Gattaca

Rating:
Summary: Not so fictional sci-fi
Review: The world of Gattaca is one where people are stratified in society by their genetic composition. Racism and classism are things of the past. Those who are bred to be genetically superior are dominant in society compared to those conceived naturally and tethered with the possibilities of a plethora of medical problems.

In this world, Vincent (Hawke) is a person trying to overcome his own DNA by impersonating a genetic superior. In this reality, impersonation isn't just looks... The movie takes great pains to show how appearance has become secondary in identification.

This movie is not the best execution. It has an excellent cast, and the supporting cast tends to run away with the film. Hawke and Thurman give somewhat cold performances, along the lines of the film itself. I think this film's strongest points are an excellent premise (one that is very relevant today with health care becoming increasingly oriented towards risk stratification)and a wealth of supporting cast talent (especially Jude Law, whose performance is stellar, and it's always nice to see Ernest Borgnine in a movie).

This movie is true science fiction, not aliens and space ships and the like. It's sci-fi like Bradbury is sci-fi. It's thinking sci-fi.

As a note, the title Gattaca is derived from the letters GTAC, which stand for the letters used to represent the nucleic acids which make up DNA (Guanine, Thymine, Adenine, and Cytosine).

Rating:
Summary: Aims high, but doesn't get there (2.5 stars)
Review: I found this film's execution to be uninspired and unexceptional, although there were some aspects to the film that make it stand out from your average sci-fi tale.

First off, the movie's pluses. The supporting cast, including Law, Arkin, and Borgnine was strong, and both Hawke and Thurman were good (too understated though, seemingly by design). The movie also had style. In addition to style, it had some good messages, including anti-discrimination, and threats posed to individual liberty by technological 'advancement'. The most important message was that the human spirit, if strong enough can accomplish virtually anything.

These are certainly admirable themes. The movie just failed to deliver them in a mature and convincing way. Below I outline some of the problems, as I see them (beware of spoilers).

While realism is generally not the goal of science fiction, much of the science and several plot developments here were totally implausible. In terms of the science, the film gives too little allowance to the role of environment in human development; while this approach adds drama, it makes the film patronizingly simplistic. The weak hearts of the two protagonists also had no science fiction basis-it was just a plot device. Some other plot implausibilities: 1) the idea that one could (almost) hide their genetic signature, and 2) that people would no longer pay attention to facial appearances, something evolution has steered us towards recognizing for millennia.

The movie also felt flat; this was clearly the tone the film was going for, but I felt it took it too far. We needed to at minimum feel Vincent's passion for flight, and the couple's romantic passion. While there's no denying there was chemistry between Hawke and Thurman, the performances were too muted. We should have felt Vincent's excitement about his final achievement, but we don't, partly because we have no sense of what he will be doing in space.

Other characters and relationships were too simplistic as well. I know men can be boys, but the paring down of the brothers' relationship to little more than a game of chicken seems too extreme; where was the subtlety and nuance in their-or any of the other- relationship?

Rating:
Summary: Better than the Matrix
Review: Gattaca takes a cliched sci-fi theme, genetics engineering gone wrong, and makes of it an intelligent, haunting fable about society stifling individuals, and of over coming obstacles to follow the true desires of one's heart.

The screen writing is achingly beautiful. It speaks of many things; the rivalry that exists between brothers, a society that will judge a human being not by who he is but by his genes, and of a normal person who will break through all the walls such a society sets in front of him to fulfill the longing of his heart, the space.

I felt like crying after watching the movie, there were so many emotions stirred up inside me. It shook me to my very core. The only time I felt that way after watching a movie was when I watched Shawshank Redemption. I felt so angry for Vincent and the way the world is in Gattaca. I felt so much sorrow for Jude Law. When the movie finally ended, I felt a shock of hope, the kind of hope you get when you see how life can work out despite all the odds. It's a movie that will definitely make you think and feel.

Ethan Hawke's acting is, as usual, subtle and believable. It's said that making the protagonist narrate a story isn't a good idea, but Ethan Hawke somehow makes it work. (Think 'Great Expectations.') He doesn't over-act to make you see his point; he doesn't shout, he doesn't sob, he doesn't whisper. He just becomes Vincent the in-Valid. There's no Ethan Hawke to be seen, only a very human, very determined man who will go to space no matter what.

Jude Law does a great job as supporting actor. Arrogant, short-tempered and yet with a warm heart, his character comes to life quite well. As an invalid Valid, if you'll pardon the pun, he represents all the irony this futuristic caste system brought. Sitting around in the basement drinking beer, he casts a new light onto the story and onto Vincent's plight. (Did anyone else like the line 'I'm bored, I'm BORED talking to you!' as much as I did? ^-^)

Uma Thurman was okay. There's nothing noticeable about her acting, but I guess that was the whole point. The spotlight falls on Vincent as it should.

One of the most brilliant science-fiction movies of the decade, it's a joy to watch and a pleasure to remember. Worth your money.

Rating:
Summary: Movies Don't Get Much Better Than This
Review: Gattaca is the perfect blend of great acting, insightful plot, thrilling pace, and sharp theme.

Hawke, Thurman, and Law give passionate portrayals of the characters each facing their own imperfections. The scenes move fluently without seeming trite. The setting of the movie cleverly mimics the Hoover era of US History.

This possible genetics based future represented in this film seems to grow ever closer in our society due to our overwhelming desire for science and business to meld. This plot is shocking because it's plausible.

This movie ranks in my top ten of all time.

Rating:
Summary: Get Ready for What Will Come
Review: I've always said that science fiction is the antidote to 'future shock' (a series of books that came out two decades ago).

Gattaca isn't far-fetched at all. Who could resist a future where all babies are perfect? No congenital defects, no weakness, no shortcomings...

And woe be it to those born of a natural coupling. Gattaca is that future examined today.

Some have said the movie is slow. Not so...it's deliberately paced. It savors the possibilities, gives the audience time to consider how a genetically perfect person (Jude Law) would aid a naturally-born person (Hawke) to realize a dream he otherwise would not have.

Recommended

Rating:
Summary: As a test tube nightmare, "Gattaca" delivers ! ! !
Review: A sci-fi bomb when released in 1997, "Gattaca" will live on as a masterpiece. You can't help but feel sympathy for "Godchild" Vincent. The "deGENErate" is masking his true identity in a sterile world of perfectly produced test tube co-workers. Andrew Niccol's vision of quiet chaos is superb. The sets are filmed crisp and cool. The effects of Man vs. Nature are revealed at a suspenseful pace. Hawke, Thurman and especially Jude Law, couldn't ask for a better script. Not to be missed !

Rating:
Summary: If Hitler had won the war
Review: Word on the streets is that this movie's premis is how things would be if Hitler had won WWII. It's a story about a future society where only the most physically capable are able to do certain things. I won't spoil it all for you. It's a slow movie, but I liked it. I thought it was really good. None of my friends like it. I think it's a movie to sit there and watch alone the first time.

Rating:
Summary: A premise played to quite an extreme
Review: I bought "Gattaca" after seeing the excerpt from what turns out to be the start of the movie, in PBS's "Nova" program. Folks design their offspring and get the USDA seal of approval on their genetic sequence. Thus is the entrance to the great machine of identification and authentication made, and the outsiders are simply not "valid". I guess I could live with less of the sensational action and further elaboration on the science, but then I'm an admitted geek from the get-go. The aura of this film is very much like what we saw in the screen version of "Fahrenheit 451"; that of a world you know has gone nuts, with some obsession that is supposed to be the end all for public safety and social harmony. Folks will wind up, in the world of "Gattaca", with an identification about as impersonal as an ear-tag appended to a factory-farmed meat animal, but a lot more telling. I shudder to imagine that the much-maligned delusions behind eugenics, made so popular earlier in the last century, will create such a bunch of cretins as the two fellows who conspire to fool...not mother nature, but Big Brother himself. One really has to wonder, in all of this, which is the better cause--one's comfort or one's innate conscience. "Gattaca" works the best it can with its premise, only by the time it gets fully laid down, we're just dealing with another story of a fugitive for whom we're supposed to cheer. There are steep and awesome precipices in the idea of genetic authentication, and the movie gives us some idea of them. But is not evolution just like that, and equally dramatic? It would seem that we're enacting our own set of challanges, then sending out intentional mutations that are supposed to win. Yes, this is all suggested, but what we principally have is an attempt at a cliffhanger flight. The subject matter of our protagonists' interpretation of propriety, however, is just another struggle of the freedom-fighter ilk. It is a little too focused on the lead characters, leaving a lot left to do with a very profound topic. It would seem, in the human intervention at hand, that ontogeny truly recapitulates philogeny, only the ontology is hardly able to account for the impossible number of original interventions that took place during the philology. Wherever a crime is comitted, evidence remains. I would have liked to have seen a better treatment of the ultimate crime behind this society's proclamation of what is good and what is not.

Rating:
Summary: Spooky
Review: This movie is both entertaining and a little scary. The plot is about what will happen when children are no longer created by the love of two human beings, but strictly through science, virtually making a society of perfect people. It explores what will happen to children bred from natural child-births and one man's struggle to follow his dreams. The spooky thing is that it strikes a real chord, the idea is not completely far fetched. The movie is good, watch it.

Rating:
Summary: awesome movie
Review: this movies is so good i was totally moved by the performance of jude law even more than the one by ethan hawke, i somewhat felt that the story was more on Jude Law than on ethan hawke because all the sadness came from him for not bein able to walk or realize his dreams