Source Code (2011)

(SPOILER ALERT: DO NOT READ THIS POST IF YOU DON'T WANT TO KNOW IF THE GUY GETS THE GIRL?)

[Now for a bust of a movie that isn't quite what it says on the tin.]

Source Code (2011) is a French-American science fiction/thriller/romance film directed by Duncan Jones, starring Jake Gyllenhaal, Michelle Monaghan, Vera Farmiga, and Jeffrey Wright.

In the end, the concious remnants of an American military helicopter pilot, declared dead-in-action, Jake Gyllenhaal, escapes the confines of the repeatedly reconstructed events of a terrorist attack, with one of its victims, Michelle Monaghan, who he has become romantically attached to.

Unwitting participant in a secret US military experiment designed to investigate the circumstances immediately preceding terror incidents using the afterglow of brain activity of their victims, Gyllenhaal, whose last memory is of flying a mission in Afghanistan, wakes to find himself on a Chicago bound morning commuter train, opposite school teacher, Monaghan, who is under the impression that he is a friend and colleague, minutes before it is destroyed by an explosion.

Alone and disoriented, Gyllenhaal finds himself trapped inside an unfamiliar capsule, receiving confusing instructions via a video link with a command centre, from a uniformed controller, Vera Farmiga, who explains that he is on a mission to find which of the train passengers is responsible for the bombing, as they have apparently threatened to carry out further attacks.

So Gyllenhaal is forced to re-experience events on the train a number of times in order to search for clues, during the course of which, it becomes apparent that there is no hope of his surviving beyond the life support system of the experiment and its disconnected existence.

Realising the grim prospect of his situation, Gyllenhaal exacts an undertaking from the program's architect, Jeffrey Wright, that he be detached from the system and allowed to die, should he meet with success.

However, when Gyllenhaal eventually tracks a mobile phone attached to the bomb he discovered hidden above a wash-room ceiling, to a man he sees deliberately planting his wallet in a carriage compartment to cover his tracks, before alighting at a station in order to collect a van containing what he describes as a dirty bomb that he intends to detonate in the city, Wright reneges on the deal.

Reasoning that Gyllenhaal is too valuable an asset to discard now that he has proved the program works, Wright orders Farmiga to wipe his memory, in preparation for his next mission.

But Farmiga, recognising Gyllenhaal's despair at being unable to effect the outcomes of the lost commuters and the future torment he is likely to suffer as a continued part of the program, defies the order, agreeing to allow Gyllenhaal one last pass through the event, before switching the system's life-support off.

This time Gyllenhaal has all the information he needs to quickly disable the bomb, restrain the bomber, and alert authorities to his intentions.

Then, with the time he has left, he leaves Farmiga a text message, consoles his estranged father by cellphone, and, paying a stand-up comedian to entertain the other passengers, embraces Monaghan in a passionate kiss, something she has clearly been anticipating, just as Farmiga pulls the plug on him, and against all expectations, Gyllenhaal and Monaghan's alternate reality persists.

The commuter train arrives at its destination, and they decide to ditch work for the day and enjoy a long promised coffee together, as Farmiga receives Gyllenhaal's message predicting the thwarting of the bomb attacks and his part in the top secret project on which she is engaged.


The cod-science underpinning the premise of this movie doesn't bear up to even the most cursory examination. But never mind that, what we have is a Groundhog Day (1993) for geeks, science fantasy romance, that plays to all of Gyllenhaal's guy out of his depth trying to solve complicated puzzle and catch the bad guy while sweeping the princess in peril off her feet strengths, even winning the heart of his let's keep this professional operator. Once again, Duncan Jones demonstrates a talent for successfully balancing mystery, drama, and emotion, with the occasional flash of humour. There is much to enjoy. Though this might very well prove to be the last good movie he is responsible for, having taken up the poisoned Warcraft chalice. Let's just hope he hasn't drunk too deeply from it. (A whole year after this post was originally penned, and there's still no sign of it. (Apparently the release has been pushed back not to compete with J.J. Abrams's Star Wars! Like that was ever possible :P))

Source(s):
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Source_Code
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Groundhog_Day
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Warcraft_(film)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Star_Wars:_The_Force_Awakens

28 Days Later (2002)

(SPOILER ALERT: DO NOT READ THIS POST IF YOU DON'T WANT TO KNOW WHETHER OR NOT ANYONE SURVIVES)

[Now for the movie that started the whole virus infected speed zombie controversy.]

28 Days Later (2002) Directed by Danny Boyle. Staring Cillian Murphy, Naomie Harris, Brendan Gleeson and Christopher Eccleston.

In the end Cillian Murphy and his two female companions survive to make contact with the outside world.

Following the animal rights activist release of an alarmingly violent chimpanzee from a medical research facility, cycle courier Murphy comes round from a road traffic accident induced coma to find himself completely alone in an abandoned major London hospital.

Dressing himself in green medical scrubs, Murphy sets off through a deserted city rife with signs of some chaotic catastrophe looking for help and answers.

Unfortunately for Murphy, the first person he encounters is a maniacal, blood splattered priest obviously intent on extracting more than just a confession from him.

Murphy's flight attracts an increasing number of similarly rabid individuals until he is rescued by a young pair who lead him to their refuge in a London Underground station snack kiosk.

Although unaware of the exact source of infection, Naomie Harris and her companion explain the rapid contagion that has spread uncontrollably through the population turning everyone affected into blood-crazed monsters.

The full horror of the situation is revealed to Murphy, first, when the pair help him to reach his parents' home, where he finds that they have committed suicide, and then, when Harris slaughters her companion without hesitation, as soon as she sees that he has accidentally come into contact with one of the infected.

Murphy and Haris's prospects seem bleak until they discover another pair of survivors, Brendan Gleeson and his teenage daughter, who plan to abandon their fortified tower block apartment in order to track down the origin of a prerecorded radio transmission promising a solution to infection.

Travelling north in Gleeson's black taxi cab, the group eventually reach a corpse strewn blockade that turns out to be the source of the broadcast.

When Gleeson is accidentally infected by one of the corpses, the group is only saved by the sudden appearance of a squad of soldiers, who subsequently take Murphy and the women to a nearby mansion that they have made into a base.

There they meet the soldiers' commanding officer, Christopher Eccleston, who explains that the promised solution is to wait for the infected to starve to death, while his men get busy repopulating society with the willing, or otherwise, help of the women that have been lured to their camp.

Realising their mistake, Murphy has to escape the now murderous squaddies and somehow free the trapped women, which he does with the help of an infected soldier who he lets loose in the mansion.

As the crazed soldier works his way through his former comrades, Murphy and the women take flight in Gleeson's cab, but not before Murphy is shot in the chest by a soon to be consumed Eccleston.

Harris is obviously no stranger to the emergency room, though, as she succeeds in saving Murphy's life.

The movie closes with the trio signalling their survival with a huge homemade banner spread out on the ground for a low flying jet fighter that buzzes the isolated cottage that they have made their home to see.


George A. Romero purists may have balked at Boyle's reinvention of the zombie horror movie. But there's no denying that his creation sustained a genre that became hard to take seriously after its superb spoofing by Simon Pegg and Edgar Wright's Shaun of the Dead (2004) which actually made an oblique reference to Boyle's contested premise that zombies could result from a virus infection and would die unless sustained by consuming others.

Source(s):
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/28_Days_Later
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shaun_of_the_Dead