Directed by: Duncan Jones
Starring: Jake Gyllenhaal, Michelle Monaghan, Vera Farmiga
Rating: PG-13

Jake Gyllenhaal stars in Source Code. (Courtesy photo)

To be honest, I was expecting the new explosion thriller Source Code to be gimmicky and overdone. It's a rare movie that successfully combines time travel and alternate universes with throwaway quantum mechanics jargon and such original lines as "Do you believe in fate?" (Case in point: Timeline.) But Source Code is surprisingly honest, and entertains without being trite. Well, not too much, anyway.

Jake Gyllenhaal (Brokeback Mountain) stars as Colter Stevens, an Army captain who suddenly finds himself the guinea pig in a top-secret government operation. As we learn, there was an explosion on a Chicago commuter rail train, and everyone onboard was killed. Now the government is trying to find the bomber before he strikes again, and they're going to do that through the Source Code, a computer program that lets someone relive the last eight minutes of someone else's life. Stevens, at the beck and call of the stoic Colleen Goodwin (Vera Farmiga, Up in the Air), is forced to relive the same eight minutes over and over again, each time trying to get more clues as to which passenger on the train set the bomb. Of course, things get complicated when Stevens finds himself falling in love with one of the passengers, Christina Warren (Michelle Monaghan, Gone Baby Gone). Stevens becomes less and less concerned with capturing the bomber in real life, and more and more convinced he can save the train passengers in this alternate reality.

It's a clever script by a new writer, Ben Ripley, who gives us a refreshing combination of The Matrix and Back to the Future. Fittingly, it's a dark movie with a nice message about making the most out of life. Of course, this message isn't without its clichés, but, thankfully, we don't dwell too long on those moments, and instead, Ripley shows off his ability to write an imaginative story that comes around full-circle. Director Duncan Jones (Moon) brings Ripley's script to life with high energy, albeit without too much flair. Then again, it's a nice break from explosion movies that are nothing but noise and special effects. In one of the more pleasing moments of the movie, we know the explosion is coming to end Stevens' eight minutes, and we anticipate it, knowing that it will bring startling noise and light; instead, Jones gives it to us in silent slow motion. It's that sort of calm composure that keeps this movie from making us overly nervous, but still interested.

The actors go at their roles in much the same way—they're energetic, but they're not doing anything revolutionary here. There is something inherently sad about this movie, in that any heroic deeds Stevens accomplishes aboard the train are moot, as the explosion is in the past and all the passengers are already dead. In addition, we gather over the course of the movie that Stevens, in real life, is horribly maimed from battle and is being kept alive by machines. Stevens is full of stubborn rejection of anything so dire, and that's where the movie ultimately gets its optimism; of course, it also makes for a tough role, not only for Gyllenhaal, but also for Farmiga, who has to deal with knowing the unsettling truth. I give the two of them credit for giving satisfying performances, while Monaghan, as a character who is completely unaware of the explosion or the "real world," plays her part with enough charm for us to like her. Maybe not to fall in love, as Stevens does, but enough to know she's nice, as far as unwitting damsels-in-distress go.

Similarly, it's easy to like Source Code as a whole, but I wouldn't say I loved it. What this movie has going for it is that nothing is egregiously bad, or even bad at all. Nothing's spectacular, except maybe the originality of the script, but nothing's disappointing. At a quick 93 minutes, it's a good ride for your money, and definitely one of the better movies to come out so far in 2011. But then again, we still have nine months to go.

Danny Eisenberg is a 2010 graduate of the Bromfield School and is currently a student at the University of Pennsylvania.