Review of Source Code

Source Code (2011)
Entertaining but not great
23 April 2011
Source Code is an action-thriller directed by Duncan Jones (Moon) also starring Michelle Monaghan (Eagle Eye, Due Date), Vera Farmiga (Up in the Air, The Departed), and Jeffrey Wright (Quantum of Solace, Syriana. When decorated soldier Captain Colter Stevens (Jake Gyllenhaal) wakes up in the body of an unknown man, he discovers he's part of a mission to find the bomber of a Chicago commuter train. In an assignment unlike any he's ever known, he learns he's part of a government experiment called the "Source Code," a program that enables him to cross over into another man's identity in the last 8 minutes of his life. With a second, much larger target threatening to kill millions in downtown Chicago, Colter re-lives the incident over and over again, gathering clues each time, until he can solve the mystery of who is behind the bombs and prevent the next attack.

I watch this today and there's no way I can say that it is a bad film. The acting was great and it was damn entertaining. And on top of that, I like sci-fi, specially if there's a human story amidst the action. And this is a film that has the potential to make you reflect about life, reality, philosophy and all that which is great. However, I left the theater feeling a bit disappointed, maybe even cheated? And here's why... In my opinion the film was doomed from the beginning. I'll elaborate; emotionally the ending was quite satisfactory, but in order to have a emotionally satisfactory ending, I feel that the story was compromised.

Why was it compromised? Because the ending was too far-fetched. Granted this is sci-fi, you had to suspend your disbelief from the get go but the ending was just too convenient if that makes sense. Even for someone who's somewhat familiarized with multi-verse theory and things like that. It's a bit hard to talk about this film without spoiling it and I don't want to give anything away so, in conclusion, it's probably a film worth seeing for all sci-fi fans but for everyone else it might be just an average piece of work.

6.5/10
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