Source Code

I want to like the director Duncan Jones, if only because I love his dad, David Bowie, so much. But, I thought his first movie, Moon, was so slow-moving and alien that I walked out on it. And, I don't waste my movie dollars lightly. I went into Source Code with an open mind and high expectations, given all the good press the sci fi film is getting. And, I left a little disappointed -- and very puzzled.

Jake Gyllenhaal is winning, as always. And, leading ladies don't come much cuter than Michelle Monaghan. (Up in the Air's Vera Farmiga, a dead ringer for Sarah Jessica Parker -- and I do not mean that as a compliment to either actress -- is miscast as a ... oh, I don't even know what she's supposed to be. She gives orders to Gyllenhaal's character, who's trapped in some sort of capsule, via a TV monitor.)

So, let me try to explain the crazy premise. Gyllenhaal plays Capt. Colter Stevens. Or, is it someone named Sean? I'm not exactly sure. There's a case of mistaken identity or amnesia going on here. The movie's a little like the far superior Groundhog Day, in that Colter/Sean has to keep reliving the same episode over and over. At Vera's orders. (But, is he really reliving it? Or, is it all in his head? Good luck trying to figure it out.)

He's on a commuter train in Chicago that's destined to explode. If he can find out who done it before the crash (that keeps happening over and over again?), then he can somehow stop it from happening. Even though it's already happened.

The way he can stop it from happening is to time travel (or mind travel?) repeatedly to the scene of the crime to look for clues. He's able to do this courtesy of something called the source code that was developed by a vaguely malevolent scientist who walks with one crutch. Of course.

Oh, and Colter/Sean may already be dead. We're never sure.

I couldn't make heads or tails of this mess. Skip it.