The Island is a 2005 American science fiction thriller film directed by Michael Bay and starring Ewan McGregor and Scarlett Johansson.
Plot[]
On July 19, 2019, Lincoln Six Echo and Jordan Two Delta live with others in an isolated compound. This dystopian community is governed by a strict set of rules. The residents are told that the outside world has become too contaminated to support life with the exception of a pathogen-free island. Each week, one resident gets to leave the compound and live on the island by way of a lottery.
Lincoln begins having dreams that he knows are not from his own experiences. Dr. Merrick, a scientist who runs the compound, is concerned and places probes in Lincoln's body to monitor his cerebral activity. While secretly visiting an off-limits power facility in the basement where technician James McCord works, Lincoln discovers a live moth in a ventilation shaft, leading him to deduce the outside world is not really contaminated. Lincoln follows the moth to another section, where he discovers the "lottery" is actually a system to selectively remove inhabitants from the compound, where the "winner" is then used for organ harvesting, surrogate pregnancies, and other important purposes for each one's wealthy sponsor, of whom they are clones.
Merrick learns Lincoln has discovered the truth about his existence, which forces Lincoln to escape. Meanwhile, Jordan has been selected for the island. Lincoln and Jordan escape the facility and emerge in the desert. Lincoln explains the truth to her, and they set out to discover the real world. Merrick hires Burkinabé mercenary and former GIGN operative Albert Laurent to find and return them to the compound.
Lincoln and Jordan find McCord, who explains that all the facility residents are clones of wealthy sponsors and are kept ignorant about the real world and conditioned to never question their environment or history. Merrick explains to Laurent that while the public is told that the clones are kept in a persistent vegetative state, trials had shown that the organs would only survive if the clones had consciousness, which is in violation of eugenics laws.
McCord provides the name of Lincoln's sponsor, yacht designer Tom Lincoln, in Los Angeles and helps them to the Yucca maglev station, where they board an Amtrak train to LA before mercenaries kill him. In New York City, Jordan's sponsor, supermodel Sarah Jordan, is comatose following a car crash and requires transplants from Jordan to survive. Lincoln also meets Tom, who gives him some explanation about the cloning institute, causing Lincoln to realize that he has gained Tom's memories. Tom seemingly agrees to help Lincoln and Jordan reveal Merrick's crimes to the public, but secretly betrays them to Merrick and Laurent, as he desperately needs Lincoln's liver to survive his cirrhosis. Tricking Lincoln into leaving with him, Tom brings him to an ambush that results in a car chase through suburban LA and ends with Lincoln tricking Laurent into believing Tom is the clone and killing him, allowing him to assume Tom's identity. Returning to Tom's home, Lincoln and Jordan give in to their romantic urges and have sex.
Merrick surmises that a cloning defect was responsible for Lincoln's memories and behavior, resulting in him and every future clone generation to question their environment and even tap into their sponsor's memories. To prevent this, he decides to eliminate the four latest generations of clones. Lincoln and Jordan, however, plan to liberate the other clones. Posing as Tom, Lincoln returns to the compound to destroy the holographic projectors that conceal the outside world. Jordan allows herself to be caught to assist Lincoln's plan. Laurent, who has moral qualms about the clones' treatment after witnessing their fight for survival and learning that Sarah Jordan may not survive even with the organ transplants, helps Jordan. Lincoln kills Merrick with a harpoon gun, and the clones are freed, seeing the outside world for the first time. As Laurent seemingly gives up his mercenary life, Lincoln and Jordan sail away in one of Tom's boats together toward an island, fulfilling their dream of one day going to such a place.
Cast[]
- Ewan McGregor as Tom Lincoln / Lincoln Six Echo
- Scarlett Johansson as Sarah Jordan / Jordan Two Delta
- Djimon Hounsou as Albert Laurent
- Sean Bean as Dr. Merrick
- Michael Clarke Duncan as Jamal Starkweather / Starkweather Two Delta
- Steve Buscemi as James "Mac" McCord
- Ethan Phillips as Jones Three Echo
- Glenn Morshower as Medical Courier
- Chris Ellis as Aces & Spades Bartender
- Tom Everett as The President
- Shawnee Smith as Suzie
- Kim Coates (uncredited) as Charles Whitman[ci