Is it wrong to design a baby?
GATTACA
In Gattaca’s dystopian society, “physical perfectibility has,
ironically, led to an obsession with flaws. Vincent's [heroic]
struggle to realize his dream strikes a blow against the
status quo on behalf of the human spirit – for which, as is
observed in the film, there is no gene.”
John A. Woodcock,
NYU School of Medical Humanities Database
http://endeavor.med.nyu.edu/lit-med/lit-med-db/webdocs/webfilms/gattaca96-film-.html
The most unremarkable of events.
The most unremarkable of events.
The most unremarkable of events.
V O: This highly prestigious assignment
was guaranteed Jerome at birth.
He has all the gifts required. A
genetic quotient second to none.
There’s nothing remarkable about
the progress of Jerome Morrow.
• What is the irony of this VO introduction?
• How does it establish the film’s central theme
of the human spirit’s victory over genetic
determinism?
Intertextuality
• Several of GATTACA’s
Sci Fi and film noir
elements are borrowed
from earlier films.
Intertextuality
• Several of GATTACA’s Sci Fi and film noir
elements are borrowed from earlier films:
2001 – A Space Oddyssey
Intertextuality
• Several of GATTACA’s Sci Fi and film noir
elements are borrowed from earlier films:
Blade Runner
INTRICATE VISUAL SYMBOLISM
Film Noir
• Film noir is a movie genre
marked by cynical characters
and a mood of menace and
fatalism.
• The term [black film] was
applied by French critics to
describe American thriller or
detective movies in the 1940’s,
which used B&W film stock
(because it was cheaper than
colour) and whose themes
reflected a social pessimism,
largely as a result of WW2.
• What are its double meanings?
GATTACA Noir
• What features does GATTACA borrow from
the genre of film noir ?
Intertextuality
• What does Niccol’s reference to Alfred
Hitchcock’s 1951 Noir classic Strangers on a
Train lend to his film?
Intertextuality
• What does Niccol’s reference to Alfred
Hitchcock’s 1951 Noir classic Strangers on a
Train lend to his film?
CHAPTER 11
• LOVE IN PARALLEL:
– WHAT DO EUGENE AND IRENE HAVE IN COMMON?
CHAPTER 11
• LOVE IN PARALLEL:
– WHAT DO EUGENE AND IRENE HAVE IN COMMON?
– (APART FROM ‘HOMOSOCIAL DESIRE’)
“MIND FORG’D MANACLES”
CHAPTER 20
DOPPLEGANGERS & SIBLING RIVALRY
“I got the better end of the deal. I only lent
you my body; you lent me your dream”
DOPPLEGANGERS & SIBLING RIVALRY
DOPPLEGANGERS & SIBLING RIVALRY
DOPPLEGANGERS & SIBLING RIVALRY