Gattaca, 1997.
Directed by Andrew Niccol.
Starring Ethan Hawke, Uma Thurman, Alan Arkin, Jude Law, Loren Dean, Ernest Borgnine, and Gore Vidal.
SYNOPSIS:
Gattaca arrives on 4K, which is welcome news to the fans who have made it a cult classic on home video after its poor 1997 box office results. The remastered print is about as close to theatrical quality as you can get these days, although nothing new was added to the minimal bonus features ported over from past editions.
Released in 1997, Gattaca is a science-fiction film of the cerebral sort, one that’s more concerned with big ideas than flashy spaceship battles. While I’ve long been a fan of franchises like Star Wars, I also appreciate sci-fi that revolves around a Big Idea, like 2001: A Space Odyssey’s ruminations on the evolution of mankind or Blade Runner’s question of what makes us human.
Gattaca, however, is a film so concerned with its Big Idea that the plot and its characters failed to engage me. Ethan Hawke stars as the on-the-nose-named Vincent Freeman, whose parents eschewed the genetic engineering that is common in the not-too-distant future in which the story takes place. As a consequence, he’s expected to have limited aspirations in life, unlike his younger brother, who was the result of the order-off-the-menu process of having babies in this world.
Vincent dreams of going to the stars, though, and he takes a menial job at Gattaca Aerospace Corporation, the company that trains astronauts and sends them to space. There’s an upcoming mission to Saturn’s moon, Titan, and Vincent gets the chance to join the training program by using the identity of Jerome Eugene Morrow (Jude Law), who was the product of eugenics but was paralyzed in an accident.
Every day, Vincent must painstakingly ensure he can get through Gattaca’s security, from literally scrubbing the truth off him so he doesn’t leave behind flakes of skin to using Jerome’s blood and urine for the routine testing regimen. When the Titan mission director is murdered, however, two detectives (Alan Arkin and Loren Dean) begin an investigation that threatens to expose Vincent’s ruse.
Meanwhile, Vincent has befriended and started to fall in love with a fellow trainee, Irene Cassini (Uma Thurman), who is in danger of having her status revoked if Vincent is found out. The relationship feels like it has been tacked onto the story, as if writer and director Andrew Niccol felt that Vincent needed an arbitrary love interest. Her character doesn’t serve much of a purpose, and the story would have mostly been the same if she wasn’t there.
In contrast, Vincent’s relationship with Jerome has some layers to it, including the revelation of what led to Jerome’s accident. Given the film’s subject matter, the information raises intriguing questions about a society in which nearly everyone is the result of genetic engineering: If we’re all tip-top specimens, then no one is really unique. And if that’s the case, how does that impact us psychologically?
Finally, there’s Vincent’s relationship with his brother, which was always competitive in nature and came to an abrupt end when Vincent simply ran away from home one day. That relationship comes full circle, although the way in which it does so ties into the murder investigation, which feels like it’s out of another film, with hard-boiled dialogue that’s straight out of a B-grade noir. The way the investigation comes to its conclusion didn’t make much sense to me, again feeling like something that needed to be there for Niccol to hang his Big Idea onto.
Gattaca didn’t do well at the box office in 1997, but it found an audience on home video in later years. If you’re one of its fans, I’m sure you will ignore my review and will want to know if this new 4K UltraHD Blu-ray disc is worth the upgrade. (On a side note, not every movie works for everyone, so I’m fine with those who had a different reaction to this one.)
If you’re looking for a visual presentation that is worthy of the new 4K format, then I can say, yes, this remastered print is worth the upgrade. This is a print that’s likely about as close to what it originally looked like in theaters as you can get these days. There’s some light grain, which is to be expected of a film shot on traditional 35mm stock, and the image is a bit soft in places, but overall, it’s a solid presentation.
The 4K’s disc only extra is the theatrical trailer. You’ll find the rest of the bonus features on the accompanying Blu-ray, which doesn’t use the restored print. A code for a digital copy of the film is included too. I don’t have any previous editions of Gattaca, so I’m not sure if everything was ported over from past releases, although I do know nothing new was created, which I’m sure is a bummer for fans.
Here’s the bonus features rundown:
- Welcome to Gattaca (22 minutes): This is a behind-the-scenes look at the making of the film that was put together for the 2008 Blu-ray. (I believe everything else here is from the DVD era.) It’s clear that Niccol, his stars, and the production team were enamored of the Big Idea they were tackling with the film, which I can appreciate – I just wish the nuts and bolts of the storytelling were handled a bit better.
- Original featurette (7 minutes): This is one of those DVD era EPKs (electronic press kits) meant to pump up a film for the media and movie theater owners, so don’t expect much here. It’s a fun watch if you’re a fan, but it doesn’t dig deep into anything.
- Do Not Alter? (15 minutes): Gore Vidal, who plays the head honcho at Gattaca in the film, narrates this discussion of the science behind the movie. It’s easy to see how this information engaged Niccol’s imagination as he crafted his script.
- Deleted scenes and an outtake (11 minutes): Unfortunately, the quality of the deleted scenes is very poor, which I assume was the result of the studio not caring how they were stored in the wake of Gattaca’s dismal box office showing. However, they’re an intriguing look at what could have been, especially an alternate ending that, in my opinion, would have added some unnecessary sentimentality to the proceedings.
And that’s it for the bonus features. The discs are housed in a nice Steelbook.
Flickering Myth Rating – Film: ★★★ / Movie: ★★
Brad Cook
