Self/less

RATING: C

Now here's an interesting case: in a modern-day Hollywood littered with remakes, here's a movie that apparently might as well have been a remake of an older one, were it not for different character names and what not. The movie in question is a 1966 flick named "Seconds," which I haven't seen, but it seems that this movie (from 2015) took its plot from Seconds so much that it might as well have been a remake. So it's not a remake... but at the same time, it kind of sort of is. Now poor Hollywood's trying to be sneaky with putting out remakes. 

Anyways, the film centers around a dying wealthy businessman named Damian (Ben Kingsley) who is offered the chance by a mysterious organization to keep on living. To be immortal. They do so by transferring his consciousness into a brand new body (Ryan Reynolds); and how exactly they're able to do that is never really explained, but in these kind of movies (with transferring of consciousness), I get the feeling that's a common thing. 

So, he's got a new body. But inevitably, all is not as it seems; and he goes on a crusade to uncover what the organization is hiding--about themselves, and the new body he has. In some ways, the plot that ensues is pretty predictable. Is it a bad one? Not particularly, but it telegraphs itself all too often so there's not that much that's an actual surprise. 

Despite having a couple decent stars, this movie was unfortunately kind of doomed to a degree by being stuck with a low budget. Hence, the direction is a bit mediocre and it feels a little sloppy occasionally. Ultimately nearly everything about this film is pretty middling. Nothing is particularly great, and nothing is particularly bad either, per se. It's a movie that's often just too average for its own good. 

It's not without its moments, though. There's a couple of nice action sequences, including a decent car chase scene. The ending is pretty good as well. But it also doesn't help that some of the things that the film is based round--such as the immortality conversation--aren't dwelled on quite as much as I'd like. 

It's certainly not a terrible film, but it's also probably easy to see why it was overlooked by virtually everyone. It's a decent movie, but it's also a bit forgettable, so if you even saw it when it first came out, you probably forgot about it when you were looking back on movies of 2015. And while one could certainly do worse with their two hours, the feeling still cannot be shaken that this film could've been done better.