Designer genes -- future fashion or mutant menace?

If I were a headline writer for The Mercury News, I don't think I would have gone with the headline this morning, "Bill prohibits bias based on genes." Instead, I would have written, "Congress avoids future Gattaca scenario." Why? Well, because Ethan Hawke doesn't make the headlines anymore, as much as he might try to reinvent himself as an author and actor.

In essence, the story from The Mercury News (and on the front page of the New York Times) is about a bill approved by both houses of Congress (and expected to be signed by the president) that protects patients from discrimination by health insurance on the basis of "bad genes."

"People know we all have bad genes, and we are all potential victims of genetic discrimination," the bill's sponsor, Rep. Louise Slaughter, D-N.Y., told The Mercury News.

Now, by "all" I'm sure she means the US Congress, and I doubt you'd find anyone to disagree with the observation that politicians universally have something very wrong in the core of their being. Me, well, I'm perfect. My mom told me so.

Anyway, this week's Rental Recs are on the theme of genetic discrimination, which to me is less about health insurance and more about science fiction.

Gattaca (1997)
Of course, this film marked the beginning of Ethan Hawke's reinvention as a serious, more-than-a-pretty-boy actor. More importantly, this was a film that returned to the basics of 1950s Philip-K-Dickian science fiction, where American life has become a dystopia of technology. Hawke plays a "natural born" young man with deep ambition. Why is that a problem? Well, because everyone else around him was genetically modified to be super-awesome (including the 12-fingered pianist) and his parents decided to just go the natural route with genetic luck-of-the-draw. Employers genetically test their employees, often surreptitiously, while romantic interests will get their lips swabbed after a first kiss in order to analyze the mating potential. Hawke arranges an identity swap with a modified but crippled swimmer in order to rise in the corporate world. It's not a particularly special-effects heavy film and that's good, as effects are not a distraction. Instead the story leads us to an extreme end of the current trend toward designer babies.

X-Men 3: The Last Stand (2006)
The polar opposite of Gattaca, the X-Men franchise isn't about discrimination for genetic inferiority, but genetic superiority. OK, for the most part. I never saw much of a benefit in being a warty toad creature, despite the elastic tongue and spitball power, or even a big blue beast with the voice of Frasier. Nevertheless, genetic discrimination is genetic discrimination, and the mutants of the X-Men world fought for three films for the right to exist without genetic inhibitors.

Species (1995)
Oh, poor Natasha Henstride; she can't help that her DNA is half H.R. Giger alien. Sure, she's instinctually compelled to shove her tongue through the back of a lover's skull, but it's not really fair to keep her locked up in a glass cage, or send a crew of hunters after her. In fact, it's a human-rights violation to sic Michael Madsen on anybody. As far as cheesy sci-fi thrillers go, Species definitely rises to the gouda. But still -- Henstridge is one sexy beast.

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