Clive and Elsa are completely devoted to their careers. Driven by their successes in the field, they now have come up with a plan to use human DNA in a hybrid that could revolutionize science and medicine. Enthusiastic as they are, the pharmaceutical company that funds their research has serious doubts and forbids the passionate couple to continue their research. But Clive and Elsa, drunk with their god-like power, are convinced of their future success, and secretly conduct their own experiments in the pursuit of even greater scientific discovery. Ignoring society’s ethical and legal boundaries, they introduce human DNA into one of their creations and manage to produce Dren, a creature that is larger than the sum of its parts.
Dren is an amazing, strangely beautiful, feminine life form, that exhibits uncommon intelligence and an array of unexpected physical developments. Dren exceeds the happy couples wildest dreams, not only scientifically, but also in inspiring maternal feelings in Elsa. But when Dren starts to show a far from normal rapid development, this animal/human hybrid, created to be the next step on the evolutionary ladder, becomes their worst nightmare, and forces Clive and Elsa to come to terms with the decision they made.
Written by director Vincenzo Natali, Splice was originally meant to follow his 1997 success Cube. But the then limited technology and budget hindered the project, until, in 2007, it re-entered active development as a Canadian/French co-production, receiving a US$2.5 million budget. About Splice, Natali said: “Splice is very much about our genetic future and the way science is catching up with much of the fiction out there. It is a serious film and an emotional one. And there's sex... Very unconventional sex. The centerpiece of the movie is a creature which goes through a dramatic evolutionary process. The goal is to create something shocking but also very subtle and completely believable.”
Splice, starring Adrien Brodey, Sarah Polley, David Hewlett, Amanda Brugel and Delphine Chanéac as Dren, premiered at the Sitges Festival in October 2009 and will be released by Warner Bros worldwide as of June 04, 2010. –B-
SPLICE | BEAUTIFULMAG