Can you feel the Source

Source Code is the second film from Duncan Jones, who previously brought us Moon and who was brought to us in part by David Bowie, him being his dad and all [/obligatory Bowie mention]. Firstly, I enjoyed this much more than Moon, but then I took the slightly heretical position of not enjoying that movie all that much. In fact, the same applies to pretty much all of the bona fide, classic dialogue-based sci-fi movies that I've seen - 2001, Solaris, Silent Running... I've clearly been raised on an unhealthy diet of space opera, action and blockbuster FX, for which I can only apologise.

Anyway, Source Code on the surface is a big leap into the mainstream by Jones - big budget, A-list star, plenty of explosions (well, technically the same explosion but it does happen LOADS of times). But even from the opening titles, sweeping aerial cityscapes accompanied by pleasingly old-school bombastic music, you get the feeling that this is a filmmaker who cares.

Jake Gyllenhaal helps provide a sense of depth too. I've never seen his most mainstream, Prince of Persia-style beefcake roles, and maybe he pulls these off very well. But for me he'll always have a large element of Donnie Darko about him - something of a conflicted teen whose toughness masks a real vulnerability. His Captain Colter Stevens keeps getting flung back onto the same train in the same eight-minute window of the past in which he must attempt to find the man who, after blowing up the train, will then blow up most of Chicago. Although Gyllenhaal makes for a plausible military tough-guy, it's in the confused and claustrophobic bits where he wakes up and is debriefed on what progress he's made before being flung back in time again where you really root for him in the way you almost certainly wouldn't for, say, Chris Pine in a Tony Scott movie.

Sci-fi has pretty much exhausted all its original concepts by now, but this movie does a good job of synthesising elements of Groundhog Day, time-travel capers and Quantum Leap (the first time Jake looks into a mirror and sees a reflection that's not his own, you half expect him to say "Oh boy!"). Jones also composes some beautiful shots, especially at the close of each "cycle" when we know the explosion is about to hit and his camera pulls away leaving a lovely tableau.

And while Moon was acclaimed for its existential angst, Source Code does not skimp on this either. I can't really discuss the ending (because hey, someone might be reading this), but Jones definitely has a healthy interest in matters of life and death and whether there is any real meaning behind it all. The great thing about Source Code is that it poses such questions in the framework of a tense and cracking action-adventure. If it ended a few scenes earlier it would have been even more touching and profound, but this is a minor quibble and as concessions to the mainstream go it's an understandable one. Jones is a talent to watch.