The 6th Day

First Dolly, now Arnie. The cloning wars have begun. Die today, live tomorrow. It's so easy. If the boffins have your DNA details, all they have to do is call up one of those fresh bodies, floating in jars in the lab, slip the details into a computer and an exact copy of you, without the gunshot wounds, wakes up on an operating table.

There is a problem. For humans, it's illegal.

This is the year they call The Near Future. The effects department have fun inventing gadgets. The guns are Men In Black size and the cars talk.

Animal cloning is big business. Pet replacement thrives on the back of scientific advance. Rover is put to sleep after a nasty accident. A few hours later, he's back, wagging his tail, and children need never suffer the pain of loss.

Having created an interesting scenario on Coma lines, screenwriters Cormac and Marianne Wibberley don't know where to go with it. The plot is absurdly complicated and durr brain simple, which means the evil boss of the cloning corporation (Tony Goldwyn) wants to play God and the charter pilot (Arnold Schwarzenegger), who takes skiers to extreme heights, somehow gets drawn into his web of deceit.

The film starts by showing off the equipment and follows with a series of shoot-outs, which don't signify anything since gunned-down baddies keep being cloned for the next encounter. When there are two Arnies running about, you can't tell the real from the unreal, and neither can he, which explains the movie's slogan, "Are you who you think you are?"

Frankly, who gives a damn?