The other night I watched a flick called Selfless. Its stars Ryan Reynolds as a man who's body is used as the recipient of someone else's mind, someone much much richer.
As expected it all got rather messy and the golden rule of mind transplanting was quickly broken; never find out about your donor.
This sub-genre of the 'spare parts for the mega-rich' has a long history and has interested scriptwriters and directors for years. The real science behind it is sketchy. Head transplants do have some technical papers to hang on https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6511668/ and brain transplants have a wiki page at least https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brain_transplant.
However, there are many films about mind uploading and whole body transplants. Gattaca springs to mind and I was surprised to see a recruitment company of the same name! In Freejack a donor who escapes is called just that, a Freejack and a phrase I love is the name of the mind trap in it, the spiritual switchboard! Total Recall explores the whole mess with memorable lines like 'Get your ass to Mars' and the UFO-like Johnny Cab. I suppose films like Avatar and the Edge of Tomorrow had mind uploading at their heart too or are these something else?
Many mind transplant films and no doubt many novels reveal society's class system, where usually its the mega-wealthy preying on the underclass as they are the only ones with all the dosh to do it. I suppose its a form of feeding; the rich digesting the poor or at least taking their bodies for themselves.
Hollywood has always been intoxicated with class at the core of many sci-fi films but what about classic British TV and film? Did mind uploading ever come up in the likes of the Tomorrow People, UFO, Space 1999 and the like readers?
Some episodes of UFO had things a bit like it, there was even a suggestion that the aliens were really not corporeal at all and could occupy other minds, such as a siamese cat!
ReplyDeleteI thought UFO might have some mind work in it Kev.
DeleteRyan Reynolds is in another mind swap movie with Kevin Costner called "Criminal" all shot in and around Croydon, one of my favorites is Steve Martin's "All of me" which is spiritual mind swap/body share, very funny in the 80's but probably tame nowadays but worth a watch on a wet Sunday afternoon
ReplyDeleteOf course, Criminal. I watched that earlier in the Summer MJ! Doh! I liked Costner's gruff portrayal. he broke the golden rule as well. Don't find out about the donor!
DeleteNot sure if this is entirely on topic, but does anyone remember a 70s film called Seconds with Rock Hudson?
ReplyDeleteMore of breaking that don't go looking rule...
I've never seen Seconds Looey but always remember a stark black and white image of Rock strapped to a gurney that's in one the horror film books I had as a kid. I really should see it.
DeleteNot mind transference, but in the 80s movie 'Society' the rich literally feed off and absorb the poor by a disgusting process called Shunting.
ReplyDeleteI remember watching Society on a dark night's VHS session one Winter after a visit to Blockbusters in the 1990's Mish. I was genuinely shocked and the film has stayed with me.
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