Movie Review: Source Code (2011)

Source Code (2011) directed by Duncan Jones

MPAA rating

PG-13 for some violence including disturbing images, and for language

ZPAA rating

Teens and up

Synopsis & Review

A man wakes up on a train, disoriented and unsure why he's there. A cute woman sitting across from him chats with him while a passerby spills her drink on his shoe. He doesn't quite know what's going on and excuses himself. Things become clearer when he looks in the bathroom mirror and sees another guy's face. Well, sort of clearer. Pretty soon the train explodes, killing him, the cute woman, and everyone else on board. You'd think that would be the end of the movie, but it is only the beginning.

The guy is suddenly in a harness in a dark room. He's suspended in front of several monitors. A woman's voice talks to him, trying to find out what happened, then trying to get him to remember himself. The guy is really Coulter Stevens, a U.S. Army helicopter pilot now works on a secret government project. They've been able to link him to the last memories of a man who died on a Chicago train early that morning. They are using that link to find the bomber, since the bomber has threatened to strike again, and soon. The army scientists send him back to the moment when he wakes up on the train in hopes that he can discover the bomber and his next target.

The premise is intriguing, both the mystery on the train and the whole operation trying to unravel that mystery. The joy of the film is in finding out what is going on, especially with Stevens. The twists in the story are good though some are predictable. The end of the film is suspenseful, but not in the best way. The outcome seems (to me) a little arbitrary. Not that it does not make sense; it could go one of many ways, any of which are just as likely as the others. The movie stuck with me for days thinking about it, but in a very good way. The movie is a solid sci-fi thriller that I would watch again.

Movie Trailer