Dual

And C.O.'s That Love Football

At the start of Riley Sterns’ “Dual”, Karen Gillan plays a bum named Sarah. Yeah, we’re doing that thing again, where a glamorous movie star is playing an absolute loser. These types of movies are about losers, and the money men always reason that maybe they don’t want to fund this Loser Story unless the loser is a conventionally-attractive person. Kind of begs the question as to why the financiers are interested in financing this project in the first place. Do they understand it? Do they get the character? Do they really believe in Riley Sterns, or is there just money burning a hole in their pocket? This movie allegedly cost less than $5 million. They couldn’t possibly have considered withholding funds until they found a sexy loser for the lead role, right?

In this case, it seems acceptable that maybe this just happens to be a good looking bum, in a depleted future where everyone is depressed and no one cares if you look like Karen Gillan. In this world, with chaos being described off-screen, Sarah drinks and sleeps in, and maybe sometimes takes in a workout at the gym. At home, she buries herself in blankets and watches pornography. When her boyfriend Peter (Beulah Koale) calls her, she is disinterested, and tells him that she’s watching a reality TV dating show instead. She’s going nowhere, and quite slowly at that.

Unfortunately, she is sick. A visit to the doctor confirms she only has months to live. Of course, in the future, the medical world has developed the ability to do everything but heal her – Sarah is given the expensive option of cloning herself, so that when she dies, the clone will step right in. They make a double, and she begins teaching the clone about her interests and desires. In return, the second Sarah acts with immediacy, eventually seducing Sarah’s boyfriend and meeting Sarah’s mother. Sarah is a familiar type – someone who can’t make any choices, but is frustrated that someone has made them for her.

And then, an unearned reprieve. Ten months after her diagnosis, Sarah finds out she will live, rendering the clone useless. She rejoices, until she learns just how aggressive this double can be – the duplicate Sarah has filed for an extension of her life. She will gain it under one condition – she can kill the original Sarah in an armed duel. Sarah, already not entirely motivated to keep living (and not entirely elated from the doctor’s news), decides to train for the battle, seeking out help. True to form, she searches for the absolute cheapest option available.

Her Col. Trautman, or Mr. Miyagi or whatever, is Aaron Paul as Trent. Trent obviously has some physical skills, and his training isn’t useless. The film depicts Trent not as someone who creates badasses every night, but in fact a guy simply doing his job. He doesn’t need to make Sarah a killing machine. He just needs to convince this out-of-shape woman to be able to survive a single duel. He has no emotional attachment to this setup, though he’s thoughtfully accommodating about his rates. Some of his advice seems useful. Other bits, like his insistence that Sarah digest a dopey low-budget slasher film franchise for “tips”, seem like flailing eccentricity.

There’s a version of “Dual” that’s a high-octane action picture – actually, nevermind, that’s probably Ang Lee’s “Gemini Man”. We watched that celluloid adventure in prison, where Will Smith had to tango with his own badass clone. The gamble in that film was having Smith act alongside a digital copy of himself, via a complex visual effect that had not reached maximum efficiency and only created the visual of Smith engaging with pixels, constantly buffering. Perhaps it would have been a more acceptable gamble if the characters weren’t forced to bark clunky 80’s-era action movie cliches at each other, dialogue meant for a trailer no one would ever see. “Gemini Man”, produced by David Ellison, cost $132 million MORE than “Dual” to tell the same basic story. A good sign for Ellison’s currently-merged Paramount/Warner Bros., who now have to wrangle out of nearly a hundred billion dollars of debt while doubling (technically quadrupling) their theatrical output in order to live up to promises made to investors. Couldn’t have happened to a nicer MAGA boot-licker.

Of course, what’s notable is that “Dual” runs through a genre storyline with a noted irreverence, as no one truly wants to be involved in this. Sarah is training for her fight, but she still doesn’t fully grasp exactly what her boyfriend sees in his new girlfriend, her clone – she doesn’t yet understand why Peter left in the first place. And as Sarah trains, she slowly realizes that the second Sarah’s heart isn’t in the idea of a duel either. All she wants to do is live, and she philosophically cannot square one of the bedrocks of a lot of crap genre storytelling today – that you cannot live unless you’re willing to kill. Riley Sterns has made a movie with life-shattering consequences where the characters really, truly, cannot be bothered to be invested in this elaborate showdown. There’s a brief glimpse at what these duels might look like, and it’s amusingly low-key – a bunch of people on bleachers behind a high school, participants poised as if they’re in a track meet. It’s the future. That’s all we can afford, either people or clones.

I read an interesting article which can be found here, speculating about the absences of c.o.’s at a Tennessee prison. As I’ve mentioned before, c.o.’s calling out has been a massive element of rampant understaffing. Prisons all over the country have been purposely staffing less officers, but that is not to blame for the occasional absences that lead to lockdowns and closed compounds. There are several reasons that are listed for officer absences, though the above story spotlights one that hadn’t occurred to me, but makes a ton of sense – football. Apparently, absences were being tied not only to the college and professional football seasons, but to specific games as well.

Male prison guards tend to fulfill stereotypical gender roles, so it’s not a surprise to know they’re sports junkies. In the prisons where I was being held, Sundays were the easiest days for most guards. Most of the inmates would be enthusiastically watching the games – with multiple TV’s, you can catch up on every channel broadcasting, and eventually the officer is just another audience member. Those days were generally free of drama, though a lot of that comes from devotion to the sport. Indeed, we would have a “count” every day at 9:30 PM, at every institution where I was. People would be escorted out of the prison, people would die, and the 9:30 count would go off without a hitch. Only one event ever delayed the count – the Super Bowl. It does not surprise me that some c.o.’s would love the game enough to ditch work, completely oblivious to the repercussions.