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Source Code begins as the character played by Jake Gyllenhaal wakes up and finds himself sat on a train. Opposite a very attractive young woman. A woman walks past and spills coffee on his shoes, while a conductor comes along to punch the tickets. The bemused guy reveals himself to be Captain Colter Stevens and that he flies helicopters for the army in Afghanistan, yet she calls him Sean, causing her to laugh with incredulity. The train stops off in Chicago and some passengers get off, but he stays on with the mystery woman. Upon seeing a inexplicable reflection in the window, he’s confused all the more…
Going into the pokey toilet, he looks in the mirror and sees that he’s another man, and the wallet in his jacket confirms his name as Sean Fentress. After coming out, the woman has come to the toilet door and tells him everything’s going to be okay – at which point the train explodes and Colter wakes up at ‘Beleagured Castle’, with a female disembodied voice over the tannoy trying to find out what he learned from his experience. When he sees face to go with the voice, he explains he was flying a plane on a mission in Afghanistan, then ended up in the train and finally wound up where he is now. She asks him who bombed the train but he has no idea, so she tells him he’ll be going back to try and figure it out with the same eight minutes he had last time.
And so he’s forced to relive the same eight minutes over and over again until he figures it out, making it a bit like Groundhog Day but with a terrorist bomb going off.
And if that’s not complicated enough, after a while he’s got more problems back in the real world when the oxygen starts to run out in the chamber from where he’s working. Whilst in there, he discovers what a source code is and why he only has eight minutes in which to save everyone, but that’s something you’ll need to discover as you watch it.
With some neat twists and turns at times, Source Code is intriguing as Colter sets about the carriage trying to get to the bottom of it all. There’s also some good acting from Gyllenhaal, here, with decent back up from the rest of the main cast – Michelle Monaghan as Christina Warren, who’s sat opposite him every time he arrives, Vera Farmiga as Colleen Goodwin, who’s his link to the real world and Jeffrey Wright as Dr. Rutledge, who’s relevance will be revealed when you watch it (yes, I’m giving as little away as possible beyond setting up the initial part of the film.)
The only let down for me with this film is that it comes up with what feels like a perfect ending and then throws that away in favour of an alternative which, without giving anything away, is a big let-down by comparison. When you see it, you will know. This is exactly the same thing that happened with Minority Report back in 2002, which is a great shame as director Duncan Jones‘ debut feature film, Moon was outstanding from start to finish and couldn’t have been better if he’d tried.
Source Code is out now on Blu-ray and DVD.
Film: 7/10
Detailed specs:
Cert: 
Running time: 93 minutes
Year: 2011
Released: August 2011
Widescreen: 1.85:1
Director: Duncan Jones
Producers: Mark Gordon, Philippe Rousselet and Jordan Wynn
Screenplay: Ben Ripley
Music: Chris Bacon
Cast:
Colter Stevens: Jake Gyllenhaal
Christina Warren: Michelle Monaghan
Colleen Goodwin: Vera Farmiga
Dr. Rutledge: Jeffrey Wright
Derek Frost: Michael Arden
Hazmi: Cas Anvar
Max Denoff: Russell Peters
Colter’s Father (voice): Scott Bakula
Reviewer of movies, videogames and music since 1994. Aortic valve operation survivor from the same year. Running DVDfever.co.uk since 2000. Nobel Peace Prize winner 2021.