Dir. John Woo, 2003, USA, 119 mins
Cast:
Ben Affleck, Uma Thurman, Aaron Eckhart
Michael Jennings (Affleck - Daredevil, Good Will Hunting, Armageddon) is being hunted, but he doesn't know why. A world-famous genius hired by high-tech corporations for specialized top-secret projects, Jennings routinely has his memory erased once a job is completed so as not to divulge any company secrets. Highly paid for his work, he expects to earn eight figures for his latest three-year project, but upon finishing the work, instead of a big paycheck, he is given an envelope full of random objects and told that he has agreed to forfeit all payment. With his memory erased, Jennings has no defense, until he discovers that the objects are clues to his past. Now, with the help of Rachel (Thurman - Kill Bill, Pulp Fiction, The Truth About Cats and Dogs), the woman he has worked with and loved for the last three years, Jennings is in a race against time to put the pieces of his past together.before his previous employers have him killed.
Based on a short story written in 1953 by Philip K. Dick, Paycheck inventively mingles the 'futuristic' and the 'realistic' , creating a world of exotic technology to include devices that can erase memories, machines that can create the weather and smokeless cigarettes. Blending the genius of celebrated science fiction writer Philip K. Dick's high-concept vision of the world of tomorrow with his own stylized and highly choreographed action, director John Woo (Face/Off, Broken Arrow, Mission: Impossible 2) creates a very human action thriller that combines stories of both self-discovery and love.
But Woo is not the first director to be captivated by Philip K. Dick's work. Since 1982, the year the author died, Dick's mind-bending fiction has been cinematically re-imagined, providing audiences with a string of films like the critically acclaimed Blade Runner and the smash hits Total Recall and Minority Report. Highly prolific, Dick produced 30 novels and 100 short stories between 1952-1982, and those that fell under the umbrella of science fiction, revolutionized the genre by breaking into unfamiliar psychological territory no author had entered before.
In fact, it is Dick's imaginative exploration of memory manipulation and the way in which he describes how misused technology can wreak havoc on humanity that enticed director John Woo to bring Paycheck to the screen.
Recognizing themes of honor, loyalty, revenge and moral crisis that have preoccupied him as a filmmaker for decades, Woo was eager to bring Dick's short story to life. He especially appreciated the author's protagonist Michael Jennings -- a complex man who is ambiguously drawn into an ethical dilemma, recognizes the tragic consequences of his actions and, despite the danger, takes heroic action.
For Academy Award winner Ben Affleck having the chance to work with a director the caliber of John Woo was one reason to join the project; the other was the exciting way in which screenwriter Dean Georgaris (Tristan And Isolde, forthcoming titles Life Of Pi and The Manchurian Candidate) adapted Philip K. Dick's story.
"When you combine high-concept science fiction source material from Philip K. Dick -- whose work has already proven to work well on the screen -- with a master of the visual medium like John Woo directing, you have the makings of something extraordinary" says Affleck.
Affleck also feels the story poses many very interesting, highly ethical questions: "What actually makes up a life well-lived?" he muses. "Is it really important to remember the small details in life? And if we could learn how to control our future, then what would be the point of trying to change anything?"
On the other end of Jennings moral dilemma, and the man who offers him the biggest paycheck of all, is billionaire entrepreneur Jimmy Rethrick (Eckhart - Erin Brockovich, In the Company Of Men, The Core) who spins a modern twist into his villain role. "Rethrick and Jennings were buddies who wanted to 'save' the world through technology," explains Eckhart. "But along the way Rethrick alters his idealist vision in favor of personal power and ambition. Now he wants to use technology to ' change' the world."
Just as his friend turns malevolent, Jennings appears to be going through life with little feeling, until he meets Rachel Porter (Thurman) whose role Woo purposefully strengthened into a key player and the catalyst behind Jennings' ethical change. Thurman views her character as critical to Jennings' larger journey toward self-discovery because after his three-year job is over she is the key to his past. "He has to find me, in order to find out what happened to him and who he really is."
Paycheck is largely faithful to the 1953 story from which it is drawn, but as with earlier Dick adaptations, the author's verbal/ cerebral acrobatics don't exactly translate to visual dynamite. Woo and screenwriter Dean Georgaris, like their predecessors, rely instead on decidedly non-Dickian brawls, car chases, and bullet- play but they thankfully manage to keep things light.
It's not exactly Hitchcock, but the story litters Jennings 's path with enough complex puzzles that things keep ticking along quite nicely. Paycheck is a speedy thing, both in story and appearance, Woo having given the film a clean, tooled-steel appearance and sharp editing structure. And oddly enough, even though the script has enough cheesy lines to have most audiences hooting at the screen in derision, it doesn't matter, as Woo has played everything as campy as possible.
Shizana Arshad
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