Huh. So, I have now watched it, and I mostly agree with Luke (at least up until the final scenes, but I’ll get to that). Maybe the intent of the movie wasn’t to show how science can be dangerous without proper oversight (actually, I’m pretty sure it wasn’t, based on a lot of the scenes), but overall it did give me that impression. Also, regarding scientific utility, I thought they addressed that pretty well (curing diseases and all that). Sure, an actual human splice as portrayed in the movie was quite obviously the wrong way to go to achieve that goal, but then again they did originally do it just to prove they could with human DNA.

I also agree that the way Dren turned out was in part because of her “parents”. However, a much bigger matter in my opinion is the fact that she aged extremely fast. I don’t know about you, but for me growing up was quite a challenge when it took 15-20 years. I can’t even imagine the psychological ramifications of going through it all in what, a couple of months? There’s no time to learn how to interact with people, no time to fully learn the difference between right and wrong.

All things considered I thought it was a pretty good movie. It did raise a lot of questions, many of them concerning morality. Unfortunately when they were all at the farm near the end, it turned into Generic Horror Movie. It really bothers me that they couldn’t think of a better ending than that. Up until that point it was fine, but that final scene in the woods felt a whole lot like “Me am play gods”.

re: update

I should comment more often :)

Interesting, I’ll have to watch this movie now just to see who I agree with more. Your argument is basically a variant of “If we outlaw guns, only outlaws will have guns”, and as such I completely agree. I just hope I’ll get the same impression from the movie =)

@ TJ:

Great, Godwins law invoked in just 4 comments. I think this is a new record on this blog. :)

Luke Maciak wrote:

On the other hand the idea of doing weird experiments for shits and giggles just because we can is not that outlandish.

*cough* Dr. Mengele *cough*

…

@ astine:

Point taken. I guess the creature could still become aggressive and rape-y even without the parental abuse. I guess I was just surprised that they didn’t go that route. Also I felt like they didn’t demonize science and scientists as a whole – just the two protagonists who were clearly unhinged from the start. But perhaps they did it in a roundabout way – instead of demonizing science they have shown us crazy scientists with nothing to balance them against.

You are absolutely right that the human splice had basically no utility. That bothered me too. On the other hand the idea of doing weird experiments for shits and giggles just because we can is not that outlandish.

Also good point about the shaky sscience in the film. Especially the puny wings. The creature should not even be able to glide on these things.

Interesting how we both watched the same movie and had drastically different reactions to it. :)

Seriously? I hated this movie. Personally, I wouldn’t describe it as very ‘smart’ at all. From a mere story-telling standpoint, you can tell how it’s going to end from the first few scenes and despite your impressions, it played out the “I am play gods” plot to a tee. The protagonists created an ego monster. The splice had little to no practical scientific utility but did serve to boost their egos. The fact that they do it without over-site is inconsequential there, as a large number of those movies have scientists acting without over-site. Dr Frankenstein (the quintessential scientist playing God) had a distinct lack of over-site if you’ll recall.

Anyway, the frustration I had with this movie was the same frustration that I had when I read Frankenstein. The protagonists are all absolute morons. For starters, they knowingly created and raised a creature with human intelligence and an alien psychology. Even with proper resources and public funding and over-site I cannot imagine a way to care for the thing that was both ethical and prevented unknown disasters. You assume that the creature turned dangerous solely because of its upbringing, but it was heavily implies by the movie that the reason it turned out the way it did was that its psychological makeup was determined by the creatures that went into it. They could have been perfect parents and it still could have tried to kill/rape them.

Of course the actual science in the movie was complete bullshit, defying the laws of thermodynamics among other things. In that final sequence when the create utters its final words, I (and a few others) burst out laughing because it was so goofy and unbelievable.

Dresden Codak FTW! :D