Self/less (2015) *

Directed by: Tarsem Singh

Starring:  Ryan Reynolds, Matthew Goode, Natalie Martinez, Michelle Dockery, Victor Garber, Ben Kingsley

I know, I know, I know.    I am supposed to just go with it.    I am expected to simply accept the insane premise of Self/less and sit back and enjoy.    Questions nagged at me such as these:

*   In the whole body swapping process (known as shedding), what part of Ben Kingsley is transplanted into Ryan Reynolds' body?    The brain?   The soul?   Brain waves?    Aura?  

*   Because Ryan Reynolds is now having flashbacks of what appears to his own life before becoming Ben Kingsley's vessel, see question one.  

*   Considering what happens to Ryan Reynolds/Ben Kingsley in Self/less, is the doctor in charge of the transplant worried at all about bad word of mouth?

*   Considering the doctor charges Ben Kingsley $250 million to perform the transplant into the new body, why doesn't he just disappear?   One client is enough to set him up for life.    He could say, "So long suckers" from a tropical paradise. 

*   Why does the actual shedding process itself look like poor Ben Kingsley's head is being held against a large grinding wheel?    How much confidence would you have when you see sparks flying?    And again, what exactly is going on?    See question one.

I would worry less about the logistics if the movie gave me any reason not to concentrate on them.    There is no emotional tug to the story.    It does not deal with the psychological impact of waking up one day in a body that is forty years younger than the one you just had.     It is simply another thriller in which bad guys are tracking down the hero and shooting at him.    We have guns, fights, chases, broken arms, and not one, but two separate uses of a flamethrower, yet what we don't have is any reason to care.     How would you react if someone you thought was dead suddenly materialized in the flesh?    How would you feel?    Would you be so overwhelmed with emotion that you lose your power to speak for a few moments?    That does not happen to anyone in this movie.    After some brief hugs, the movie goes about its business.     The scene in which the hero reveals everything to his loved one is also handled horribly.     We hear no dialogue, but we see pantomimed expressions of bewilderment.     This is likely because this would require the screenwriters to explain the film up to that point, and they have no clue how to explain it in any rational way.

I'll fill in the blanks now.    Self/less begins with Ben Kingsley as Damian Hale, a billionaire with terminal cancer and a desire not to die just yet.    He receives a business card with a note on the back saying "They can help you."    He is soon in the lab run by the devious Dr. Albright (Goode), who wants $250 million to perform the procedure and absolute secrecy.    One way to ensure absolute secrecy is to print up business cards with the company name on them, but I digress.    Hale has an estranged daughter with whom he attempts to make peace, but other than that is able to fake his death so the bodies can be switched.     Damian wakes up in the alleged genetically created body of Ryan Reynolds and given a new identity.     He is instructed to take medication regularly to ward off the side effects that must inevitably come with having a new body.    The red pills look like Mike and Ikes and it seems refills are available.     It goes without saying these pills do not come with FDA approval.   

Damian's new name is Eddie, but Eddie soon experiences haunting flashbacks of a young woman and child who live near a water tower with a pumpkin on top of it.    The pills do not help.   Dr. Albright assures Eddie/Damian these are just hallucinations that have no connection to anything.     Eddie is suspicious and Googles "pumpkin & water tower" and voila! he sees the water tower from his visions and travels there to seek the truth.     In this movie, whenever Eddie/Damian is stuck and needs information, he simply Googles it and any information he needs is provided with no more effort than a few keystrokes.     At one point, Eddie/Damian is looking for the widow of the doctor who originally presented the idea of shedding in a news conference (which was conveniently available on YouTube).     Why would Google have a photo of the building where she is now staying?     Or her address?   

Eddie/Damian discovers that the body being used is that of an Iraqi war veteran named Mark who was believed to be dead.     We begin to understand that Mark sacrificed his body to the shedding lab in order to save his sickly daughter's life, although it is not made clear how exactly the daughter's health suddenly improved.      What is made clear is that Dr. Albright's goons follow Eddie/Damian/Mark and he is soon on the run with his wife and daughter.     And yes this is the first movie in many a long day in which a flamethrower is used.    Are flamethrowers still a thing?     I began to recall a George Carlin joke discussing why flamethrowers needed to be invented.   ("I would like to set that guy on fire, but I'm standing too far away to do that.   I need to invent something that will set that guy on fire right from here.")

Self/less is a movie in which the premise sounds even more ridiculous the more it is explained.    Plot developments spring up that only further cloud the issue.    I would have enjoyed a movie in which there were no chases, fights, guns, or flamethrowers (especially flamethrowers).    In fact, I would have ditched the whole Mark subplot altogether and focused on the implications of the original concept.     The emotional impact could have been powerful.     If you think about it, though, why pay $250 million to be transplanted into another body if you have to abandon the life which afforded you the luxury of tossing $250 million to the winds?     Before that question can be answered, I am still looking for the answer to my first question, which put delicately is, what the hell is going on here?