Is Gatta worthy to be classified as a “Quest Film”?
Josiah Del Pilar - TG:21 - Tutor: Geetha Nair – Teacher: Chris Brookes
Gattaca, a film released in 1997, written and directed by Andrew Niccol, fits into various genres such as Romance, Drama and Sci-Fi. Set in a world where everything is determined by your genetic make-up, the film explores the aspect of a quest film by the use of film techniques and by following the story of the protagonist who sets out on a journey to achieve his personal goal to one day travel to space, showing the characteristics of what common protagonists share in quest films; determination, courage and heroism.
The protagonist’s determination is one key aspect of what defines a quest film.
At the very start of Gattaca, we are introduced to the protagonist, Vincent Anton Freeman, a man who was conceived naturally, classifying him as a…show more content… With death rapidly approaching, Vincent results to illegal means for a way into Gattaca. In order to do this, he relinquishes his identity, becoming a man with the perfect genetic make-up, a process classifying him as a ‘borrowed ladder.’ However, this process was not simple. Vincent has to suffer by having a surgical procedure on his legs in order to obtain the exact height of the peculiarly tall Jerome. Furthermore, Vincent proceeds with a scrubbing routine, where he scrubs all the loose hairs out of his body each time he has to take a shower to avoid what was left of his “invalid” self from being noticed. When he was finally accepted into Gattaca Corp, he was to act as an unsuspicious character that happens to be successful in every single test due to the blood/urine sample provided by the real Jerome Morrow, known as Eugene, who is wheelchair bound. The process that Vincent has to undertake, to get into Gattaca, effectively demonstrates his determination to overcome all obstacles, connecting to the quest