A who-dunnit poseur, Gattaca attempts to revolve around the premise of a murder mystery. But you can't be what you're not... or can you?
Right down to its heart-warming stock finale, Andrew Niccol's quasi-thriller celebrates the triumph of the human soul-if its axiomatic maxim ("There is no gene for the human spirit.") is of any indication. The film's protagonist, Vincent, swims upstream against the fierce currents of an implacable world, his innerdemons and ultimately himself. But defying natural order and societal assumptions, he literally breaks out from what seems to be an impervious stratosphere.
Gattaca is set in an era plagued by perfection. However, with every progression comes a regression. Gone are the days when the lines of segregation are drawn according to color, gender or sexual preference. Now, an elitist gene-plutocracy reigns and discriminates against those who are genotypically inferior-making rudimentary existence virtually impossible for the new "degenerate" class.
What should be the time of joy becomes the time of sorrow for Vincent's parents. At birth, an "in-valid" Vincent (Ethan Hawke) is sentenced to live until he is only 30.2 years old due to a string of disorders-heart problems and other distinguishing debilities of natural procreation.
The dominant theme of brotherly conflict is foreshadowed from the onset. From their conception, the two brothers Vincent and Anton tread upon different paths, as the former is conceived in the Riviera-"the Detroit sort"-while the latter is a test tube baby with the best of both possible worlds. They perpetually vie for parental love, societal acceptance and fulfillment of dreams, but for one all efforts are to no avail.
Vincent leaves home, holding onto his only life-long fantasy: a voyage to space. And one day Opportunity knocks on his door. Vincent encounters a so-called "DNA-broker" by the name of German (Tony Shalhoub) and comes to purchase the identity of Jerome Eugene Morrow (Jude Law), a once genetically superior specimen who gets shafted by the Fates and becomes confined to a wheelchair.
The ravishingly exquisite Jude Law practically steals the show, as he plays the crippled character to chilling perfection. From his initial arrogance to his metamorphosed self at the end, Law's character toys with the audience's emotions, as his dichotomous appeal procures both disdain and pity.
To blend in a maximum-security society, where a strand of hair, a flake of skin and a drop of blood could divulge one's identity, Vincent takes extreme measures to blanket his defects: His myopic eyes, height, etc.. With his newfound body and idenity, Vincent (now Jerome Morrow) applies to and gets accepted by Gattaca, an elite enterprise that engages in space exploration. With his near-perfect genetic disposition and punctilious perserverance, he becomes the best of the best and steadily inches toward his goal.
But one little mishap hinders his ascension-the murder of the program director-that sweeps up the whole operation into a torrential whirlwind. In the midst of such not-so-dramatic drama, Jerome/Vincent befriends Irene Cassini (Uma Thurman), a co-worker and the signature femme fatale.
Thurman's part was considerably underwritten, but who am I to judge artistic intention? Uma, like a Monet, looks good from far away but not up close. Though her dad, Robert Thurman, is a great Eastern mystic and scholar, he couldn't give her the requisite delivery of a fine thespian. Her innate tragic flaw becomes further evident, as her trademark nose flare kills what could have been a poignant scene with her co-star Ethan Hawke.
Hawke, on the other hand, pulls off just enough of that "human spirit" that seems to be the movie's pervading theme-despite the industry's dismissal of him as another pretty face.
Gore Vidal, as Gattaca's Director Josef, seems to have deserved a greater share of the spotlight, but he devolves into a character of convenience in the plot's d*nouement.
"There is no gene for the human spirit," touts the makers of Gattaca. Well, there is no excuse for a poorly scripted film, either. The film's director Andrew Niccol, who also scripted the film, seems to have a strong predilection for visual sophistication rather than for the narrative. A series of sporadic near misses and great one-liners add suspense and different dimensions to an otherwise one-sided film; nevertheless, Niccol could have tinkered around a little more with the suspense element instead of wasting footage on superfluous associations and parallels.
Although, Niccol's spectacle is nonetheless stunning; the seamless stretch of rich mise-en-scene, where futuristic art deco architecture meets neoclassical symmetry, would leave any cinephile in a state of continual ecstasy.
Every celluloid inch is as intricately contrived as Stanley Kubrick's A Clockwork Orange, and the film carries a certain sense of Peter Greenaway's blatantly pretentious flamboyance. Gattaca also appropriates several elements from the mother of all futuristic films, Metropolis, from its class segregation to the glazed faces of classic-cut suit-donning workers. The refined elegance of the highly stylized costuming is reminiscent of Prada-paralleling the overall aloofness of this pseudo-utopic society.
Gattaca plays upon one of our greatest fears-rejection; however, it breathes reassuring life into the definition of what it means to be a fault-carrying human, and that somehow balances out the loss of cinematic perfection.
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