The Island

http://www.theisland-themovie.com/youhavebeenchosen.html

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Director: Michael Bay
Cast: Ewan McGregor, Scarlett Johansson, Djimon Hounsou, Sean Bean,
Steve Buscemi
Writers: Alex Kurtzman, Roberto Orci, Caspian Tredwell-Owen

 In the future, the survivors of Nuclear and Biological contamination reside in a sterile, safe area of the Earth. The residents of the city live their lives in security and health, with their body functions and mental state monitored by the staff.

Their lives are directed from the start of the day, as they wear sterilized white suits and eat a regimented diet then go to a job that they do without question.

As one of the lucky survivors, Lincoln Six Echo (Ewan McGregor) is protected from pain, emotional distress, anger and even love by Dr. Merrick (Sean Bean). Merrick is in charge of the city and wants to find out why Lincoln is having bad dreams every night. Lincoln is certainly not like the rest of the residents around him. Lincoln asks questions, wonders what his purpose in life is and seeks answers to these worrisome points with all the people he meets.

Merrick holds out to the inhabitants of his city that they can go to the one remaining
un-contaminated area on Earth known as “The Island”. Rumored to be a veritable Garden of Eden, a lottery is held each day so that some lucky person gets to leave and live in paradise.

Lincoln Six Echo is less interested in the Lottery then he is in one of the other residents of the city. Jordan Two Delta (Scarlett Johansson) shows him how to con bacon out of the servers in the cafeteria and fights Lincoln in a virtual kickboxing tournament some nights.

Lincoln often visits with his only real friend McCord (Steve Buscemi), who seems to know more about the world around them then the other people he knows. During one of these visits, Lincoln discovers a butterfly flying around the pipes.

The thing is, everyone knows that all life was destroyed by the disasters that befell the planet, forcing all the survivors into the facility.

That night, Jordan is chosen as the winner of the lottery. Even though he is happy for her, he realizes that he will miss her and that he regrets not knowing her better.

In his depression, Lincoln follows the trail of the butterfly and discovers that his city, The Island and his very life is not what he believes. Now, racing against time he tries to stop Jordan from leaving. This is pretty much the plot.

From this point on, I will talk about stuff that happened on the screen and what I thought about it. 

This is an amazing film, and in my opinion it is the best Sci-Fi film of the year. Yes, that includes SW: ROTS; sorry Nana. But, you have to remember that both films, while they are Science Fiction, are different types of movies. “Sith” is a film dealing with BEM’s, massive space ship battles, distant far-away worlds, and happened a “Long Time Ago, in a Galaxy Far, Far Away.”

“The Island” takes place solely on Earth and in the U.S. around the year 2019, has no space ships, light sabers, or giant monsters.

Dealing with a question that is currently on the minds of many people, the film doesn’t answer any social questions and doesn’t try to. It simply sets out to entertain the viewer and it succeeds in a wonderful manner.

Taking parts of “Blade Runner”, “Logan’s Run”, “The Matrix” and a couple of other films and taking the best of each of them and forming it into a working film, Micheal Bay does one of the best jobs he has ever done. He creates a world of the future that not only might happen but very possibly will. 

Possibly one of the best things about the film is the people in it. McGregor and Johansson work so well together it is a pleasure to watch. I have only seen her in two other films and I have to say that I was not overly impressed with her in either of them. Here, she shows that she is lots more then a body; she has a great deal of talent and can display it with no trouble. Her range of emotion in “The Island” is amazing to watch, and the chemistry between her and McGregor is fun and intense to watch.

The guest stars, including Djimon Hounsou as a mercenary hired to track down our runners and Bean as the psychotic/sociopath ruler of the facility do nothing but add excitement and energy to the film. This is the first time I have seen Hounsou in anything like this, and he shows great ability with action/adventure; Bean more of less repeats his role from “Equilibrium” and does that with style and finesse.

The special effects are just that, “Special”. During his obligatory car chase we deal with Humvee’s, armored trucks, motorcycles, semis, automatic weapons, explosions and some of the most original car wrecks I have seen in a while.

As Lincoln and Jordan work their way from Arizona to California via Grav-Train (which I am looking forward to) they move around the futuristic Los Angeles trying to evade Hounsou’s private army and the police, being chased by flying motorcycles and helicopters and finally hanging off the side of a towering building by it’s logo, they find that there are really very few people they can trust.

The Island is an ambitious popcorn film in the classic Sci-Fi tradition that will challenge your mind as much as your eyes. Going far beyond what we have seen in Science Fiction this year, “The Island” proves what a real action/adventure film can be like.

While there were some minor problems in the editing area leaving a few loopholes here and there, that is not enough to hurt the film in any way. Scarlett Johansson and Ewan
McGregor make up for these minor problems.

Once more, to me this is one of the best Science Fiction films of the year.