Gattaca (1997)

reviewed by
David Sunga


Review: Gattaca (1997)
Rating: 3.0 stars  (out of 4.0)
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Key to rating system:
2.0  stars         Debatable
2.5 stars        Some people may like it
3.0 stars        I liked it
3.5 stars        I am biased in favor of the movie
4.0  stars        I felt the movie's impact personally or it stood out
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A Movie Review by David Sunga
Directed by:
Andrew Niccol
Written by:
Andrew Niccol

Starring: Ethan Hawke, Uma Thurman, Jude Law, Loren Dean, and Alan Arkin

Ingredients: Futuristic corporate world where genetics determines promotion, impersonator who bucks the system, girlfriend, murder

Synopsis: In a world which lacks emotion or real relationships, Vincent (Ethan Hawke), a nearsighted young man with a heart condition, dreams of being selected for a manned space mission. Unfortunately, Vincent lives in a futuristic world with a rather cruel social system - - where society is based completely on DNA testing. The world is robotic, cold fish, and corporate; well-dressed crowds of people file behind desks in long, neutral office rooms after going through a series of DNA detection machines. In order to accomplish his astronaut dream, normal guy Vincent impersonates someone genetically perfect, since only genetically enhanced people can get white collar jobs.

As the movie starts, Vincent is only moments from being selected for the space mission of his dreams. He's wearing a dark suit, and everyone calls him Jerome. Through a flashback and voice narration Vincent explains to us that he is not really Jerome. He is an imposter who is impersonating Jerome. He has risen through the ranks with the help of the real Jerome (Jude Law), a wheelchair-bound genetically enhanced person who is bitter at the system. (When an accident left him paralyzed and no longer elite, Jerome soon found he didn't like the system.) To spite the system, Vincent and Jerome have joined forces in an elaborate charade. Vincent has been impersonating Jerome, while Jerome has been supplying the blood, urine, fingernail and hair clippings, etc. needed in order to fool DNA testing. If they can manage the charade for just one more week, Vincent will accomplish his dream of participating in a manned mission to one of Saturn's moons.

Unfortunately, when one of the directors at Vincent's workplace is murdered and police are crawling all over the facility, all it takes to discover Vincent and Jerome's secret is an eyelash, a hair, a touched door handle, a print on a glass or a bit of saliva in the wrong place. Soon the innocent Vincent (in his guise as Jerome) is implicated in the murder, and the charade becomes a matter of life and death.

How long can they maintain the charade?

Opinion:
New Zealander Andrew Niccol both wrote and directed this film. This is
his directorial debut.

This film is a suspenseful, intelligent science fiction piece whose main theme is impersonation (i.e. the film is not about romance, action, or solving a murder). The setting of the story is a rather robotic future, but despite the setting's lack of emotional warmth, it fascinates because the genetic situation appeals to our real life fear of the consequences of genetic tampering on society.

'Gattaca' keeps our attention with good old fashioned suspense, and the fear that the hero might be discovered at any time is with us all the away until the final 10 minutes of the movie. A subplot of the film is Vincent's romance with Irene (Uma Thurman). Here, too, the romantic element isn't emphasized but serves as another way the charade might be discovered; the charade makes the movie.

On the negative side, the last 10 minutes of the film include a scene with a swim contest that doesn't really matter, and an underplayed scene where Vincent sees a doctor before the movie ends. These last few minutes could probably be sharpened and improved by cutting out the swim contest entirely and hyping the suspense music on the doctor scene before the movie ends.

I like the movie because of its underlying questions.

Reviewed by David Sunga

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