Movie Synthesis: “The Island”

By NOBLE, Y.A

“The Island” is a movie that can be classified as mixed futuristic sci-fi and thriller
directed by Michael Bay in the year 2005. This eye opening screenplay was about a contained
facility where all residents in it are known to be “survivors” from a very contagious disease or
virus which hopes to be chosen to go to “The Island.” These infamous island is known to be the
last uncontaminated land on planet where, the very reason why all residents of the facility desires
to go here. In order to go there, one must win the “the lottery” and there will only be one winner
per lottery. At the first part of the movie, it was seen that Lincoln Six Echo – a character played
by actor Ewan McGregor – is very inquisitive where he almost questioned everything around
him and the things he has been doing in the facility such us why does every resident wears white
and the same as his, where and how does survivors being found, why does their health is
carefully and strictly monitored and other more intriguing things. The action in the movie started
when Lincoln Six Echo started having shocking nightmares of him being drowned and him being
in a large boat together with another resident in the facility, Jordan Two Delta. Soon enough due
to Lincoln Six Echo’s curiosity, he was able to discover all the secrets behind the facility that
they are in including the fact that there is no “The Island” instead he found out that all those
previous winners in the lottery did not go to the island but were forced to death after giving birth
as a surrogate and another scenario is that organs of a man was being removed. As Jordan Two
Delta won the said lottery the night before, Lincoln Six Echo tried to convince Jordan Two Delta
to escape the facility to find the whole truth about their existence. This is where they both found
out that all residents in the facility are clones of someone from the outside world and there are no
such things as the contagious disease or virus, survivors, and “The Island.”

The whole movie’s concept was set in a circumstance where all the impossible today
might be possible in the nearest future. Before, the concept of genetic engineering is quite a blur
where most people think this concept is not feasible but looking at today’s setting, everything has
a chance to be possible. Truthfully, I’m not that knowledgeable about cloning but all I know is
cloning allows someone to have a multiple version of oneself, like there’s a version 2 of me, and
these cloning were already tested to some animals but as far as I know, they really haven’t done
it in humans . With the technologies that our generation has been developing nowadays, I have a
great feeling that cloning might be very possible to humans. Even so, I’m having some issues
about this matter as from what I’ve watched in the movie, I found some things that are quite
bothering.

Humans like us in the movie were free to while live their own lives while their clones
were kept in a closed facility where all of them are carefully taken care of. The knowledge of
these humans to their clones are very limited where they believed that they are in a vegetative
state, don’t have any emotions, don’t have an ability to think, things like that. Truth is, it’s the
other way around. Them too has feelings, emotions, has an ability to think, and all the things that
a human person can do, they can also do. Moreover, after a clone has served its purpose, they
would just dispose it just like a disposable plastic spoon. That scenario really bothers me. For
me, those clones in the movie were also part of our society where they could also feel, think, feel
love, they are part of us. For me, killing a clone is not fine as I feel and believe that clones are
also like us people.

There are way a lot of things that are left unexplained and difficult to understand about
the concept of cloning in the movie so I’m not quite sure if I’d be fully okay with cloning if one
day this would really be applicable in real life. I’m just afraid that we, the people of this world,
would be dependent on to these clones that we were having someday. Most of us would
definitely live their lives to the fullest without worrying much as there would be an alternative
ready already if something goes wrong with us. With such thinking of people, the possibility of
that scenario may really happen in the future.

Summing it all up, from my personal view, genetic engineering enables us to do

something that all of us thought that may not work but as years and different technologies rises,
it is slowly happening little by little. I think this is good for everyone but at some point it has
limitations. Even though this would give us more opportunities to continue or make life, this
should be carefully taken of as there could be a lot of possibilities that a life could be at stake or
be risked.