Gattaca
1997
🎯 Verdict
✍️ Full Review
What begins as a personal grooming ritual akin to Patrick Bateman in American Psycho metamorphoses itself into a very personal journey about the illusion and tyranny associated with an extreme form of meritocracy, preordained legacy, identity and ambition along with elite class hegemony and how much of a determined formidable weight one must require to punch through all that. Although I don't know what needs more suspension of disbelief that they tried to pass Ethan Hawke as a doppelganger of Jude Law or make it so that Hawke wouldn't pass up as 6'1", this sci-fi refreshed my memory as to why the 90s and early 2000s were a paradigm shifting period for the science fiction genre. I can only guess, Is it because the technology at the turn of the century complemented the horizon of the futuristic ideas and daring vision or that up and comer celebrities used to throw their hats in the ring on a stage breaking in groundbreaking concepts which paved the way for well-established actors to take risks in the later periods within this same genre. Though it's less techy tech and not at all high-concept, rather it plays like a thriller surrounding a swindler with a cat and mouse routine, Gattaca has its moments while it misses on other marks. It's not very Arthur Clarke or Greg Egan sci-fi, it's more Ishiguro sci-fi. My contention was as it has always been with movies such as these with one too many lucky interventions, when the plot is riding on so many obstacles being cleared away with so many coincidences falling right into the lap, putting another one at the end just might break the camel's back.