Source Code

 Is there a way to predict when films will be released in Australia? Some secret algorithm that only distribution companies are aware of? We get to see Thor before anyone in the world but we have to wait weeks for Source Code! Go figure.
I absolutely adored Duncan Jones' directorial debut Moon so much I gave it ten out of ten. I knew then that anything that man did would be something special.
Jones is back with his second film, Source Code, which is written by first time feature writer, Ben Ripley.
Sean Fentress (Frederick De Grandpre - Red Nose) is on a train on his way to work in beautiful Chicago. Across from Sean sits frequent commuter Christina Warren (Michelle Monaghan - Due Date). Some time before they reach their destination, the train blows up. Oh, that's not really Sean Fentress either.
It's actually Coulter Stevens (Jake Gyllenhaal - Love and Other Drugs). Stevens is a helicopter pilot in the army and he's in a swanky new experiment called Source Code. Inventor of the experiment is Doctor Rutledge (Jeffrey Wright - Quantaum of Solace) and talking Stevens through his mission is Goodwin (Vera Farmiga - Up In The Air).
Through the Source Code, Stevens is transported into Sean's consciousness during the last eight minutes of his life before the train blows up. Stevens has eight minutes to find the bomb and to find the bomber. Turns out the train is just the first thing that will blow up that day, Stevens has to find the bomber to save the Windy City.
Stevens soon gets a routine as he goes back to the train for eight minutes at a time. He thinks he can save the people on the train but, as Rutledge points out, it isn't time travel, it is time reassignment. Stevens is in a parallel universe, even though each trip on the train is different, nothing he does there changes anything here.
And that's where we stop - being a Duncan Jones film, nothing is as it seems and spoilers will spoil!
Wow. With it's fifties thriller-esque soundtrack it really felt like I was watching a Hitchcock film. Jones does not let up with what is happening on screen, there are no down times, no dreaded lull. As with Stevens' time on the train, every second counts. Kudos to Ripley and his amazing script - awesome work for a first timer! There was just enough scientific techno-babble to give me an understanding of what was going on but not too much as to send me straight to my Star Trek Fact Files for a translation.
The inevitable comparisons to Donnie Darko were quickly forgotten as Gyllenhall's cracking performance as Stevens filled the screen. Farmiga is great as Steven's conduit to the real world.
At just over the hour and a half mark this film is not too short, not too long but just frikken right.
I can't wait (again) to see what Duncan Jones does next.
Things I learnt: there's an arsehole convention in town and you're the headlining act; Queensland Rail needs to employ comedians on every train; who uses Bing anyway?
Blown away.
Ten out of ten.