Replicas (2018)

Plot of Replicas: William Foster is a scientist working for a company, Biodyne, whose objective is to implant the mind of  human into a mechanical body, seen in the film as “345”. He has a friend, and fellow employee, Ed, who is expert in creating clones of human bodies. Despite his best efforts, his efforts at transferring the minds of dead soldiers into 345 are unsuccessful. On a family outing he has a car crash into a lake and Mona, his wife, and his three children die. He calls Ed and together they take the bodies back to William’s house together with all the kit which would enable him to clone the bodies and transfer the minds. He is one cloning tank short and so does not clone his youngest daughter Zoe. In the 17 days it takes to create the bodies William attempts to remove all traces of Zoe, and creates false communications supposed to come from his family. Ed is given the task of disposing of the “old” bodies. When his experiment appears to be successful his troubles seem to be over, but Biodyne is on the case.

Content: No sex but a bit of semi-nudity, it is a cloned body so does that count? No drinking or smoking. There is the car crash and the collection of bodies of the drowned family. A lot of time spent in the laboratory, with William doing stuff which looked just like what Tom Cruise does in Minority Report. Then all the time spent creating the clones and then inserting the minds. There is not much drama in this, it is all sciencey stuff. Once Mona the wife3 knows what she is, she seems to accept it without question. When they go on the run they go to a hospital and seem to stop their hearts?

A View: This film lost a fortune, and was mostly dissed for its plot holes. After the car had crashed into the lake it was just left there, even though William took the bodies away. Starting with the car even the most limited police investigation would have found a lot for William to answer for. There are a lot more unanswered questions. I write stuff and am used to having to segue over plot weaknesses to get to where I want, but this was ridiculous. And I still don’t know why they went to the hospital, and apparently stopped, or was it started, the clone hearts. So even if you are an SF fan this is not really for you.

Fun Fact: Alice Eve? British actor, well known for stripping off for no good reason in Star Trek the movie.