Tagline: One push can change everything.
Telekinesis. Clairvoyance. Telepathy. For decades, governments around the globe have investigated the possibility of using paranormal abilities as highly effective, covert weapons against their enemies-and even their friends.
In 1945, the Nazis launched the first effort to develop psychic warriors. Soon after, the Soviets and the Americans began to conduct their own top-secret research programs, including the CIA’s notorious MKUltra mind control experiments, to develop paranormal operatives, the ultimate tool for undetectable surveillance.
Those real-life experiments inspired the riveting action-thriller Push, set in a deadly world of psychic espionage where the ability to move objects using only the mind, see the future, create new realities and kill without ever touching the victim can turn a person into lethal weapon-or a target. In Push, a young man and a teenage girl with extraordinary gifts take on a clandestine agency in a battle they can win only if they can change the future.
Push is a 2009 American science fiction action-thriller film directed by Paul McGuigan and written by David Bourla. Starring Chris Evans, Dakota Fanning, Camilla Belle, and Djimon Hounsou, the film centers on a group of people born with various superhuman abilities who band together in order to take down a government agency that is using a dangerous drug to enhance their powers in hopes of creating an army of super soldiers.
On its opening weekend, the film opened #6 grossing $10,079,109 in 2,313 theaters with a $4,358 average. The film grossed $48,858,618 worldwide, and $16,285,488 in DVD sales in the US alone making $65,157,106 (not including worldwide DVD sales) surpassing its budget cost of $38 million by over $27 million.
About the Story
This film uses many sudden flashes to other scenes to connect information and events, making it difficult to give a single, clean chronology of events.
“Ten years ago”, a young boy named Nick Gant is walking nervously through a motel, led by his father(Joel Gretsch). They pass a maid and after a glance at her wristwatch, hurriedly enter a room. Nick’s father tells him that one day a girl will give him a flower and that he needs to help her, explaining “help her, help us all.” Nick clearly doesn’t understand, but his father just apologizes, and says “I always said you were special, turns out I was right.” He hugs Nick and then telekinetically shoves him through the wall just before a team of agents (led by the maid) burst in and subdues him while Nick watches. The head agent, Henry Carver (Djimon Hounsou) enters, and a concussive force rips through the room, resulting in the dad’s body flying out. Carver emerges, saying, “What a waste,” and orders the body to be packaged for dissection.
During the opening credits, we get a crash course in the history of the world, narrated by Cassie Holmes (Dakota Fanning). In 1945, Hitler and his Nazis were using experiments on people who were born with special abilities to create an ultra-powerful army. However, the war ending didn’t put a stop to it. Other countries, fueled by the Cold War, set up their own branches, or Divisions, to investigate and weaponize psychic abilities. Types of powers: Watchers are able to see the future in quick flashes and scenes. (This is literally a visual skill, which is shown to be a weakness). Movers can move objects and people with their minds. Pushers can “push” people into believing that certain things are or aren’t true (like hypnosis). Eye contact is required.
The following are only quickly mentioned at this point, but explained by demonstration later in the film: Bleeders emit high-pitched sonic screams that destroy their targets (glass, internal organs…) Stitches can disassemble or reassemble any damaged tissue. Sniffs can take any object and get a history of where it’s been and who has touched it. Wipers can erase controlled amounts of memory. Shifters make objects appear to be something else, retaining approximate dimensions. Shadows, people whose ability is basically to block the effectiveness of other clairvoyants (the Sniffers, mainly).
Cassie is a Watcher, and although she can know the future, she says that the only thing to know for sure about it is that it’s always changing, and can change just by knowing it. “Today”, in a government facility somewhere, we see a girl (Camilla Belle) being injected with some substance while Carver, now a little gray around the bald spots, looks on worriedly. We see a woman in a patient’s gown being led down a hallway from behind, and watch as she drops a glass marble, which goes rolling through the facility, bouncing off walls and closing doors on its way to somewhere.
The girl seemingly dies on the table, but before she can be disconnected, her heart starts again and she is soon moving fast, breaking out of the facility while Carver stares in awe. He shouts at “Kira” to stop, but she naturally doesn’t listen. She evades various security measures, interspersed with images of the marble rolling and bouncing at precise angles off of doors and walls. Kira reaches an exit, whose automatically-shutting door is just barely held open by the dropped marble rolling into place at precisely the right moment, and escapes while Carver and his Mover henchman Victor (Neil Jackson) discuss the fact that Kira is the first to survive the injection and that they need to get her back pronto, leading Carver to order all Watchers and Sniffers in the country to full alert.
“Two days later”, we see the now fully-grown Nick (Chris Evans) waking up in his Hong Kong apartment. After some finger-flexing and moving-practice, he practices making a trio of dice land the way he wants them to. Satisfied, he heads down to the park and does a little betting, but after losing a set of rolls and just barely not making the last die turn properly, he has to flee (with a now-bloody nose) from the men to whom he now owes six thousand dollars.
Nick is about to enter his apartment when two Sniffer agents from Division, Mack (Corey Stoll) and Holden (Scott Michael Campbell), show up and threaten their way into the room (though they arrogantly tell him that “if they wanted him, he would be in the back of a van by now”). From them we learn that many Americans with powers have expatriated to Hong Kong to avoid Division. We are also introduced to the true power of Sniffers as they tell him they tracked him from a 10-year-old toothbrush, and begin to casually go through his apartment touching and smelling things to see where he’s been and if he’s seen “the girl” they are looking for.
After finding that he hasn’t, they warn him not to do anything stupid like trying to run from them. He contemplates the guns in his clothing drawer, but hides them instead of using them, and the two agents leave. Nick starts gathering stuff up to flee when the phone rings. He answers it and is told to “let me in, and put down the gun”, just as a knock sounds on the door. He opens it, gun drawn, and sees Cassie, who B-lines for the chicken she knows is in the fridge and tells him about a case they need to find that could net them about six million dollars, which would get Nick out of his debts.
The Abilities
Movers – Nick Gant (Chris Evans), a second-generation mover, can transport objects though space with his mind. From dice to guns to a foe’s body, a mover can remotely manipulate the physical world to his advantage.
Watchers – A watcher has the ability to see the future. Some, like Cassie Holmes (Dakota Fanning), produce detailed drawings of their visions. The problem for watchers is that the future can be changed by events both large and small, so they have to keep checking make sure their past visions are still accurate.
Pushers – Far more advanced than mere telepaths who communicate through thought, a Pusher can plant ideas so powerful in a subject’s mind that it is impossible to distinguish them from actual thoughts or memories. Both Kira (Camilla Belle) and Carver (Djimon Honsou) are pushers, the most feared and dangerous of the psychically gifted.
Stitches – A psychic healer like Stowe (Maggie Siff) can lay hands on a person and heal their wounds, but beware-cross a Stitch and he or she can return the patient to their injured state.
Sniffs – Like human bloodhounds, sniffs can track their quarry by scent, even if all they have to go on is a decade-old toothbrush. Feared by their fellow paranormals, sniffs are often used by the Division to hunt down its targets.
Shadows – Shadows like Pinky Stein (Nate Mooney) can use their minds to hide anything-from a renegade psychic to an entire skyscraper-from sniffs. But they can only shield people and objects temporarily from watchers.
Bleeders – Bleeders like the Pop boys possess the ability to shatter glass and blood vessels with the sound of their voices.
Shifts – A person with this skill never needs cash. A shift like Hook (Cliff Curtis) can transform the appearance of any object can at will. But there’s a hitch: the effect doesn’t last long.
Wipers – A wiper can erase any memory merely by laying hands on a subject. Nick and Kira turn to a local Chinese wiper to keep the watchers-who can predict future actions based on intentions-off their trails.
Continue Reading and View the Theatrical Trailer
Push (2009)
Directed by: Paul McGuigan
Starring by: Chris Evans, Dakota Fanning, Camilla Belle, Djimon Hounsou, Maggie Siff, Scott Michael Campbell, Colin Ford, Joel Gretsch, Robert Tsonos, Brandon Rhea
Screenplay by: David Bourla
Production Design by: François Séguin
Cinematography by: Peter Sova
Film Editing by: Nicolas Trembasiewicz
Costume Design by: Laura Goldsmith, Nina Proctor
Set Decoration by: Jeffrey Kong
Music by: Neil Davidge
MPAA Rating: PG-13 for intense sequences of violence and action, brief strong language, smoking and a scene of teen drinking.
Distributed by: Summit Entertainment
Release Date: February 6, 2009
Visits: 95
