IMDB Review
Review by: Keith Simanton
Starring: Scarlett Johansson, Ewan McGregor, Djimon Hounsou, Steve Buscemi8 out of 10: Director Michael Bay's new action film, The Island, is a crackling good action movie but it can't keep its own momentum up, stumbling in the end, and reaching its dirt-caked-arms out in anguish at its goal, just a few feet away from being a great sci-fi action movie, nearing a Total Recall-comparison. You almost want to run out on the field, help it to its feet and say, "Good try."
Still, for the breadth of its running time The Island combines a gritty style with a Darwinian plot to create some thrilling sequences. It's all capped by a highway chase set piece (the "giant metal spool" scene shown in ads) that is really rather astounding and truly memorable.
Bay (Armageddon, Pearl Harbor) seems so inspired because he's got his teeth into the kind of screenplay (written by Alex Kurtzman, Roberto Orci and Caspian Tredwell-Owen, based on his story) that suits him best, a "kill or be killed" scenario that keeps the talk to a minimum and the frantic movement to a maximum.
Lincoln Six Echo (Ewan McGregor) has nightmares about going to the Island. It's odd because they start out on a nice boat, with a pretty girl, and suddenly he's drowning, surrounded by half-formed, hairless men who pull him down. When he wakes up his bad dreams have been noticed by the monitor in his room, and some unseen overseer puts him on food rations to cure any biological imbalance as evidenced by the bad REM time. Lincoln is one of a colony of people who live in a penned-up facility, hermetically sealed off from the outside. They've been rescued from the external world, a contaminated place that is so noxious not even insects have survived, and they have a simple, uncomplicated life. Their one shared dream is to go to "the Island" the last known un-contaminated place on the planet and they're chosen by lottery to go there.
Lincoln is attracted to his friend Jordan Two Delta (Scarlett Johansson), who has recently been selected to go to the Island, but the handlers of the facility don't let them get very close; they have to watch their proximity to one another. Lincoln's nightmares get him called up by Merrick (Sean Bean), the operator of the facility. Merrick is right to suspect something is up for Lincoln has become insatiably curious. Lincoln is trusted though and allowed to step into the outer corridor of the clean environment where he has befriended McCord (Steve Buscemi, essentially reprising his role from Armageddon), a kind-hearted maintenance guy.
Of course, the facility is not what it seems and Lincoln discovers that Merrick and his cohorts have sinister designs on him and his fellow inhabitants. They are all clones, grown as "insurance policies" to ensure that their "sponsors" on the outside have harvestable body parts. Lincoln and Jordan escape and discover that they're in the middle of Arizona in 2019 and the world isn't contaminated at all. With mercenaries from Merrick on their tail (led by Djimon Hounsou) they attempt to get to Los Angeles to tell the world about themselves and the hideous corporation that created them.
This scenario provides for a lot of action that could be called mindless but is exquisitely complicated and beautiful in its execution. I have a habit of jumping and flinching when a stunt looks particularly realistic and I jumped and flinched a lot in The Island. Several of the bad guys are hit with pipes, wrenches, etc. and the sound effects and editing give some fine wincing moments.
Much of the film harkens back to other films such as Capricorn One, Logan's Run but doesn't copy from them directly. The clones are fully matured but they're only a few years old; they're naïve innocents. This interesting take makes what could have been a hard-to-swallow first act more easily digestible. The clones don't quite get that there's something wrong with their situation (Hey, why are there people in black suits who supervise us?) but we do and quickly. Bay, for once, lets the audience make leaps before his characters and then anticipates what the audience is thinking and doesn't help the stragglers who haven't figured it out yet. It's a monumental step in his career.
But people don't go to Michael Bay films to circumvent the tropes the cinema. They're there for the big booms and Bay pays off and more, and then provides annuities. The signature chase sequence, wherein Jordan and Lincoln hide out on a tanker hauling metal spools and release the straps that hold them, provides about a gasp every other second. Bay and his filmmakers make an action sequence for the record books.
The Island also provides-gasp-some moral complications as well. A clone mother has a baby, then is euthenized in the birthing room. The baby is then handed over to an expectant (and from all appearances loving) couple in another room. The sponsors are the clones only hope because they're the only ones who can prove what has happened at Merrick, but these are people who are doing exactly what the clones are doing, trying to survive. When Jordan attempts to contact her sponsor she discovers she's a model in a coma from an accident and accidentally gets the model's child on a two-way visual tele-phone. "Mommy?" the kid queries, when he sees her face, leaving Jordan to realize that she's consigning her sponsor to death. It's good stuff.
But the finale of the film feels as restructured as Cher's face. The biggest service the two escaped clones could provide, to alert the world of the acts behind the Merrick corporation (Merrick has always said that it harvests organs from stand-alone chrysalis that have no sentience, no feelings), gets shuffled off for the bigger, and riskier feat of returning to free their fellow clones.
McGregor is fine as Lincoln but he's actually much looser, and more interesting, as his sponsor, Tom, a renegade designer and engineer whose life of unprotected sex has left him with a kidney doomed to failure from hepatitis. Johansson is Kewpie-doll cute and Jordan is correspondingly blithely unaware of what's going on (her version of street smarts is buffaloing the cafeteria lady). One wants more backbone, more instinct coming from such a hunted creature but she reacts as if they're playing a very mean version of a video game.
As far as satisfying action flicks go, The Island keeps up with some of the best of them but, as if looking to the sidelines to hear the advice of its coach, trips over its own feet, missing out on the chance to be a great action flick as well.
IMDB Review
This review was written by Keith Simanton. He starts talking about the film straight away and giving his opinion. ‘a crackling good action movie but it can't keep its own momentum up’, shows that he uses a light tone throughout the review. The review is written in a manner to entertain the audience and inform them about the movie. Words like "Good try" and "kill or be killed" are words that will entertain the readers. The reviewer concentrates on the director of the film telling us about his intentions and his skills. “Bay (Armageddon, Pearl Harbor) seems so inspired”. He also links the director with other of his films to make the audience aware of the director’s line of films. The review doesn’t give a chronological order of the film. It starts of telling the audience about the most exciting thrilling sequences in the film. Then after he starts giving a more detailed summary of the film, telling us about the events in chronological order. The use of language shows us that he is addressing a younger mature audience. “It's good stuff”. The reviewer keeps the audience interested with humor mixed with his own opinions, “But the finale of the film feels as restructured as Cher's face”. We also hear about the main actors in the film and about their roles.
