The people who made 1980s the Island were not without talent: Michael Ritchie directed Downhill Racer and the Candidate, classic Redford vehicles form the 70s; Peter Benchley wrote the novel Jaws and co-wrote Speilberg's screenplay; and Michael Caine was such a fine actor he could actually convince you that face -- British by way of a bulldog's rectum -- he calls a face was actually attractive. On paper at least, the Island had a lot going for it.
Unless of course that paper contained any portion the Island's screenplay.
A gift given to me by insomnia,the Island is, hands down, the bat-shittiest movie I've ever had the pleasure of watching. It's aged badly, in a way not too dissimilar from how DW Griffith movies have aged badly. But it's also the product of a clearly deranged imagination, one not bound by any convention of genre, but instead driven by a mix of the Freudian and the freaky, the Oedipal and the awful.
Following the plot ever further into the ether of its own fever dream provides its own peculiar pleasures -- in describing it, I would only be depriving you. But if you need more enticement I'll tell you a few things it involves: The Bermuda Triangle; retarded pirates; eugenics; even gun control law!
It truly is one of the oddest, the most bizarre, the most fantastically misbegotten pieces of art I've ever consumed. I encourage everyone to put this movie into their bodies.
