Movie review: Code 46

A few weeks back I saw a list of under appreciated sci-fi movies. Most of the list was stuff that I'd seen, but "Code 46" was new to me. So I put it on the list of stuff for Yummy and I to rent.

Rent or steal.

Either way.

We stopped at the video store Saturday and was stunned to find that they had it. Naturally, we grabbed it and I flashed the clerk some cleavage while Yummy made a break for it while he was busy vomiting.

I'd never heard of "Code 46" because it was made and released in England. And it was kinda lame.

In the not too distant future we've lost the natural shielding from the sun. During the day you want to spend most of your time indoors or in a vehicle with shielded windows. The big cities are sealed off. To get in you have to have "cover" - an ID that lets you in. To travel you need to have "cover" for where you're going and where you are. "Cover" refers not just to cover from the sun, but the protection provided by the vaguely Orwellian police force, a place in the work force, medical care, etc. There are cities outside "cover" but they're pretty much deserts. Plenty of people and jobs, but not much in the way of plants, food, transport, protection from the criminal element, health care, etc. It's a much harder life.

Code 46 refers to a law where people with 100%-25% identical DNA aren't allowed to reproduce. This means not just with siblings and cousins, but with clones of yourself.

Tim Robbins is an investigator hired to find the source of faked cover passes. He takes an empathy virus to help him read people better and starts interrogations among the people he knows have access to the printer that he know the fakes came from. He deliberately fingers the wrong person and excuses the law breaker. He and the girl who made the fakes have dinner and go back to her place. Soon he's gone back to his family.

Shortly thereafter three people turn up dead who traveled using fake IDs that the girl made. Tim must return and complete the investigation. But she's in an asylum of sorts after she was found with a Code 46 violation.

She was pregnant.

With his kid.

They aborted the fetus and wiped her memory of the pregnancy and who got her pregnant. He turns up, claims she's a witness and takes her away to help her get her memories back.

Turns out that his mom and hers were clones of the same person. Genetically, they're half-siblings.

They run off together to lands without cover. They're tracked down. His memories of the whole thing are wiped and he returns to his family. She is cast out but left with her memories so they'll torment her.

I said the movie was lame, but I kinda like the story. I wanted the areas under cover to be more technologically advanced than they appeared. Oh, sure, they have some neat new toys, but I wanted a bit more. The chase scenes could be enhanced. Explain what cover means a bit more and what it means to be outside the cover.

It's alright, but you can skip it.