Exciting and entertaining - but don't think too much

Rating: Null/10 (12 April 2011)

Inevitably, "Source Code" will be compared with "Groundhog Day" since both deploy the same plot device of repeating the identical time period with slight but important differences. However, whereas "Groundhog Day" obviously replays a 24-hour slot and is a whimsical comedy, "Source Code" revisits an eight-minute slice and is a sci-fi thriller.
At the heart of "Source Code" and rarely off the screen is the very watchable Jake Gyllenhaal as US Army captain Colter Stevens whose task is to prevent a dirty bomb exploding in Chicago. On either side of the code are two women: mission controller Captain Colleen Goodwin, played by Vera Farmiga (who was so good in "Up In The Air"), and fellow train passenger Christina Warren, portrayed by Michelle Monaghan (whom I last saw in "Mission: Impossible III").
Writer Ben Ripley has come up with an intelligent and intriguing script, although - like so many sci-fi movies located in our world - it does not pay to analyse it too much, while British director Duncan Jones (who once went by the name Zowie Bowie) has translated this into a taut tale that is both exciting and entertaining.