I really didn't like this movie. It is very poorly made which partly owes to its low budget but then Primer had a low budget and managed to seem much more professional than this.
SPOILERS AHEAD!
The scientific basis of the movie is inherently flawed as it says that his genes have happened to evolve such that they no longer have flaws when copying(mutations). But this is like saying that if you built a car perfectly you could reduce its chance of having an accident to zero when in fact the probability of the car having an accident is not a function solely of the car, it also depends upon the environment. In the same way, the chance of mutation is dependent upon the environment such as ionising radiation and mutagens and thus the mutations could not be entirely stopped by his genome.
However, many sci-fi films have shaky scientific basis so we may excuse this. Then there is the fact that he doesn't scar, which would have to be unrelated to the previous genome modification but again we can excuse this as it isn't a major issue.
The part that really irritated me was when it continued to peddle such misconceptions like that people still thought the Earth was flat at the time of Columbus even though that hadn't been a serious viewpoint since at least the days of Eratosthenes some one thousand years before. At one point he also attributes his fortuitous luck in not succumbing to disease to the idea that the 'Water and food were so much purer back then' (meaning neolithic times) when this is just patently false and plays to the prejudices of the New Age pseudo-intellectuals that seem to worship this film. We are much better off today in the age of quality control and water treatment than we were then even if there is the occasional gripe about HFCS or food intolerances.
The final straw that proved just how crappy the film really is came when he reveals that he is in fact Jesus and spent time with the Buddha etc. by which point I was seriously wondering whether all the positive reviews of this movie were in fact the work of a Moriarty of trolls.
In conclusion, the movie had some promise but was wrecked by poor acting and a host of basic scientific and historical mistakes. The movie seems to be popular only because it plays on New Age notions of the 'pure' neolithic times and the apparent simplicity of religion. If you want a good, cerebral experience then read a book, there must be dozens of sci-fi stories which explore similar themes but in greater depth and without the patronising attitude. Even some non-fiction works touch on similar themes, I would strongly recommend those by Carl Sagan for example.
SPOILERS AHEAD!
The scientific basis of the movie is inherently flawed as it says that his genes have happened to evolve such that they no longer have flaws when copying(mutations). But this is like saying that if you built a car perfectly you could reduce its chance of having an accident to zero when in fact the probability of the car having an accident is not a function solely of the car, it also depends upon the environment. In the same way, the chance of mutation is dependent upon the environment such as ionising radiation and mutagens and thus the mutations could not be entirely stopped by his genome.
However, many sci-fi films have shaky scientific basis so we may excuse this. Then there is the fact that he doesn't scar, which would have to be unrelated to the previous genome modification but again we can excuse this as it isn't a major issue.
The part that really irritated me was when it continued to peddle such misconceptions like that people still thought the Earth was flat at the time of Columbus even though that hadn't been a serious viewpoint since at least the days of Eratosthenes some one thousand years before. At one point he also attributes his fortuitous luck in not succumbing to disease to the idea that the 'Water and food were so much purer back then' (meaning neolithic times) when this is just patently false and plays to the prejudices of the New Age pseudo-intellectuals that seem to worship this film. We are much better off today in the age of quality control and water treatment than we were then even if there is the occasional gripe about HFCS or food intolerances.
The final straw that proved just how crappy the film really is came when he reveals that he is in fact Jesus and spent time with the Buddha etc. by which point I was seriously wondering whether all the positive reviews of this movie were in fact the work of a Moriarty of trolls.
In conclusion, the movie had some promise but was wrecked by poor acting and a host of basic scientific and historical mistakes. The movie seems to be popular only because it plays on New Age notions of the 'pure' neolithic times and the apparent simplicity of religion. If you want a good, cerebral experience then read a book, there must be dozens of sci-fi stories which explore similar themes but in greater depth and without the patronising attitude. Even some non-fiction works touch on similar themes, I would strongly recommend those by Carl Sagan for example.