Watched ‘Never Let Me Go’ last night. The film was memorable to me due to the heartwarming acting and story idea. I have agreed with a review that it is beautiful and haunting but find the ending seemed too tragic to appreciate.

Watching the film has brought me tears though the story idea of creating clones to be donors is not a new idea. Even if the story is meant to be just a dystopian fiction, I will not support any idea of creating a clone who can be a human like us and has to donate his/her organs just to save us from dying – this is as good as murder in my personal opinion.

At one scene when Miss Emily, the headmistress of Hailsham boarding school, told Tommy and Kathy that the love deferral for couple has never existed. My instant reaction to her answer was anger and disbelief – and for a moment, I felt that she and Madame should be tried for even being partly involved in some inhumane and murderous experiment, although the creation of that school and fate for clones might not be according to their own wills (i.e. they could just be employees or participating in an experiment to research if clones have souls and feelings or just to raise clones as future donors to their sponsors). They explained that the Gallery is created to challenge the ethics of the creation of donors, and if clones have souls. Miss Lucy, the form teacher of Kathy and Tommy was actually fired for revealing the truth about the fate of the clones whom she taught.

I suppose the creation of donors is still much debated today (one of the issues could be the big question on ethics), while the scientists are currently researching on the possibility of using stem cells as a means to extend the human lifespan or cure critical illnesses. If the existence of evil and good clones is possible in the hypothetical sense, I personally still feel that they deserve to live on as long as they want, just like anyone of us (whom I feel has no right to dictate that a ‘real’ human should deserve more to live than a clone should). Perhaps Kathy (the protogonist of ‘Never Let Go’) says it all about my opinion on that; in the movie when she was contemplating the ruins of her childhood, she asked in voice-over whether her fate is really any different from the people who will receive her organs: after all, “we all complete“.

I personally appreciate Kazuo Ishiguro (author of Never Let Me go) and Caspian Tredwell-Owen (author of the Island) for creating such meaningful story ideas that challenge the ethics of organ donors’ creators.

While I can’t say that ‘Never Let Me Go’ is a fantastic film since this is subjective, I’d say it’s a recommended watch. It’s a successful movie and story in my personal opinion, since it had effectively brought some viewers to tears, as well as some reflection about one’s will to live lingering on their minds.