Source Code

In 2009, director Duncan Jones brought his film Moon to the Seattle International Film Festival. The screening was sold out and very well received. After the screening and the Q&A I wondered what this talented, energetic director would do next.

And here it is. Source Code is a tightly written, tautly directed thriller that surprised and delighted me as much as Moon did almost two years ago.

The film finds an Army captain Jake Gyllenhaal repeatedly transported to a commuter train in Chicago in order to find out who is about to blow it up. He has eight minutes before detonation, and after the explosion he must return (in Groundhog Day fashion) to repeat the same eight minutes over and over again until his mission succeeds. I won’t try and explain the “science” of how this works. The film does a decent job of it, so I won't steal Jones's and writer Ben Ripley's thunder. But I will say that the film turns and twists its way to its satisfying and very unexpected conclusion. Like Moon before it, things in Source Code land are not quite what they seem.