The 2000s were a great time for action movies. Movies like The Fast and the Furious, 300, National Treasure, The Bourne Identity, and so many more thrilled audiences but even within the action genre, there were great films that crossed into other genres as well — specifically sci-fi. Sci-fi action movies were also big during the decade, giving fans greats like Minority Report and Equilibrium. Now, however, it’s about to become a little harder to watch one of that era’s hidden gems of the sci-fi action pack as it’s about to leave Netflix and fans have just days left to watch it.
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Released in 2005, The Island had everything you’d expect that would have made it a huge hit. It was directed by Michael Bay, who is well known for his high-octane action films. It starred two major actors, Scarlet Johansson and Ewan McGregor. And it had a really interesting concept and expansive worldbuilding. However, the film was a box office bomb and has only started to gain appreciation since its time on streaming and it’s set to depart Netflix on February 23rd.
The Island Is a High Concept Hidden Gem Sci-Fi
Set in a then-future reality, The Island follows the residents of a futuristic compound who lived orderly, controlled lives away from the outside world which they are told is contaminated save for one idyllic island. Each week, one resident is selected by lottery to go live on that island. However, Lincoln Six Echo (McGregor) begins to question everything when he discovers that that might be a lie, sending him and Jordan Two Delta (Johansson) on a dangerous journey to reveal the truth. It’s not exactly an entirely original concept — movies about people living in dystopian, controlled realities that turn out to be horrifically not what they seem are plentiful. However, what makes The Island an intriguing film is the extent of its worldbuilding.
While The Island has plenty of action and all the big sci-fi concepts that you’d crave — like cloning technology, allusions to a contaminated environment (though, in this case, that’s a ruse), and a society in which the wealthy are able to manipulate and exploit others for deeply personal gain — how it expresses those concepts is very well done. There is a lot of detail in this story, about the elite that are utilizing the clones, how the cloning works, and even details that go into the visuals that make up this reality. There’s a lot to take in with The Island and while its execution isn’t necessarily perfect, it is a fascinating and exciting watch. The film also has some solid performances, most notably from Michael Clarke Duncan who doesn’t appear in the film for an extensive period of time, but his scenes are powerful.
What’s particularly interesting about The Island, however, is that while it didn’t perform well in the United States, the film did find success overseas. It’s something that Bay chalked up to poor domestic marketing, suggesting that had more American audiences known about the film at the time of its release, it would have been a bigger hit — and considering it’s done well on streaming, he may just have been right.
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