Review of Source Code (2011) by Rieve S — 14 Mar 2013

Hollywood needs more directors like Duncan Jones. Too often do we get dumbed down trash that treats filmmaking as nothing more than 'mindless entertainment' for an audience that can't - or perhaps shouldn't - appreciate something for its vision.

On the other side of things the 'intellectual' crowd is too often pre-occupied with a theme or message to really craft something exciting and engaging. While there are a few notable directors who who meld intelligence and entertainment successfully (Christopher Nolan), too many who try fall victim to ideological grandstanding that compromises the integrity of their work (I'm looking at you James Cameron).

But with Source Code Duncan Jones seems to be welcoming himself into the select group of directors who do it right. While there are a number of holes, and the ending is slightly overlong, Jones generally does balance well between what he shows us and what he trusts to the imagination of the audience.

Considering the bulk of the action takes place during a repeating 8 min segment of time, the details of each encounter are retold in ways that move the story forward and reveal more about the characters and situations.

Another welcome aspect of the film is the thematic bond it shares with Duncan's earlier work, Moon. Questions of identity, knowledge, memory, and trust--specifically the trust of one's employers/superiors--are central to the plot-line and the character.

It's very clear these themes will be a signature element in his future as a filmmaker he does need some improvement in masking these ideas early on. As in Moon, the resolution is very clear from early on, and the major "twists" do not come as any sort of surprise.

However, the story being so elegantly told as it is, even when these foreseen elements officially come to light, its easy to appreciate the manner in which we got to that point, even if the intention may have been to shock or surprise.