Source Code

Source Code is a 2011 American techno-thriller film directed by Duncan Jones, written by Ben Ripley, starring Jake Gyllenhaal, Michelle Monaghan, Vera Farmiga and Jeffrey Wright. It was released on April 1, 2011 in North America and Europe by Summit Entertainment.

Colter Stevens (Jake Gyllenhaal) is a decorated army helicopter pilot who finds himself on a mission to locate the maker of a bomb which exploded and destroyed a train headed into Chicago. Stevens is isolated inside a chamber, where Air Force Capt. Colleen Goodwin (Vera Farmiga) explains to Stevens through a computer screen that he is inside the Source Code, a program that allows him to take over someone's body in his or her last eight minutes of life.

Stevens' mission is to locate the bomb, discover who built it, and report back to Goodwin before the bomber can detonate a second larger bomb, a dirty nuclear device, in downtown Chicago, which could cause the deaths of millions of people. Stevens can perform different actions each time and learn from those actions. Goodwin and the Source Code's creator, Dr. Rutledge (Jeffrey Wright), tell him that the Source Code is not a simulation, but a visit into the past in the form of an alternative reality. He's told that he cannot truly alter the past to save any of the passengers, but that he must gather intel that can be used to alter the future and prevent a future attack.

Every time he is sent into the train he awakens as Sean Fentress, a teacher, sitting across from a woman named Christina Warren (Michelle Monaghan). A series of events repeat each time with slight variations while he goes on searching for the terrorist and deepening his understanding of Christina, until the bomb that destroys the train goes off and Stevens (as Fentress) dies, sending him back to the chamber.

Stevens has no memory of how he arrived to the mission; his last memory is of flying in a recent mission in Afghanistan while taking on enemy gunfire. Confused and frustrated, Stevens wonders how he got assigned to this project. Using a cellphone, he eventually discovers that he supposedly died in the war two months ago and that his severely injured body was apparently appropriated by the Air Force and used by Rutledge to enter the Source Code.

Stevens is sent back several more times. The second time he locates the bomb in the ventilation shaft above the bathroom. Each time he learns more, both about the terrorist attack and his real life personal situation, even though Rutledge and Goodwin constantly direct him to focus on finding the bomber. Stevens resolves to complete his mission, now with the added personal goal of saving Christina and the people on the train if at all possible.

He eventually discovers that the bomber is an American extremist named Derek Frost (Michael Arden). Stevens pursues Frost to a white van where the radioactive bomb is hidden. Stevens is eventually shot dead in the confrontation, but still able to gather enough information about Frost to inform Rutledge and Goodwin after he awakes from the source code. Authorities are able to apprehend Frost and save Chicago before the second bomb is detonated.

With the mission accomplished, Rutledge orders Stevens' memory to be erased and stored for reuse in further missions. But Stevens persuades Goodwin to send him in one more time and give him one last chance to avert the train disaster. Goodwin agrees that he deserves to be allowed to die in peace afterwards instead of being held alive as a military artifact.

With the information he has uncovered from previous trips into the Source Code, Stevens is able to defuse the bomb and capture Frost before he can destroy the train. Frost is arrested by the police and the people on the train are saved. Stevens and Christina kiss in the last seconds before the plug is to be pulled at the eight-minute mark. In that instant, Goodwin turns off his life support per his request, but to Stevens' surprise, his mind remains in Sean Fentress' body. He was able to safely leave the train with Christina and the rest of the passengers. Now in the alternate universe, where the bomb was defused, the alternate version of Goodwin receives an email from Stevens explaining what has happened and how the Source Code works by connecting (or creating) alternate realities. The alternate version of Goodwin gets the letter before she is even aware of the operation or of the bomb that will explode on the train later that day. Stevens asks her to listen to him and consider his requests once her communication begins with the Captain Colter Stevens inside the chamber she soon will find out about.

X-Men First Class

At a German concentration camp in occupied Poland in 1944, scientist Dr. Klaus Schmidt observes young Erik Lensherr bend a metal gate with his mind when the child is separated from his parents. In his office, Schmidt orders Lensherr to similarly move a coin on a desk, and kills his mother when the child cannot. In his grief and anger, Lensherr's magnetic power manifests, killing two guards and destroying the room, to Schmidt's delight.

At a mansion in Westchester County, New York, young telepath Charles Xavier meets homeless young shape-shifter Raven. Overjoyed to meet someone else "different", he invites her to live with his family.

In 1962, an adult Lensherr is tracking down Schmidt to take revenge. In England, Oxford University graduate Xavier is publishing his thesis on mutation; Raven, now his foster sister, lives with him. In Las Vegas, CIA agent Moira MacTaggert follows US Army Colonel Hendry into the Hellfire Club, where she sees Sebastian Shaw, Emma Frost, and Azazel. After Shaw threatens Hendry, Azazel disappears with the officer; moments later Hendry is in the War Room, advocating that the US install nuclear missiles in Turkey. Shaw later kills Hendry, revealing himself as Schmidt and demonstrating the energy-absorbing mutant power that has de-aged him.

MacTaggert, seeking Xavier's advice on mutation, convinces him and Raven to join her at the CIA, where they convince Director McCone that mutants exist and Shaw is a threat. The unnamed "Man in Black Suit", another CIA executive, sponsors the mutants and invites them to the CIA's secret "Division X" facility. Xavier locates Shaw, arriving in time to stop Lensherr, who had attacked Shaw, from drowning as Shaw escapes. Xavier brings Lensherr to Division X, where they meet young scientist Hank McCoy, a prehensile-footed mutant whom Xavier inadvertently outs as a mutant. McCoy, developing a bond with Raven, promises her he will find a way to normalize their appearance. Xavier uses a mutant-locating device, Cerebro, to find and recruit mutants for training to stop Shaw. He and Lensherr find stripper Angel Salvadore; taxi driver Armando Muñoz, who takes the code name Darwin; Army prisoner Alex Summers, who calls himself Havok; and Sean Cassidy, who dubs himself Banshee. Raven takes the name Mystique. She also dubs Charles "Prof. X" and Erik "Magneto."

When Frost meets with a Soviet general in the USSR, Xavier and Lensherr capture her. Meanwhile, Azazel, Riptide and Shaw attack Division X, killing everyone but the young mutants and offering them the chance to join him. Angel accepts; when Darwin tries to fight back, Shaw kills him. With the facility destroyed, Xavier takes the mutants to train at his family mansion. McCoy devises protective uniforms and a stealth jet. In Moscow, Shaw compels the general to have the Soviet Union install nuclear missiles in Cuba.

During the Cuban Missile Crisis, US President John F. Kennedy institutes a blockade to stop a Soviet freighter from moving the nuclear missiles to Cuba. Shaw, wearing a helmet that foils Xavier's telepathy, accompanies the Soviet fleet to ensure the missiles arrive, trying to trigger World War III and achieve mutant ascendency. Raven goes to seduce Lensherr, who convinces her to embrace her nature as a mutant. Later, McCoy offers Raven his cure for her appearance, but she refuses. The cure backfires on McCoy, rendering him a leonine beast. Though ashamed of his new appearance, he pilots the mutants and MacTaggert to the blockade line. In an ensuing battle with Shaw, Lensherr takes the helmet for himself, allowing Xavier to immobilize Shaw. Despite Xavier's objections, Lensherr kills Shaw by forcing the Nazi coin through his brain.

Fearing the mutants, the fleets fire their missiles at them. In a struggle, Xavier keeps Lensherr from destroying the fleets with the missiles, but when MacTaggert fires at Lensherr, a deflected bullet hits Xavier in the spine. Lensherr, remorseful, leaves with Mystique, Angel, Riptide and Azazel. A wheelchair-bound Xavier and the mutants return to the mansion, where he intends to open a school. MacTaggert promises never to reveal his location and they kiss; at the CIA later, she says she has no clear memory of recent events. Lensherr, in a uniform with the helmet and calling himself Magneto, breaks Frost from confinement.

The Eagle

In the year 140 AD, twenty years after the Ninth Legion disappeared in the north of Britain, Marcus Flavius Aquila, a young Roman centurion, arrives in Britain to serve at his first post as a garrison commander. Aquila's father disappeared with the eagle standard of the ill-fated legion, and Aquila hopes to redeem his family's honor by bravely serving in Britain. Shortly afterwards, only Aquila's alertness and decisiveness saves the garrison from being overrun by Celtic tribesmen. He is decorated for his bravery but honorably discharged due to a severe leg injury.

Living at his uncle's estate near Calleva (modern Silchester) in southern Britain, Aquila has to cope with his military career having been cut short and his father's name still being held in disrepute. Heeding rumors that the eagle standard has been seen in the north of Britain, Aquila decides to recover it. Despite the warnings of his uncle and his fellow Romans, who believe that no Roman can survive north of Hadrian's Wall, Aquila travels north into the territory of the Picts, accompanied only by his British slave Esca. Esca, the son of a Brigantes chieftain, detests Rome and what it stands for, but also considers himself bound to his master, who saved his life during an amphitheater show.

After several weeks of traveling through the northern wilderness, Esca and Aquila encounter Guern, one of the survivors of the Ninth Legion, who attributes his survival to the hospitality of the Selgovae tribe. Guern recalls that all but a small number of deserters were killed in an ambush by the northern tribes — including Esca's Brigantes — and that the eagle standard was taken away by the Seal People, the most vicious of the tribes. The two travel further north until they are found by the Seal People. Identifying himself as a chieftain's son fleeing Roman rule and claiming Aquila as his slave, Esca is welcomed by the tribe. After allowing the Seal People to mistreat Aquila, Esca eventually reveals that his actions were a ploy and helps his master to find the eagle. As they retrieve it, they are ambushed by several warriors, including the Seal Prince's father, but Marcus and Esca manage to kill them and escape with the eagle standard. With the aid of the Seal Prince's young son, Esca and Marcus manage to escape the Seal People's village.

The two flee south in an effort to reach Hadrian's Wall, with the Seal People in hot pursuit. Aquila, slowed by his old battle wound, orders Esca to take the eagle back to Roman territory and even grants the reluctant slave his freedom. Freed, Esca still refuses to abandon his friend and instead heads out to look for help. He returns with the survivors of the Ninth legion just as the Seal People catch up with them. The legionaries, wishing to redeem themselves, accept Aquila as their commander and prepare to defend the eagle standard.

As an example to those who would betray their people, the Seal Prince kills his young son in front of Esca, Marcus, and the legionaries, then orders his warriors to attack. A battle ensues, in which the Seal Prince and all his warriors are killed, along with most of the Ninth Legion soldiers. After burying the fallen legionaries — including Guern — Aquila, Esca, and the few survivors of the Ninth return to Roman territory, where Aquila delivers the eagle to the astonished governor in Londinium. There is some talk of the Ninth legion being reformed with Aquila as its commander. But when Aquila and Esca wonder what they will do next, Aquila leaves the decision to Esca.

Rango

Rango is a 2011 American computer-animated Western comedy film directed by Gore Verbinski and produced by Graham King. It features the voices of actors Johnny Depp, Isla Fisher, Bill Nighy, Abigail Breslin, Alfred Molina, Harry Dean Stanton, Ray Winstone, Ned Beatty, and Timothy Olyphant.

A pet chameleon (Johnny Depp) becomes accidentally stranded in the Mojave Desert after his terrarium falls from his owner's car. After meeting an armadillo named Roadkill (Alfred Molina), who is seeking the mystical Spirit of the West, he narrowly avoids being eaten by a red-tailed hawk. The next day, after having a surreal nightmare, he meets desert iguana Beans (Isla Fisher), a rancher's daughter, who takes him to Dirt, an Old West town populated by desert animals.

Beans discovers that the water reserves, stored in a water-cooler bottle in the bank, are dangerously low. At the Gas Can Saloon, the chameleon, using bravado and improvisation to fit in, presents himself as Rango, a tough drifter. He quickly runs afoul of outlaw Bad Bill (Ray Winstone), narrowly avoiding a shootout when the hawk returns, scaring Bill. The hawk chases Rango until by luck Rango kills the predator by crushing it under an empty water tower that he accidentally caused to collapse. In response, the Mayor (Ned Beatty) appoints Rango the new sheriff. A skeptical Beans demands Rango investigate the water problem while the townsfolk worry that the hawk was the only thing keeping gunslinger Rattlesnake Jake from returning to terrorize them.

That night, Rango inadvertently gives some mole robbers the location of the bank and tools to break into the vault. When the townsfolk find their water stolen, Rango organizes a posse that finds the bank manager, Mr. Merrimack (Stephen Root), dead. They eventually track the robbers to their mountain hideout, only for their leader, Balthazar (Harry Dean Stanton), to reveal that his clan of moles, prairie dogs and other such subterranean animals greatly outnumbers the posse. Nabbing the covered wagon water-bottle, the posse flees, chased in a ground and air fight before discovering the bottle is empty. Despite the robbers professing that they'd discovered it empty, the posse returns them to town for trial.

After Rango and Beans deduce that the Mayor has been buying all the nearby land around, Rango recalls the mayor telling him how controlling water equals control of everything. He confronts the mayor, who denies he has done anything wrong and shows Rango that he is building a modern city on the old land. With no proof of the mayor's wrongdoing, Rango leaves, while the mayor, seeing that Rango is close to figuring out what his true plans are, orders one of his men to call Rattlesnake Jake (Bill Nighy), who soon arrives, firing shots with his gatling gun tail. Recognizing that Rango is a fake, Jake runs him out of town after humiliating him and making him admit that everything he told the town about himself is a lie.

Ashamed and no longer knowing who he is, Rango wanders the desert and, in a daze, meets the Spirit of the West (Timothy Olyphant), a cowboy whom Rango calls the Man with No Name. The Spirit inspires Rango and tells him, "No man can walk out on his own story". With the aid of Roadkill and mystical moving cacti, Rango learns the source of Dirt's water is Las Vegas and that someone has shut off a water line. Realizing the mayor's hand in this, Rango recruits the hill clan in his plan.

Returning to town, he calls out Jake for a duel—a diversion so that the hill folk and the cacti can flood the town with water. The mayor threatens Beans' life, forcing Rango to surrender. The two are put into the bank vault to drown, while the mayor prepares to shoot Jake, whom he calls a relic. However, Rango manages to take the only bullet from the gun and uses it to break the door of the vault, flooding the room and taking out the mayor and his men. Jake, acknowledging Rango as a worthy opponent and a great legend for saving his life, grabs the mayor and drags him into the desert to take revenge. The citizens of Dirt celebrate the return of the water and acknowledge Rango as their hero.

TRON Legacy

In 1989, Kevin Flynn (Jeff Bridges), the innovative software engineer and the CEO of ENCOM International, disappears. Twenty years later, his son, Sam (Garrett Hedlund), now ENCOM's controlling shareholder, takes little interest in the company besides an annual practical joke on the board of directors. Sam is visited by his father's friend, ENCOM executive Alan Bradley (Bruce Boxleitner), urging Sam to investigate a mysterious page originating from Flynn's abandoned arcade. There, Sam discovers a concealed computer laboratory and unintentionally teleports himself to the Grid, a virtual reality created by his father.

On the Grid, Sam is captured and sent to compete against a masked program called Rinzler. Realizing that Sam is a User, Rinzler takes him to CLU, the world's ruler, who is physically identical to a younger Kevin Flynn. CLU nearly kills Sam in a Light Cycle match; but Sam is rescued by Quorra (Olivia Wilde), an apprentice of his father's, who conveys him to his father outside CLU's territory. There, Flynn reveals to Sam that he had been working on a new, "perfect" system and had appointed CLU and Tron, a security program created by Alan Bradley, as its co-creators. After much work, Flynn discovered a new series of sentient "isomorphic algorithms" (ISOs), self-produced Programs that spontaneously evolved in the system, which carried the potential to resolve various mysteries in science, religion, and medicine; but CLU, considering these an aberration, betrayed Flynn, captured Tron, and destroyed most of the ISOs, with the sole exception of Quorra. Meanwhile, the "portal" permitting travel between the two worlds has closed, leaving Flynn a captive; wherefore CLU sent the page that originated from the arcade, hoping to summon an individual to draw Flynn out of hiding and re-open the portal.

Against his father's wishes, Sam returns to the Grid to find Zuse, a program promised to provide safe passage to the portal. The End of Line Club owner, Castor (Michael Sheen), reveals himself to be Zuse and betrays him to CLU's guards. In the resulting fight, Flynn appears to rescue his son, Quorra is injured, and Zuse gains possession of Flynn's 'identity disc'. Knowing the disc works as a master key to the Grid, Zuse attempts to use it to bargain with CLU; but CLU simply takes it and destroys the club. Flynn and Sam save the injured Quorra and stow away aboard a freighter heading towards the portal, where Flynn restores Quorra and reveals her to be the last surviving ISO.

The three unexpectedly arrive at a station aboard a massive warship and encounter Rinzler. As Quorra attempts to distract him, Flynn recognizes Rinzler as Tron, reprogrammed by CLU to serve him. Meanwhile, CLU announces his desire to enter the real world to his massive army as his warship heads towards the portal. Sam saves Quorra from Rinzler and reclaims Flynn's disc. The trio use an aerial shuttle and flee, but CLU, Rinzler, and several guards pursue them in Light Jets. After making eye contact with Flynn, Rinzler remembers his original identity and collides with CLU's Light Jet. CLU uses Tron's Light Jet to escape while Tron falls into the Sea of Simulation, where his armor converts from red to blue.

Sam, Flynn and Quorra eventually reach the portal, only to find CLU blocking their path. After attempting to reason with CLU, Flynn sacrifices himself by merging with CLU, while Sam and Quorra use Flynn's disc to travel through the portal back to the real world. Flynn and CLU's merge causes a massive explosion that destroys them both, as well as CLU's army and his warship.

Back in the basement of Flynn's arcade, Sam backs up the system onto his flash drive and powers it off. He then meets Alan and tells him that he will start working at ENCOM, and, as the controlling interest shareholder, he will name Alan chairman of the board. Quorra meets Sam outside, and the two take off on his motorcycle. The movie ends with Sam showing Quorra the sunrise she has longed to see.

Gulliver's Travels

Lemuel Gulliver (Jack Black) is the boss of newcomer Dan (T. J. Miller) in the mail room of a New York City newspaper, but soon, Dan is promoted to a boss. Deeply depressed at his dead-end job, Gulliver decides to talk to journalist Darcy Silverman (Amanda Peet). He convinces her he could write a report about his (false) extensive world "travels" saying his dream is to become a writer. After suffering writer's block and thinking that Darcy will not want to hang out with a "guy from the mailroom", he plagiarises a report from other publications on the Internet. The next day, Darcy, impressed by his writing, presents Gulliver with a new task – to travel to the Bermuda Triangle and write an article confirming that the legend of ships mysteriously disappearing in the area being caused by extraterrestrials is not true.

Upon arrival in Bermuda, Gulliver rents a boat and travels into the triangle. After falling asleep at the helm of his ship, he's caught in a freak storm and the boat is overwhelmed by a waterspout. He washes up unconscious on the shore of Lilliput, where he is immediately confirmed as a "beast" by the town's tiny people. He is captured and imprisoned in a cave, citizens claiming him to be dangerous because of his huge size. Here, he meets another prisoner named Horatio (Jason Segel) who was jailed by General Edward (Chris O'Dowd) because he likes Princess Mary of Lilliput (Emily Blunt), whereas Edward wants her for himself. After the island across from Lilliput, Blefuscu, infiltrates commandos to kidnap Princess Mary, Gulliver manages to break free of the plough-machine he is forced to work and then rescues the princess from being kidnapped. Gulliver also saves her father, King Benjamin (Billy Connolly) from a fire by urinating on it.

Gulliver is declared a hero by Lilliput's citizens and makes up a deal of lies saying he is the President of the United States, says Yoda is his Vice-President and a living legend in his homeland. Edward, however, becomes enraged due to the luxurious accommodations that have been built for him, and even being presented as an honorary general of the Lilliputian Army complete with uniform. When the townspeople find Gulliver's boat and his things, Gulliver gets angry voice mail messages from Darcy, angrily saying she has to take his place and travel to Bermuda now, and also found out about his plagiarism and she no longer wishes to be friends with him. The next day, chaos ensues as the Blefuscian Navy lay siege on the city when Edward shuts down its defense system as an act of revenge for Gulliver's treatment. Gulliver defeats the armada, invulnerable to the cannonballs being fired at him (although he receives numerous welts on his stomach). Embarrassed once more, and with Mary no longer wanting to do anything with him, Edward defects to the Blefuscians and brings with him blueprints of a robot coming from one of Gulliver's sci-fi magazines. The Blefuscians secretly build the robot based on Gulliver's magazine, with Edward as the pilot.

The Blefuscians invade Liliput and the robot-wielding Edward makes Gulliver admit to the people that he is "just the guy from the mail-room" and nothing more. Edward banishes Gulliver on the shores of Brobdingnag ("the island where we dare not go"), where he is captured by Glumdalclitch, a giant girl who is to Gulliver as Gulliver is to the people of Lilliput, and forced to become her doll complete with wig and dress. Darcy is then imprisoned by the Blefuscians when she is lost in the Bermuda Triangle in the same manner as Gulliver. Horatio, who has gone to Brobdingnag after being spurned by Mary, reveals to Gulliver that Darcy is imprisoned. Gulliver narrowly escapes with him, using a parachute that he took from a dead U.S. Air Force pilot sitting in the dollhouse (a crashed F-104 Starfighter is seen in the girl's yard).

Once again accepting a duel from Edward, this time not only for Lilliput's freedom but for its fate as well -as Edward threatens to destroy it should Gulliver fail- Gulliver ultimately defeats him with the assistance of Horatio, who disables the machine's electrocuting weapon. Horatio is hailed a hero and gets King Benjamin's permission to court the princess. Edward, reaching the point of insanity, threatens to kill the princess, but the princess, finally having enough of Edward, knocks the traitor down in frustration. Gulliver then helps to make peace between the rival island-nations by reciting Edwin Starr's "War" and he, along with Darcy, return to New York on their repaired boat. The film ends with Darcy and Gulliver holding hands walking away from the screen.