Jim (2010) Dir: Jeremy Morris-Burke
This film opens this Friday, October 15th in Los Angeles area.
This sci-fi film focuses on a middle-aged widower named Jim Kotofsky who is reaching his breaking point from debt, unemployment, and isolation. He is considering the help of a biotech firm, using his wife’s frozen eggs, creating an heir who will be engineered to overcome the obstacles of common men.Meanwhile, in the distant future Niskaa, the leader of a group of genetically modified beings, controls a race of worker clones in a super-industrialized, post-human Earth. He discovers a young clone who seems to be connected to Jim via dreams.
When I first saw the film’s poster, it intrigued me. It looked to be a sci-fi film about cloning and genetic tampering. Then came some clever little viral ads online for Lorigen, the fictional biotech firm in the film, explaining their ability to bioengineer a kid to look, act, and perhaps even think a certain way. This idea was an intriguing one. They could have done much with that. It’s a pity that the film didn’t explore this aspect too much. There isn’t really much sci-fi here, nor is there anything here that is too original.
It probably wasn’t a good idea to have two stories of vastly different worlds going on at once, given that one is fairly believable while the other is a bit sketchy. Jim’s story takes place in the modern times. We see Jim, happy, content, and working, conversing with his wife. We later see Jim, after his wife’s death, unemployed and gradually losing touch with himself and society. One can sympathize with Jim, especially in this day and age. The other story takes place in the post-apocalyptic future, centering on a young clone running away from a leader of an army of worker clones. This clone is psychically connected with Jim (of modern times) through dreams. How? Why? I’m not sure, but it looked to be a pretty major plot element, which actually wasn’t. There isn’t much tension in this particular world because the limits of possibility and established rules are quite fuzzy—you just find things out along the way. This dystopic future contains familiar elements from other films, without giving enough detail, including what looks like the Wheel of Pain from Conan the Barbarian.
The script could have used more humor. There are small, dark elements of it when Lorigen is introduced in the film, although far too late in the film. The happy moments in this film are few. While I felt sorry for Jim, I had a hard time understanding what his wife saw in him. I was hoping for something that brought him alive as a character—normally, we want to cheer for our characters, not just feel sorry for them. Nevertheless, Dan Illian plays Jim the way he probably was meant to be played on the script. The character seems written to stay mostly one note. Vanessa Morris-Burke is likeable and perhaps the brightest spot in the whole film, as Susan Kotofsky, Jim’s wife.
Made on a miniscule budget, the framing of the shots, the editing, and the imagery is not unlike the modern Twilight Zone episodes of the early 2000’s and could've made a decent 30-minute episode. Given its length, there are pacing issues. Given the film’s limited resources and lack of a crew, it’s still interesting to see a fairly ambitious project that tries to go beyond the constraints of its budget. Admittedly, one can’t help but think that the initial concept could have spawned a better story.
My Rating: * 1/2 out of **** stars
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