Evaluating The Island
I don't know if anyone's seen the adverts for The Island. I've seen a few of them, and I think I'm going to make an effort to go see it. Have a look at this blurb...
Now, we all know that Hollywood suffers from a pathological inability to make a movie that doesn't have some underlying political message. This one's being directed by Michael Bay, the guy who did Armageddon and Pearl Harbor. Armageddon, aside from its global patriotism, seemed to be at least semi-patriotic; Pearl Harbor was extremely lousy, but aside from the travesty of desecrating the memory of all our heroic sailors with an ahistorical script and an asinine love story, it was at least pro-American. I'm going to go out on a limb and say that Michael Bay may not be the self-important scum sucking weasel that most Hollywood directors are.
So, given the quoted section, what do you think the underlying message is? If you ask me, it sounds like this film is going to be a direct allegory for embryonic stem cell research and human cloning. Consider it for a moment.
In the film, Ewan MacGregor and Scarlett Johansson are clones who live in a closed colony, unknowingly waiting until their genetic sources need replacement parts for transplant. This can be directly likened to the possibility of cloned humans, and the reality of embryonic stem cells. The ethical argument against human cloning research has always been that human beings could be grown purely for the purpose of being used as spare parts. Few people realize that embryonic stem cell research represents precisely the same ethical quandary.
The argument is often made that the "lines" of terminated embryos are already beyond help, and that they'll never be born. Few people realize that this isn't the issue. The existing embryos are in limited supply. What do you think would happen if embryonic stem cell research led to a cure for some horrible disease? I'll tell you, reader, exactly what would happen: the wholesale harvest of human embryos. Living, viable humans would be turned into little more than spare parts. It's not the research itself that's the issue, it's what would happen if the research yielded results.
It looks to me like The Island is a story of precisely what will happen if embryonic stem cell research achieves success. I'll probably make a point of seeing it.
Thoughts?
Lincoln Six-Echo (McGregor) is a resident of a seemingly utopian but contained facility in the mid-21st century. Like all of the inhabitants of this carefully controlled environment, Lincoln hopes to be chosen to go to the "The Island"—reportedly the last uncontaminated spot on the planet. But Lincoln soon discovers that everything about his existence is a lie. He and all of the other inhabitants of the facility are actually human clones whose only purpose is to provide "spare parts" for their original human counterparts. Realizing it is only a matter of time before he is "harvested," Lincoln makes a daring escape with a beautiful fellow resident named Jordan Two-Delta (Johansson). Relentlessly pursued by the forces of the sinister institute that once housed them, Lincoln and Jordan engage in a race for their lives to literally meet their makers.
Now, we all know that Hollywood suffers from a pathological inability to make a movie that doesn't have some underlying political message. This one's being directed by Michael Bay, the guy who did Armageddon and Pearl Harbor. Armageddon, aside from its global patriotism, seemed to be at least semi-patriotic; Pearl Harbor was extremely lousy, but aside from the travesty of desecrating the memory of all our heroic sailors with an ahistorical script and an asinine love story, it was at least pro-American. I'm going to go out on a limb and say that Michael Bay may not be the self-important scum sucking weasel that most Hollywood directors are.
So, given the quoted section, what do you think the underlying message is? If you ask me, it sounds like this film is going to be a direct allegory for embryonic stem cell research and human cloning. Consider it for a moment.
In the film, Ewan MacGregor and Scarlett Johansson are clones who live in a closed colony, unknowingly waiting until their genetic sources need replacement parts for transplant. This can be directly likened to the possibility of cloned humans, and the reality of embryonic stem cells. The ethical argument against human cloning research has always been that human beings could be grown purely for the purpose of being used as spare parts. Few people realize that embryonic stem cell research represents precisely the same ethical quandary.
The argument is often made that the "lines" of terminated embryos are already beyond help, and that they'll never be born. Few people realize that this isn't the issue. The existing embryos are in limited supply. What do you think would happen if embryonic stem cell research led to a cure for some horrible disease? I'll tell you, reader, exactly what would happen: the wholesale harvest of human embryos. Living, viable humans would be turned into little more than spare parts. It's not the research itself that's the issue, it's what would happen if the research yielded results.
It looks to me like The Island is a story of precisely what will happen if embryonic stem cell research achieves success. I'll probably make a point of seeing it.
Thoughts?
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