Gattaca Opening Scene Analysis

Show how the opening scene introduced ideas that were concluded in final scene.

The movie Gattaca directed by Andrew Niccole, it a dystopian film a bout a man Called Vincent Freeman who is known to be a “God child” which in certain cases you would think to be a good thing but in this movie natural born children are considered the bottom of the heap. In this film discrimination exists not based on skin color, socio-economic class, culture or religion, but on whether or not you were genetically engineered to be perfect. Vincent has a lot of determination, drive, hard-working mentality, goals, and ambition and is much stronger, and better than the genetically altered person that he borrows DNA from called Jerome Eugene Morrow. His donor
DNA person is selfish, lazy, embittered and prideful. In this film there are many Ideas in the opening scene that are finalized the end, these ideas are carried through with a lot of suspense and also many intensifying scenes to show Vincent’s struggle with his dreams, goals and determination of going to space.

In the opening scene of the movie "Gattaca" It is actually set more towards the end while he flashes back to where he was conceived.
We see Vincent in the shower scrubbing himself clean and trying to trace of every bit of dead skin possible which is the symbolical meaning of him trying to be ‘perfect’ and fit in with this society, while he burns the remainder of his own DNA in the caldron. He then goes to the science center and looks around. After Vincent's urine test he changes his contacts in the bathroom. The lighting is very blue almost like science lab and it is as if his whole life is under a microscope. We see extreme close ups of fingernails, dead skin, and hair etc., which confuses us at first but introduces the main idea around the film, Andrew Niccol is now introducing that things aren’t always what they appear to be, and that we don’t know the whole truth about DNA, genetic engineering and its harmful effects. We never see Vincents face front on, allthough sometimes is hidden by shadows and objects, he has to hide his identity and this symbolises the critisism from society. “Consider God’s handiwork. Who can straighten what he has made crooked?.” This is a traditional pro nature quote that comes on the screen right at the beginning opening scene of the movie. “I not only believe that we will tamper with mother nature but that mother wants us to.” This is also another quote that appears at the beginning on the film, this quote is more modern and pro science,
these quotes represent the genetic engineering involved in this film and Andrew Niccol is showing us right at the beginning a hidden meaning to what this film is about. These contrasting quotes give 2 sides of the dilemma and really gets us to think about which side of the controversey we fall on. This society is such a steriole environment of the future world at Gattaca, each and every little piece of DNA counts and from that they can predict almost anythign about any single person from birth.It is important that we see the issue this way at the start because the society we are then introduced to does not see it differently to most of the characters. We see the flaws of the genetic engineering and they don’t. We start to judge the society very harshly.

The society that Gattaca is set in is a very sterile environment which is what the future world will be like, there is so much pressure on being the ‘perfect human specimen with the right blood cells and regular urine tests. If you pass the sterile environments tests you are almost promised to be whatever you want which is what we feel viewing the fist few scenes of the movie, we see the on guard testing, regular checking, and the insanley persistant DNA checking from birth detecting things such as life expectancy, heart conditions, mental states and wether or not they are likely to have a drinking problem. We gather from the start that Vincent is ‘different’ especially when his father does not want to give Vincent the name Anton (which is his name) he later on gives it to his genetically eneginered son who is supposivly ‘perfect’, and we almost imidatly feel sorry for Vincent. An indidcation of his un-genetically enhanced DNA is the fact that he wears glasses meaning that he doesn’t have 20/20 vision like his younger brother Anton.

The doctor at Gattaca who regulaly checks the urine samples keeps a secret for Vincent allowing him to continue his destiny and follow his dreams of going to space.
We later find out that humanity overides the doctor and he lets Vincents faults slide, there is a stong connection between these two which is closely connected towards the end of the film yet the recurring tests are done throughout. The doctor asks Vincent in the beginning of the film and then once again when he is entering the rocket to launch into space, “Have I ever told you about my son?” we gather in the end that his son also is a ‘gods child’ and is a very big fan of Vincent as he has managed to successfully follow his near-impossible dream of going to space even though he is a
degenerate.

Throughout the film from beginning to end there is a major idea of human determination which is showed through Vincent consistantly, at the beginning Vincent and his brother Anton have a swimming race which is a repeated motif in the film. At first they are only kids and Vincent does not beat his brother since he believes that his brother is perfectly genetically enhanced and must be much stronger alothough this is not the case because we see the human determination when he says “I never thought about the swim back, only about beating my brother on the way there”. This scene is very intense as Vincent finally beats his brother Anton, he feels as though a miracle has happened, he thought it was impossible for that to happen. Vincent became stronger at this point because this drove him to drive harder for his goal and I think he feels as he had completely beaten the system and that being genetically enhanced is not all it takes, it takes hard work, passion, determination, and a strong mind set on what you want. We see this change from the beginning to end as Vincent never gives up and reaches his goal as he walks into the circular hallway where space awaites him. We see the lengths that Vincent goes to just to have a chance at life and to follow his dream even though Vincents brother caught him out for being an ‘in-valid’ he still let him go to space and they had one final swimming race where Vincent won once again, this proved a lot to his brother and I guess to a certain extent he would be very proud and mayble a little bit jealous of his hardworking human nature.

Vincent risked a lot even trying to work at Gattaca yet his hard working spirit paid off. He has finally passed and is finally off to space ad a role model of determination for the Doctors son who is also a degenerate.