The Island (2005) - 10 questions

Question: Say that a client of Merrick Biotech, like Starkweather who used his policy and had it terminated, needs another one for whatever reason. They'd have to regrow a new Starkweather 2 Delta and reintroduce him into the colony and everyone would say "Hey, isn't that the guy who won the lottery a few days ago? What's he doing here?" How would Merrick account for that? Whitman even says to Lincoln that they were going to "regrow" his policy.

Answer: It would be easy enough for the administrators to fabricate some story as to why the clone needed to return to the colony. Doctors would most likely implant fake memories into the new clone's mind to convince him and everyone else that this was the same person as before. Also, if a client should ever need a new clone many years after using their original one, it is likely that most of the other clones would no longer be there--having been harvested to meet their host's medical needs.

Question: At the beginning of the movie, when Lincoln wakes up, he removes something from his ID bracelet. What is this and what significance does it have?

Answer: It appears to be some sort of cable - it can be seen leading to the bracelet in the shot from above the bed immediately prior to the one where Lincoln unplugs it. Exactly what it does is never revealed, but it seems likely to be some sort of monitoring system, keeping an eye on Lincoln's health through sensors in the bracelet.

Question: At the beginning, when Lincoln and the others are in the elevator, the computer voice says the date. I remember it saying July 2019, but on what day exactly? I keep thinking it was the 18th, but I just want to be sure.

Answer: The date is July 18th, 2019.

Question: When McCord takes Lincoln and Jordan to the train station, it looked as if is said "Yucca" at the entrance, indicating that the cloning facility is outside of Yucca, Arizona. However, I checked Arizona in my road atlas (one from 1999, and I'm from Massachusetts, just so you know, and have never actually been to the Grand Canyon State). Was I confusing this for Yuma, Arizona, or is Yucca a real place?

Answer: It is a real place. http://www.roadsidethoughts.com/02/c02_7206400.htm.

Question: I've been trying to figure out the sequence where Jordan is captured. First question is whether it was intentional for her to use the credit/debit card? She has a reaction when she scans it, but the shot seemed more for the audience's benefit, then she waits nearby and doesn't put up much resistance. The thing is how does she know that card can be traced? It's a given she's undeveloped mentally (and we don't know the real Jordan's intellectual ability), can she make that connection? On the other hand, she's been very keen at improvising for her survival. The next is how she got the gun into the facility? Laurent's group has a female agent, so the group (or the agent) would know where to look for it. However, Laurent develops a connection with Jordan and I wondered whether he allowed it/concealed it himself. This is all speculation, and I wanted to know if there's a more definite answer?

Answer: Without reading the minds of the scriptwriters, there can't be any more definitive answers than what's given in the film. I think it's a mistake, however, to consider Jordan to be undeveloped mentally - she lacks experience, true, but shouldn't be considered stupid by any means. It seemed to me that this was a carefully considered plan to get herself inside the facility. McCord tells them earlier that they can only use the card for 24 hours and use cash after that; she knows from that that using the card will attract some sort of attention. Then she simply waits passively until she's captured. As far as the gun goes, it may simply never have crossed their minds to search her - previously she and Lincoln have gone to great lengths to avoid capture, so they may well assume that had she had a gun, she would have used it to try to escape; after all, from their point of view, why would she want to go back?

Question: What happens to all the clones at the end? Do they live? Do the sponsors get their money back? Does the government kill them all?

Answer: We saw them set free, so assume beyond that what you will. If we apply current reality to it, we can guess the sponsors lost their money, as the venture was entirely illegal to start with. The government would gain nothing killing them, so they likely would issue new Social Security numbers to them and start collecting taxes ASAP. If you must have a definitive answer to 'what happened next', you can always wait for a sequel.

Question: The 2 Lincolns are fighting in the car while trying to outrun the copter. 6 Echo keeps biting Lincoln, and at one point Lincoln says "What's with all the biting?" But that line in not on the DVD. Anyone know why? That was one of my favorite lines in the movie, and it's not on the DVD, I was disappointed.

Answer: Sometimes after the film is released the editors take out things to either help the film or take out mistakes.

Question: Why make a whole adult just to give birth to a baby? Why not just make a baby in the first place? We know they can adjust the clones' age. Come to that, why was Lima killed right after she gave birth? Her body would still be fine for organs and parts should her sponsor need them.

Answer: The company claims to have the ablity to create organs for their clients. They most likely claimed that they can create babies too. They did not want anyone to know that they are allowing the clones to "live" let alone one to carry a baby. Lima was killed becuase they wanted to conceal this secret. Besides, if their client wants new organs, I guess they'll make her pay for another insurance policy.

Question: I don't understand how Lincoln Six Echo ended up with Tom Lincoln's memories. If they explained it, I missed it.

Answer: This is a concept usually referred to as genetic memory or racial memory, which suggests that an individual can receive memories and knowledge from their forebears even without direct contact with them - that the information is, in some way, coded into DNA. Lincoln Six Echo is created from a sample of Tom Lincoln's DNA and has therefore inherited some of his memories, albeit in an apparently disjointed and vague form. There's no scientific evidence that genetic memory transferral actually occurs in human beings (although some scientists have claimed to have observed it in chimpanzees), but it has nevertheless formed a major plot point in numerous works of science fiction.

Question: When Jordan and Lincoln are on the streets of future LA, and Jordan sees herself on the TV screen, is that Scarlett Johanson's Calvin Klein commercial?

Answer: Yes - both the print ad in the background and the television commercial were done and published before the movie.