Jake Gyllenhaal stars in Source Code, the new science fiction
action film directed by Duncan Jones, who gave us the excellent Moon. Gyllenhaal
appears here as Captain Colter Stevens, a U.S. Army helicopter pilot serving in
Afghanistan who abruptly finds himself on board a commuter train bound for Chicago.
He’s speaking with a beautiful woman named Christina (Michelle Monaghan). Stevens,
not knowing what’s happening, promptly freaks out. When he goes to the restroom
aboard the train, he’s stunned to see that he's actually a completely different
person, a school teacher named Sean Fentress. But just as Stevens is getting a
grip on this strange new reality, the train blows up in a fireball, killing him
and all others aboard.
Stevens awakens in some sort of pod, in a place that’s identified as the
Beleaguered Castle. An Air Force Captain named Goodwin (Vera Farminga) is calling
for him over a video intercom. Stevens, still jumpy from having just been ‘killed’
is told by Goodwin that he must go through everything he went through on the
train again. It turns out that Stevens is serving as part of a special experimental
program where he’s sent back in time, where his consciousness winds up in the
body of an ill-fated passenger aboard the train, eight minutes before the bomb
goes off. This train bomb is only the first by the bomber, who plans to set off
a dirty bomb within Chicago itself, and so Stevens had better hustle if he’s
going to stop him.
Audacious, intelligent and just plain suspenseful, Source Code is a heck of a
fun thrill ride. It’s a well-done action film that doesn’t slight the science
fiction elements, as Dr. Rutledge (well-played by Jeffery Wright), the creator of
the Source Code--the scientific experiment that Stevens is a part of--explains
to Stevens that he’s not actually traveling back in time, per se. The events
where the people aboard the train were all killed have already happened. Instead,
Stevens is in the memories of a deceased passenger so he can find
the bomber before he can set off the dirty bomb. So it’s not exactly Quantum Leap--the old SF series that starred
Scott Bakula as a time traveler who leapt into the bodies of people in the
past--but Jones still has Bakula appear in a cameo voice-over as Steven’s dad in
a nice homage.
Gyllenhaal is very good in the lead role, handling the action-hero business with
ease while making the viewer care for his character. Michelle Monaghan is also
superbly sympathetic as Christina, and the always good Vera Farminga ably essays
her Goodwin character, who starts out as a cold fish, but winds up having a heart
of gold. At first, the storyline, with Stevens going back over and over, is
presented in the familiar ‘repeated scenario’ sequence made famous by
Bill Murray’s Groundhog Day. But Jones wisely
ditches this format pretty quickly once Stevens realizes that he can affect a
great deal of change in his missions into the past. Source Code is an outstanding
science fiction thriller that’s enthralling to watch, thanks to its intensity,
as well as its smart storytelling.
--SF
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