The Island (PG-13, 2005)

It's 2019, and Lincoln Six Echo (Ewan McGregor) is disturbed by nightmares that run counter to his conditioned belief that the "island" is a paradise, the last unscathed location in a post-apocalyptic world. He and his friend Jordan Two Delta (Scarlett Johansson) live at a facility run by Dr. Merrick (Sean Bean), until they are "chosen" to leave for the island. Lincoln learns his dreams are "genetic memories," and that he and his community are all clones, paid for by wealthy people who plan to use the clones' organs, genes, and wombs in order to prolong or enhance their own, "original" lives. Helped by engineering, non-clone friend McCord (Steve Buscemi), Lincoln and Jordan learn the world has not been destroyed, escape the facility, and flee to Los Angeles. Merrick hires a mercenary crew to hunt them down, led by former Special Forces soldier Albert Laurent (Djimon Hounsou), who has a particular, historically motivated understanding of breeding people for money.

Loud, fast, and fulsome, this action movie actually spends a few minutes pondering ethical questions. But just a few. For the most part, The Island is simplistic science fiction, pitting very athletic, very attractive heroes on the run against plainly despicable corporate villains.

Besides Hounsou's character, the other visible black man is a football star (Michael Clarke Duncan), or rather, his clone, whose vigorous resistance to harvesting surgery initially reveals the truth to an understandably horrified Lincoln. Most of the film, however, is given over to the pretty white clones' multi-faceted education -- in running, spending money, driving, and soft-focus kissing.

Studio: DreamWorks
Director: Michael Bay
Cast: Ewan McGregor, Scarlett Johansson, Sean Bean
Genre: Action/Adventure
Run time: 127 minutes
Theatrical release: July 22, 2005
DVD release: December 13, 2005
MPAA Rating: PG-13
MPAA explanation: intense sequences of violence and action, some sexuality and language