has recently had a series of nightmares that cause him to question the entire system.

            In addition to all the great things around them, there is also the guards who wear black, lead the by the mysterious Dr. (Sean Bean, Fellowship of the Ring). They monitor just about everything. Lincoln finds a living organism from the outside, and thanks to a friend (Steve Buscemi, Airheads) he makes his way through the tunnels to a different level of the complex. There he sees ‘winners’ of the contest who went to ‘the island’ being euthanatised, and having their organs removed.

            What’s worse is that Lincolns best friend, Jordan Two Delta (Scarlet Johannsen, Lost in Translation) has just won the lottery and is scheduled to go to the island in the morning. They soon escape and make their way to LA in attempts to tell the world what they really are: Clones. They are insurance on organs and tools for suffering. Clones can bear the babies for mothers, and then are euthanatized.

            It has so many layers, and different ways to interpret it. There is a lot of symbolism. The white and black contrast show a clear understanding of evil and good, and the Dr. is definitely a satan-character, putting himself in the place of God, masquerading as the creator, and sending forth forces to do his will, yet all the time buffeted by unseed forces that seem to direct the flow of the world.

            There is also a very Genesis like feeling, where innocence and questioning the will of what we’re presented can somehow lead to something “better” and sin is definitely portrayed in a positive light, in the same vain as in Pleasantville. This movie also raises a lot of questions about cloning, which I’m not sure how to answer biblically. Cloning isn’t anymore wrong than any other kind of science, and clones will be individuals with souls. For example, test tube babies, same principle. We cannot “program” clones, they are simply genetic twins, not literal twins. They will look and be different, by the laws of genetic variance, adaptation and such.

            This story takes much from stories like Logan’s Run, The Sixth Day, The Matrix, The Machine Stops, and many other stories like these. The acting is great, I think. I am biased, but Johannsen is wonderful, and much more beautiful than in other films, and McGregor does well in a double role, playing Lincoln Six Echo, using a flat, regionless dialect, and his Scottish counterpart, Tom Lincoln. 2. I’d watch it again, and write a paper on it.