You may or may not have already noticed that I skipped last week’s Netflix pick. The past week has been INSANE. Mark and I have had to go from Wedding Plan C to Plan D because of the pandemic and there was a lot to deal with because of the changeover. Honestly, we really did not feel comfortable putting any of our friends or family members at risk, even though Plan C was going to be we a much smaller group compared to our original plan. The challenges of last week left me too exhausted to really do much, so I took a break from, well, just about everything.
I’ve also been thinking that this will probably be the last “Netflix Pick of the Week” that I do for a while. It’s not that I don’t enjoy them; it’s been nice to have something like this going because it’s given me something to do. And it’s given me a reason to really think about what I’m watching instead of just mindlessly consuming everything on my Netflix list. But my annual spooky movie marathon is coming up, so for all of October I’ll be writing about ALL of the scary movies I watch. And once November comes around, not only am I attempting another NaNoWriMo this year, but I’m getting married in November! So I probably won’t get back into my “Netflix Pick of the Week” posts until December. Or maybe by then, I’ll have a new project. Who knows? This year has certainly thrown a lot of curve-balls my way.
So, since this is the last “Netflix Pick of the Week” I’ll be doing for a while, I wanted to write about something a little more nostalgic. Netflix for me is a bit like going to the video store. When I was a kid, we used to go to the video store at least once a week. Sometimes, I was on the hunt for a specific movie; sometimes I just went in with an open mind. As I browsed the shelves, there were some titles and DVD/VHS cover art that stuck out in my mind. And I still have clear memories of seeing some of those movies on the selves. But I never actually rented or watched those movies back in the day. Sometimes it was because I was too young, and sometimes it was because I rented something else instead and just never got around to those other titles.
As an adult, I’ve since been able to watch a lot of those movies that I remember seeing in the video store. Thank you Netflix! But what I really love about Netflix is that it is a kind of low-risk video store situation. I can go in looking for something specific, or I can go in with an open mind. And because I pay a flat rate every month, I don’t have to worry about watching something that I might consider to be a waste of money. I can watch whatever I want without having to worry about racking up the kind of bill that I might have had to pay to rent each individual title.
You’ve probably guessed by now that this week’s Netflix pick is one of those movies that I never got to watch. I remember seeing it a lot in the video store, and the image on the DVD/VHS case really stood out to me. This past weekend, 20 years after seeing it on the shelves of the video store, I finally got to watch…
The 6th Day Directed by Roger Spottiswoode – Action, Mystery, Sci-Fi: In the future, cloning has advanced enough that you can clone your pet, but human cloning is still illegal. In this high-tech world, a helicopter pilot discovers that he has been cloned without his knowledge. Not long after, he finds himself being hunted down by the people behind this; they will stop at nothing to keep the public from finding out that they have already been making successful human clones for years. Our hero (obviously Arnold Schwarzenegger) will stop at nothing to save himself and his family.
Pros: I really enjoyed the aesthetics of the more sci-fi elements of the film. I loved the tech, the labs, and especially the pre-formed clones. I think the only futuristic element that I didn’t like was that creepy looking talking doll. I also really liked how the plot was a good jumping off point for some pretty heavy moral debates. The film touched on these debates a fair amount, but I still wish it had gone further. I would have loved to have been made to feel uncomfortable by the moral ambiguity of certain situations.
Cons: The editing and cinematography are definitely products of the time. And let me tell you, some of the effects added to enhance or alter the pace of certain scenes did not age well. This movie reeks of the late 1990s/early 2000s, and that’s not a good thing. The cherry on top was the cheesy (and sometimes bad) acting. And I feel like some of the dialogue in the script only added to the cheesiness.
Final thoughts: Despite any cons, I’m really glad I finally watched this. Given how much the visual of Arnold Schwarzenegger with that futuristic eye gear stuck in my mind, I’m happy that I was finally able to cross this one off the list. In the era of remakes (and dark/gritty remakes for that matter), I actually think that something like this might do well if it were made into a more dystopian kind of movie that really delved deep into the moral implications of human cloning.
That’s all for now folks. Tune in for my Spooktober Marathon coming soon!
