‘The Island’ (2005) – A Decent Sci-Fi Flick

‘The Island’ – A Decent Sci-Fi Flick

‘The Island’ is a simple plot-driven sci-fi thriller but with quite a few ethical questions that remained unanswered till the end. Director Michael Bay’s idea of bringing in the near future with much-advanced developments in stem cell research and cloning of humans was quite predictable yet entertaining in its own way.

Many critics have panned this flick for its half-baked plot, but as far as entertainment is concerned, it offers you enough to spend an hour and a half with bliss. I don’t think it’s that monotonous considering I had no clue and expectation from this film. Although it leaves little suspense, it does have a fair share of romance and a lot more action scenes than expected.

The film starts with Lincoln Six Echo (Ewan McGregor) and Jordan Two Delta (Scarlett Johansson) who lives with a community of people highly monitored in an isolated compound. It is being told to the people there that the outer world has become too contaminated for human life after some sort of global unrest. The only place still inhabitable on earth is an island where people are allowed to go through a lottery system.

With no previous memory as such, those living in the guarded compound lives, a very strict life with no such fun but with a dream to leave for the island someday to experience real life. Lincoln learns in the first few minutes that there is something fishy in the environment they all live in. The truth is he and all his inmates are clones of others who live a lavish life outside this compound.

Yes, these clones are only needed when the sponsor of their DNA falls ill or needs an organ transplant. ‘The Island’ is fictional but the state when one of the clones is subjected to be killed in the wake of organ demand or any other use such as surrogate motherhood. When Lincoln gets some clue that the outside world is not really contaminated and there is no island as such, he escapes only to resist the attacks from the owner of the Biotech firm Dr. Merrick (Sean Bean).

The rest is all the usual action in Bay’s signature mark action sequence with high-end motorbikes, highway collisions, explosions, etc. Overall, ‘The Island’ is indeed watchable and you may ignore those websites that have rated this film very low. After all, movies are all about entertainment.

‘The Island’ (2005)
Directed by Michael Bay, ‘The Island’ is a science fiction thriller film starring Scarlett Johansson and Ewan McGregor. The film follows two clones who escape a doomed existence.

Directed by Michael Bay
Screenplay by Alex Kurtzman, Roberto Orci and Caspian Tredwell-Owen
Story by Caspian Tredwell-Owen
Starring: Ewan McGregor, Scarlett Johansson, Djimon Hounsou, Sean Bean, Michael Clarke Duncan, and Steve Buscemi.
Cinematography: Mauro Fiore
Release Date/Year: July 22, 2005

This post is written, edited and published by the Cinecelluloid staff.

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