Gattaca

Gattaca is a 1997 science fiction film which presents a society driven by genetic engineering.

The story centers on Vincent Freeman (Ethan Hawke), who was born naturally but has a younger brother who was optimized. Vincent has poor eyesight and a heart defect, but wants to work on the space program at the eponymous agency. He joins forces with Jerome Eugene Morrow (Jude Law), who has perfect genes but was crippled when he attempted to commit suicide by jumping in front of a car. Using contact lenses and copious amounts of Eugene's hair and blood while being careful not to lose a trace of his own genetic material, Vincent manages to pass himself off as a Valid and get a job at Gattaca, where he succeeds by hard work and determination despite his inferior genes.

However, a week before Vincent is scheduled to leave Earth on a mission to Saturn's moon Titan, the Mission Director is murdered in his office and one of Vincent's In-Valid eyelashes is found on the scene. He must now avoid being discovered despite intense police scrutiny and his progressing relationship with his Love Interest Irene Cassini (Uma Thurman).

Compare and contrast Brave New World.

Tropes used in Gattaca include:

The Alcoholic: Jerome.
Always Someone Better: The reason Jerome is so disillusioned with himself.
- For Vincent, this is his brother. See Sibling Rivalry.
Asshole Victim: The Mission Director.
Auto Erotica: The main character was conceived this way.
Badass Normal: Through sheer training and determination, Vincent becomes almost equal to any of the Designer Babies he works with.
Badass Boast: "If the glass is clean it'll be easier for you to see me on the other side of it."
Bigger Is Better in Bed: Despite his overall genetic inferiority, Vincent is mentioned to be superior in one notable area. The doctor reveals at the end that he knew it was fake all along, and is literally complimenting Vincent on the equipment he used to pull off the scam, which would by necessity require a fake phallus to cover the delivery system from the urine pouch.
Blind Without'Em: Vincent is myopic, and wears contact lenses to fake perfect eyesight. In one scene he has to ditch the lenses to duck a police inspection. Then he has to cross a busy highway. Yikes.
Born Winner: Played straight and subverted throughout the movie.
Bury Your Disabled: Jerome, Type 3, although his suicide is presented as strong and noble, rather than pathetic or induced by Wangst.
Casual Interstellar Travel: Gattaca is a space agency that performs several launches a day, and space travel has become so common that Vincent is thought to be unusual for wanting to watch the takeoff every time (since his dearest dream is to travel in space himself). When he finally gets to go on the mission to Titan, he and his fellow astronauts don't even wear space suits.
Chekhov's Gun: The incinerator.
Chekhov's Gunman: Vincent's brother the cop and Director Josef Who killed the Mission Director.
Crap Saccharine World: Despite looking pristine and well-organized, the world of Gattaca is not a nice place to live for anyone with less than perfect genetics.
Days of Future Past: Specifically, a blend of early 60s style and 30s noir. The plot and theme has a very 50s Science Fiction feel as well.
- Particularly, there are a lot of notable similarities and parallels in both atmosphere, setting, and characterization to indie and/or sci-fi works by Philip K. Dick (very much so, especially those written in the 60s), and 90s movies by the Wachowskis and Darren Aronofsky, all of which reflected a similar stylised dystopian bent with works set Twenty Minutes Into the Future.
Designer Babies: This film is the former Trope Namer. The embryo products of in-vitro fertilization are screened for genetic predispositions to unwanted traits. Embryos without genetic defects are brought to term and these children are considered superior to children born by random chance. Whether they actually are or not is played with:
- Vincent has a high probability for developing a heart condition, but his heart is fine. Despite this, he can't match Jerome even with his training.
- It's implied that Irene's heart condition is largely, if not entirely, psychosomatic-- she was told she was defective, and so she is.... or at least experiences enough symptoms to believe she is.
- The doctor who tests Vincent for his genes has a son who "Wasn't everything they promised."
Determinator: Vincent. Everything he accomplishes is through hard work, unlike everyone else who gets ahead by superior genetics and discrimination.
Driven to Suicide: Jerome's backstory; he attempted to kill himself because of the intense pressure upon him to succeed (thanks to his supposedly perfect genes) and was left disabled.
Easily Forgiven: Despite lying to Irene about his identity and status as an In-Valid, she forgives Vincent the next time she sees him after finding out, possibly because her genes aren't perfect either.
Esperanto, the Universal Language: All public address announcements are in Esperanto.
Everybody Smokes: Which seems strange given the vision of the future presented.
Failed a Spot Check: Whenever they check Jerome's blood, his name and photo show up on a computer screen with the word "VALID". That said, the guy giving the sample is Vincent, who looks nothing like Jerome. Vincent himself brings this up the moment he meets Jerome; the forger explains that photo ID is so outdated Vincent could use the forger's photo (played by Tony Shalhoub) and people wouldn't notice. People have grown so complacent in depending on the DNA checks that they commit the first-week-of-basic-training mistake of not comparing the ID to the ID holder.
- They do make something of an effort, though. Vincent dyes his hair and matches his hairstyle to that of the photo. He also has to undergo surgery to "stretch" both pairs of his tibia/fibula in order to be the same height as Jerome.
- Also subverted by the doctor. He knew full well that Vincent wasn't Jerome, he just didn't care. His own son wasn't everything the clinic promised.
Fantastic Noir: Once the murder subplot is introduced.
Fantastic Racism: The entire point of the film. Although discrimination based on genetics is supposed to be illegal, Vincent says "no one takes the law seriously," because they can easily check your DNA to find out, thus its nevertheless present from birth, preventing him from getting into a good school and finding a good job despite his hard work and intelligence. Which is why he decides to impersonate someone else to work at Gattaca.
Future Slang: Derisive terms for non-engineered people abound: Faithbirth, Godchild, In-Valid, etc.
Genius Cripple: Mostly subverted with Eugene.
Gilligan Cut: When it becomes clear that Vincent will need surgery to match Jerome's height. "I'm not doing it!"
Hard Work Hardly Works: Averted, which is probably the point.
Holographic Terminal
In the Blood: The true murderer isn't even considered a possible suspect for most of the investigation, on the dubious grounds that his genotype contains no markers for violent behavior.
Ironic Echo: After Irene mentions her heart condition:

Irene: (handing Vincent a piece of her hair for a DNA test) Here. If you're still interested [after finding out the truth], let me know.
Vincent: (drops hair) Oops. The wind caught it.

- Later, after Irene discovers Vincent isn't actually Jerome:

Vincent: (hands Irene a strand of hair) Here. If you're still interested, let me know.
Irene: (drops hair) Oops. The wind caught it.

I Want My Jetpack: Now that the scientists have finished the Human Genome Project, no one knows what exactly to do with it. We still don't have Designer Babies yet, though we're a lot closer to being able to do a lot of what was done in the movie, what, with medical technology having come as far as it has now. We can screen for all sorts of things with prenatal testing and it is possible to create "designer babies". Ethics, of course, are heavily involved in all this, which may explain why we don't live in Gattaca yet.
- In-vitro fertilization already uses the technique of identifying the most optimal embryos as candidates for uterine implantation and it is already possible (for an exorbitant sum of money) to clone your favorite cat for the next generation.
Jerk with a Heart of Gold: Jerome. Even though he's a jerk to Vincent at times, he still comes through for him when needed and leaves enough genetic samples to last Vincent a lifetime before committing suicide.
If You Know What I Mean: Vincent's excuse to weasel out of getting his mouth swabbed at a checkpoint. He nods in Irene's direction and says they'd just get a contaminated sample.
The Law of Conservation of Detail: A lot of the space issues and program in this movie don't make a lot of sense, and understandably so because the movie is about Sci Fi genetics, not Sci Fi space.
Locard's Theory
Meaningful Name: Vincent Freeman and Jerome Eugene Morrow.
- The title of the movie and eponymous agency is spelled using the initials of the four DNA bases (the parts that define genes).
- "Vincent" means "winner" in Latin.
- Jerome may suggest "genome".
- Eugene means "well-born" and relates to "eugenics" as practiced too.
- Also, Morrow suggests "tomorrow".
- Cassini from the Cassini Space Probe.
- In the Greek from which it comes, "eu" means "good" - so it literally means the incredibly blatant Jerome Good-Gene Morrow.
No New Fashions in the Future
Not Even Bothering with the Accent: Nobody ever figures out that Vincent is not Jerome despite the real Jerome having a British accent which Vincent never even tries to fake.
One-Scene Wonder: Tony Shalhoub has a few minutes as the underground contact who brings Vincent and Jerome together, helping and lending the equipment necessary for the fraud, and is brilliant as a genetic profile carsalesman.
Our Graphics Will Suck in the Future: Despite having Holographic Terminals and Casual Interstellar Travel at Gattaca, their handheld testers are fairly simplistic. See Zeerust.
Planet of Hats: With the planet in question being the future Earth, of course.
Police Are Useless: The police constantly focus on Vincent, assuming that the In-Valid must be responsible for the murder at Gattaca. If not for the one rational cop on the investigation (Vincent's brother), they not only would have failed to find the murderer, they wouldn't even have come close to finding Vincent.
Precision F-Strike: Jerome does this at least twice.
Prim and Proper Bun: Irene's default hairstyle.
Readings Are Off the Scale: Jerome's superior genetics are described this way.
Screw Destiny: A biological take on this.
Screw the Rules, I'm Doing What's Right: Lamar, a doctor, discovers that Vincent is an In-Valid, who took the identity of a Valid to get a spot for Titan. However, Lamar doesn’t report him and allow the trip to Titan to go as plan. This is due to the fact, Lamar has a son who’s also an In-Valid, who sees Vincent as a hero, and he doesn’t want to upset either party.
Second Place Is for Losers: The reason for Jerome's attempted suicide.
Shown Their Work: The device used to lengthen Vincent's legs? Pretty much completely accurate.
Sibling Rivalry: Vincent is shown to have been jealous of his brother since childhood, which is then played with as his brother turns out to be just as insecure as he is in adulthood.
Spare Body Parts: A pianist with twelve fingers is mentioned, who plays music you need extra digits to perform.
Spot the Imposter: Vincent spends the entire film trying to avoid being outed as an In-Valid.
Suicide By Cremation
Twenty Minutes Into the Future: The beginning of the movie actually notes it being "The Not-Too-Distant Future". Whether or not it's next Sunday AD is anyone's guess.
Villainous Breakdown: Anton experiences this when Vincent tells him that his real motivation is to deal with his own jealousy and insecurity.
What Do You Mean Its Not Symbolic: The staircase in Vincent and Jerome's apartment is twisted and spiraled just like DNA.
- As Jerome burns himself in the furnace, his silver medal he's wearing turns gold.
Zeerust: The movie focuses its future speculation on genetic engineering, so it's natural that other aspects of the film's future would be less well thought out. Still, it can be a bit odd watching the movie and wondering why the televisions and computer monitors look like they're stuck in The Nineties, why Pluto is still a planet, and why nobody knows what Titan's surface looks like.