Send in the Clones.
Cloning has been in the papers a good bit over the past few years. The technology points to cloning of humans being feasible not long in the near future. With any good technology advancement that has moral implications, it is the job of the media to bring about questions in peoples' minds of the ethics and morality of using these technologies. GATTACA showed us a society built on the technology of genetic manipulation and delivered a well-developed story about one man's success in overcoming his limited genetic potential through will-power and determination. With the ability to clone a human looming on the horizon, one would expect an ambitious studio to release a good movie dealing with the moral ambiguities of cloning.
This is not that movie.
On the other hand, perhaps you'd rather go see a great action movie. The producers would hire in an action icon like Arnold Schwarzenegger, add in huge special effects and more explosions than WWII.
This isn't that movie, either. It's too busy wishing it were the first one.
In an anachronistic future ("Sooner than you think" is the date cited in the movie) where people shoot laser guns but drive today's cars with extra plastic on the side, the "Sixth Day" laws are passed to ban human cloning. The world's biggest cloning company, however, has perfected the technology, and is secretly using it to its own benefit. And Adam Gibson (Ahnuld) has been accidentally cloned.
In order to cover up the mistake-- and the fact that the company is cloning humans and not just pets -- Gibson has to die since his clone has already taken over his life. Or maybe it's the clone who has to die? On the one hand, there's no way to tell, it seems, but on the other, nobody in the theater really cares. Add in a few gratuitous plot devices, a researcher (Robert Duvall) getting second thoughts about his technology, some intentional sabotage of the clones, a bad guy trying not to try to be Bill Gates (Tony Goldwyn) and entirely too many fu-free moments, and you get The 6th Day.
One high point to the movie is the idea of virtual immortality. The thugs assigned to kill Gibson are willing to take whatever risks necessary to bring him in. If they die, the company will just bake a new clone and implant memories from the dead body into the clone. Well, either that or they're just dumb thugs following Ebert's Law. It's not like they say they're willing to take those risks...
Cormac and Marianne Wibberley, the script writers, need to be taken out and shot. (I certainly hope there's no relation to Leonard Wibberley here, author of The Mouse that Roared. If so, Leonard should do the lynching himself for sullying the family name.) The plot makes a sieve look solid, the dialogue is flat at best. Really, the dialogue has two modes: Brady Bunch and Action-Speak. Whenever Arnold has a dramatic family or romantic scene, the dialogue turns into this Ozzie and Harriet nonsense delivered with an Austrian accent. When you listen to this "Oh honey?" garbage, you'll feel a throbbing pressure on one side of your head. This is your brain trying to leap out of your skull through the auditory canal. As for the other half of the dialogue, Arnold wrote at least a whole chapter of the Action-Speak book in the last two decades so he delivers these lines with some believability. The worst scenes were when Arnold talked to his clone, buddy-fashion. Just when you thought you'd heard the flattest line in the movie, another one pops out. Then there are the other actors -- were they worse than should be expected, or is that just the best anyone could do with lines like they had? Too close to call. Robert Duvall is the only actor who manages to shine while covered in this morass of a script. It was almost as if he was playing a character in a different movie that happened to intersect with a Schwarzenegger action flick by way of the Twilight Zone.
One thing that normally saves an Action Movie are the special effects and action scenes. The special effects were mediocre. Spines of physics or biology texts were definitely not cracked or damaged in the making of this movie. This is not a movie to go see for something spectacular and visually mind-expanding. You'd have better results from cleaning out the fridge. The action scenes were pretty standard and uninteresting. Go see Legend of Drunken Master.
A late brainstorming event has come up with suggestions on how this could have been a better movie:
a) When Michael Rooker gets his foot blown off, have him say in a bad
Cockney accent, "I'm not dead yet! Come back and I'll bite your kneecaps
off!"
b) Hire Danny DeVito to play Schwarzenegger's clone
c) Replace Arnold with Harrison Ford. Replace the director (Roger
Spotiswoode) with Ridley Scott. Replace the composer (Trevor Rabin)
with Vangelis. Replace... oh hell, just go watch the director's cut
of Blade Runner. A much
better movie with a parallel premise.
d) Don't make it in the first place. - Probably the optimal
solution.
We expect to see more movies with cloning as a main premise. It really cuts your actor budget-- you can kill off a thug, and then bring him back again and not have to hire a new actor to play the thug's replacement. Digital image manipulation is good enough that it's almost easy to have an actor banter with himself; you don't need to hire a supporting actor sidekick type. And if enough folks like us were duped into going to see it, it will make enough money that everybody will want to jump on the clone bandwagon. We predict that even George Lucas will turn out a clone film in the next couple years. ;-)
On the one hand, we're glad we went to go see this movie. It wasn't an entire waste of time, and if we hadn't seen this, we might have had to sit through another damned Jim Carrey movie-- The Grinch was the other movie suggested for this week.
On the other hand, that's not saying much...
We give it a 2 on the good movie scale and a 5 on the bad movie scale. Wait for it to come out on USA where at least their fanatical and Puritanical editing will shorten the overall length of the movie making it less painful.
Our Drive-In Totals:
32 dead bodies
0 breasts
1 Virtual Blonde Chickie with Interactive Chair
0 Virtual Breasts
20 "blank" clones
3 fingers
1 foot
1 uncooperative tongue
4(x3) Thugs (Smart Thug, Girl Thug, Stupid Thug, Ethnic Thug)
2 Re-Pets
1 aphrodisiac stogie
Girl Chucky Doll
2 Arnolds
1 Huge Megacorporation
Portable Thumb
1 Yowling Cat cliche (don't writers own cats? We've never seen
a
cat charge anything except yarn, let alone a screaming
charge that takes it near someone holding a gun. The
real reaction is a hiss and running away very rapidly.
Cats, unlike most Hollywood screenwriters, are smart)
SUV with AutoNav
4 parallels between the Megacorp and Microsoft (subtly applied
with a sledgehammer)
1 cloned "I'll Be Back" line. The clone suffered mutation.
1 Milk-Ordering Fridge
2 helicopter/airplanes inspired by "Switchblade" from the
animated series MASK. Er, 3. Hey, how many of these things
do they have?
1 really gratuitous race with aforementioned helicopter/airplanes
designed to give video game designers something to work with
1 arm-mounted Plot Device
Genetic Existential mascara
1 Blackmail Backup Tape
1 overused cut scene of a cityscape and a red car driving down the
street
3 Obligatory Product Placement ads (applied with sledgehammer)
1 Drive-Thru House
6 really flat buddy-movie wannabe lines
14 expensive Arnold one-liners
20 calm rational minutes to live
Kung Fu
Gun Fu
SUV Fu
Oxygen Tank Fu
Dog Fu
Cat Fu
Helicopter Fu
Clone Tank Fu
Cliff Fu
Hose Fu
QB Sack Fu
Razor Fu
Genetics Fu
Clone Fu
Clone Fu
Clone Fu
Good Movie Scale: 2 out of 10
Bad Movie Scale: 5 out of 10
Occasionally, we err. Here's an email from a relative and J.D.'s response.
> ---------- Forwarded message ----------
> Date: Thu, 10 Jan 2002 14:57:38 EST
> From: Lecter82@aol.com
> To: idris@cc.gatech.edu
> Subject: I really don't know how to title this
>
> I was on the web searching for bibliographical information on Leonard
> Wibberley, and I came across your 6th Day review. Just wanted to give you
> some info-
>
> Cormac Wibberley is indeed the son of Leonard. He and his wife Marianne
> wrote the script for their tiny little independent company to make a tiny
> little independent film. Some big shots got a hold of it, decided it would
> be a good vehicle for Arnold Swarzeneggar (or however that's spelled), and
> ruined the entire thing. The producers brought their own writers to rewrite
> it, Arnold brought his own writers to rewrite it, the director brought his
> own writers to rewrite it, and yet for some reason the blame went to Cormac
> and Marianne. But such is the film business.
Indeed, and in all truth, I suspect that it was probably a tough decision
on the part of the writers on whether or not to leave their names on this
film-- when you're a Tom Clancy, you don't worry about whether you can sell
your next book if you take your name off the steaming pile of crap that
Hollywood produced with your book's title on it, but in the case of people
nobody's ever heard of, it was probably worth the gamble-- if your stuff
sells incredibly well, you may get to do your next movie the way you want.
> The movie's over a year old and this doesn't much matter (and I doubt it's
> even near your radar anymore), but I just wanted to make a case as for why my
> aunt and uncle do not deserve to be taken out and shot and why my grandfather
> is probably not spinning in his grave. After all, he also experienced
> Hollywood first hand and didn't find it the best experience (The Mouse that
> Roared was not his only experience with the Hollywood system).
Point taken. I hope you understand that _someone_ deserves being taken out
and shot for this film, and unfortunately, your aunt and uncle's names
were what was on it, which is where my comment came about.
I really do think that the movie could have been something really good, and
while my only real experience with Hollywood is from the theater seat, it
would not surprise me if what your aunt and uncle created _was_ good. I
suppose I should update the review with the producers' name, instead. :)
Actually, if you don't mind, I think it might be more interesting to tack
this correspondence to the end of our review. I would like to tack at
least something on the end-- while I suspect it's not on anybody's radar
anymore, it's probably a good idea to point the blame in the right
direction...
(Hm. I suppose now I'll never become a professional movie reviewer on my
take-no-prisoners no-apologies style...)
-JDF
