Taglines: The Prisoner. Her Cell.
Gattaca movie storyline. In the not-too-distant future, a less-than-perfect man wants to travel to the stars. Society has categorized Vincent Freeman as less than suitable given his genetic make-up and he has become one of the underclass of humans that are only useful for menial jobs.
To move ahead, he assumes the identity of Jerome Morrow, a perfect genetic specimen who is a paraplegic as a result of a car accident. With professional advice, Vincent learns to deceive DNA and urine sample testing. Just when he is finally scheduled for a space mission, his program director is killed and the police begin an investigation, jeopardizing his secret.
Gattaca is a 1997 American science fiction film written and directed by Andrew Niccol. It stars Ethan Hawke and Uma Thurman, with Jude Law, Loren Dean, Ernest Borgnine, Gore Vidal, and Alan Arkin appearing in supporting roles.[2] The film presents a biopunk vision of a future society driven by eugenics where potential children are conceived through genetic manipulation to ensure they possess the best hereditary traits of their parents. The film centers on Vincent Freeman, played by Hawke, who was conceived outside the eugenics program and struggles to overcome genetic discrimination to realize his dream of traveling into space.
The movie draws on concerns over reproductive technologies which facilitate eugenics, and the possible consequences of such technological developments for society. It also explores the idea of destiny and the ways in which it can and does govern lives. Characters in Gattaca continually battle both with society and with themselves to find their place in the world and who they are destined to be according to their genes.
The film’s title is based on the letters G, A, T, and C, which stand for guanine, adenine, thymine, and cytosine, the four nucleobases of DNA. It was a 1997 nominee for the Academy Award for Best Art Direction and the Golden Globe Award for Best Original Score. The film flopped at the box office, but it received generally positive reviews and has since gained a cult following.
About the Production
The exteriors (including the roof scene), and some of the interior shots, of the Gattaca complex were filmed at Frank Lloyd Wright’s 1960 Marin County Civic Center in San Rafael, California.[6] The parking lot scenes were shot at the Otis College of Art and Design, distinguished by its punch card-like windows, located near LAX, the main airport of Los Angeles.
The exterior of Vincent Freeman’s house was shot at the CLA Building on the campus of California State Polytechnic University, Pomona (Cal Poly Pomona). Other exterior shots were filmed at the bottom of the spillway of the Sepulveda Dam and outside The Forum in Inglewood. The solar power plant mirrors sequence was filmed at the Kramer Junction Solar Electric Generating Station.
The movie uses a swimming treadmill in the opening minutes to punctuate the swimming and futuristic themes. The futuristic turbine cars are based on 1960s car models like Rover P6, Citroën DS19 and Studebaker Avanti, and futuristic buildings represent modern architecture of the 1950s.
The film was shot under the working title The Eighth Day, a reference to the seven days of creation in the Christian Bible. However, by the time its release was scheduled for the fall of 1997, the Belgian film Le huitième jour had already been released in the US under the title The Eighth Day. As a result, the film was retitled Gattaca.
Gattaca was released in theaters on October 24, 1997, and opened at number 5 at the box office; trailing I Know What You Did Last Summer, The Devil’s Advocate, Kiss the Girls, and Seven Years in Tibet. Over the first weekend the film brought in $4.3 million. It ended its theatrical run with a domestic total of $12.5 million against a reported production budget of $36 million.
Gattaca (1997)
Directed by: Andrew Niccol
Starring: Ethan Hawke, Uma Thurman, Alan Arkin, Jude Law, Loren Dean, Ernest Borgnine, Elias Koteas, Maya Rudolph, Elizabeth Dennehy, Jayne Brook
Screenplay by: Andrew Niccol
Production Design by: Jan Roelfs
Cinematography by: Slawomir Idziak
Film Editing by: Lisa Zeno Churgin
Costume Design by: Colleen Atwood
Set Decoration by: Nancy Nye
Art Direction by: Sarah Knowles
Music by: Michael Nyman
MPAA Rating: PG-13 for brief violent images, language, and some sexuality.
Distributed by: Columbia Pictures
Release Date: October 24, 1997
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