Genetic engineering in film: the case of chimeras
Abstract The development of molecular genetics in the second half of XXth century has allowed considering situations, which were in the bioscience fiction field until then. Among them, the possibility of making chimeras using the combination of genetic material is now a real option. Movies have repeatedly shown this possibility by means of literary works o directly by screen plays. This article analyzes some films that may help to understand social beliefs on chimeras in the last century. We have considered Island of lost souls (1932), The island of doctor Moreau (1977), The fly (1958, 1986), Mimic (1997) and Splice (2009). The main conclusions of this analysis are the presence of a negative view to the possibility of making chimeras following the point of view that was used in Frankenstein. The movies also lack of a consideration of the potential benefits of using chimeras. Ethical misgivings and the vision of playing God scientists avoid a impartial view of a situation, which is already among us.
- Referencias
- Cómo citar
- Del mismo autor
- Métricas
Abbott A. Regulations proposed for animal-human chimaeras. Nature 2011; 475:438.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/475438a
Aldiss B. Introduction. En Wells HG. The Island of Doctor Moreau. Londres: Everyman; 1993. p. xxix-xxxvi.
Anónimo. The legacy of Doctor Moreau. Nature 2011; 475:423.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/475423a
Bixler A. Teaching evolution with the aid of science fiction. Am Biol Teach 2007; 337-340.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1662/0002-7685(2007)69[337:TEWTAO]2.0.CO;2
Blake W. The marriage of heaven and hell. Londres: William Blake, 1790 (Citado en el Prefacio del autor de Origen y presente de Jean Gebser. Atalanta, 2001; p. 15, traducción de Ursprung and Gegenwart publicada originariamente en Munich por Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt en 1949-1953).
Bowen R. Science, myth, and fiction in H. G. Wells’s Island of Dr. Moreau. Studies in the Novel 1976; 8:318-335.
Brem SK, Anijar KZ. The bioethics of fiction: the chimera in film and print. Am J Bioeth. 2003; 3:22-24.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1162/15265160360706787
Ferguson C. Language, science and popular fiction at the victorian fin de siècle: The brutal tongue. Aldershot: Ashgate; 2007.
Friedman M, Friedland GW. Medicine’s 10 greatest discoveries. New Haven: Yale University Press; 1998.
Futuyma DJ. Science’s greatest challenge. Bioscience 2007; 57:3.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1641/B570101
Gibson DG, Glass JO, Lartigue C et al. Creation of a bacterial cell controlled by a chemically synthesized genome. Science 2010; 329:52-56.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1126/science.1190719
Glassy MC. The biology of science fiction cinema. North Carolina, 2005; pp. 55-80, 212-221.
Gomel E. From Dr. Moreau to Dr. Mengele: the biological sublime. Poetics Today 2000; 21:393-421.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1215/03335372-21-2-393
Gonder P. Like a monstrous jigsaw puzzle: genetics and race in horror films of the 1950s. Velvet Light Trap. 2003; 52:33-44.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1353/vlt.2003.0022
Gribbin, J. History of Western science. 1543-2001. Londres: Folio Society, 2006; p. 574-619.
Halder G, Callaerts P, Gehring WJ. Induction of ectopic eyes by targeted expression of the eyeless gene in Drosophila. Science 2005; 267:1788-1792.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1126/science.7892602
Harris M. Vivisection, the culture of science, and intellectual uncertainty in The Island of Doctor Moreau. Gothic Studies 2002; 4:99-115.
http://dx.doi.org/10.7227/GS.4.2.2
Higashi S. Invasion of the body snatchers: pods then and now. Jump Cut 1981; 24/25:3-4.
Jackson K. Splice: the modern prometheus. HOST 2012; 3:125-138.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1386/host.3.1.125_1
Katovich MA, Kinkade PT. The stories told in science fiction and social science: reading The thing and other remakes from two eras. Sociol Q. 1993; 34:619-637.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/j.1533-8525.1993.tb00109.x
Lakoff G, Johnson M. Metaphors we live by. Chicago: Chicago University Press; 1980.
Magnusson M (ed.). Cambridge Biographical Dictionary. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press; 1990. p. 1544-1545.
Marsden S. ‘Dr. Moreau’s crimes. H.G. Wells and the victorian vivisection controvery.’ En Mordavsky Caleb A (ed.): (Re)Creating science in nineteenth-century Britain. Newcastle: Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2007; p. 116-127.
McLean S. ‘I flung myself into futurity’: Wells studies for the twenty-first century. Lit Compass 2001; 8/7:476-486.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/j.1741-4113.2011.00818.x
McLean S. Animals, language and degeneration in The Island of Doctor Moreau. En McLean S (ed.): H. G. Wells interdisciplinary essays. Newcastle: Cambridge Scholars Publising; 2009. p. 25-33.
Meinecke-Tillman S, Meinecke B. Experimental chimaeras – removal of reproductive barrier between sheep and goat. Nature 1984; 307:637-638.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/307637a0
Meningaud JP, Moutel G, Hervé C. 2001. Ethical acceptability, health policy and foods biotechnology based foods: is there a third way between the precaution principle and an overly enthusiastic dissemination of GMO? Med Law 2001; 20:133-141.
Otis L. ‘Howled out of the country: Wilke Collins and H. G. Wells retry David Ferrier.’ En Otis L (ed.): Neurology and Literature, 1860-1920. Newcaste: Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2007; p. 27-51.
Parish JR, Pitts MR., The Great Science Fiction Pictures. Metuchen: Scarecrow Press; 1977.
Passarge E. Genética. Texto y atlas. Panamericana: Buenos Aires; 2004. p. 5-8.
Pearson M. Mimic. En Astonishing stories 1942; 4 (2): 58-62. [El film tuvo dos secuelas, Mimic 2 (2001) y Mimic 3: sentinel (2003)].
Porter R. The greatest benefit to mankind. A medical history of humanity. Nueva York: Norton and Co; 1997.
Real Academia Nacional de Medicina. Diccionario de términos médicos. Madrid: Editorial Médica Panamericana; 2012. p. 1386.
Robert JS, Baylis F. Crossing species boundaries. Am J Bioethics 2003; 3:1-13.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1162/15265160360706417
Rodríguez G, Baños JE. Frankenstein: un mito más allá de la ciencia ficción. Rev Med Cine 2014, en prensa.
Rollins BE. Ethics and species integrity. Am J Bioethics 2003; 3:15-17.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1162/15265160360706435
Rose C. How to teach biology using the movie science of cloning people, resurrecting the dead, and combining flies and humans. Public Undestand Sci 2003; 12:289-296.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/0963662503123007
Rose CS. Biology in the movies: using the double-edged sword of popular culture to enhance public understanding of science. Evol Biol 2007; 34:49-54.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s11692-007-9001-8
Soto-Nieto F, Fernández FJ. 2010. Entre Dios y los hombres. La práctica médica y científica a través del cine. Madrid: Dykinson, 2010; p. 251-270.
Wells HG. The Island of Doctor Moreau. Londres: William Heinemann; 1896 [Se ha consultado la edición publicada por Everyman en 1993].
Wells HG. The limits of individual plasticity. Saturday Review, 19 de enero de 1885.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/475438a
Aldiss B. Introduction. En Wells HG. The Island of Doctor Moreau. Londres: Everyman; 1993. p. xxix-xxxvi.
Anónimo. The legacy of Doctor Moreau. Nature 2011; 475:423.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/475423a
Bixler A. Teaching evolution with the aid of science fiction. Am Biol Teach 2007; 337-340.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1662/0002-7685(2007)69[337:TEWTAO]2.0.CO;2
Blake W. The marriage of heaven and hell. Londres: William Blake, 1790 (Citado en el Prefacio del autor de Origen y presente de Jean Gebser. Atalanta, 2001; p. 15, traducción de Ursprung and Gegenwart publicada originariamente en Munich por Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt en 1949-1953).
Bowen R. Science, myth, and fiction in H. G. Wells’s Island of Dr. Moreau. Studies in the Novel 1976; 8:318-335.
Brem SK, Anijar KZ. The bioethics of fiction: the chimera in film and print. Am J Bioeth. 2003; 3:22-24.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1162/15265160360706787
Ferguson C. Language, science and popular fiction at the victorian fin de siècle: The brutal tongue. Aldershot: Ashgate; 2007.
Friedman M, Friedland GW. Medicine’s 10 greatest discoveries. New Haven: Yale University Press; 1998.
Futuyma DJ. Science’s greatest challenge. Bioscience 2007; 57:3.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1641/B570101
Gibson DG, Glass JO, Lartigue C et al. Creation of a bacterial cell controlled by a chemically synthesized genome. Science 2010; 329:52-56.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1126/science.1190719
Glassy MC. The biology of science fiction cinema. North Carolina, 2005; pp. 55-80, 212-221.
Gomel E. From Dr. Moreau to Dr. Mengele: the biological sublime. Poetics Today 2000; 21:393-421.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1215/03335372-21-2-393
Gonder P. Like a monstrous jigsaw puzzle: genetics and race in horror films of the 1950s. Velvet Light Trap. 2003; 52:33-44.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1353/vlt.2003.0022
Gribbin, J. History of Western science. 1543-2001. Londres: Folio Society, 2006; p. 574-619.
Halder G, Callaerts P, Gehring WJ. Induction of ectopic eyes by targeted expression of the eyeless gene in Drosophila. Science 2005; 267:1788-1792.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1126/science.7892602
Harris M. Vivisection, the culture of science, and intellectual uncertainty in The Island of Doctor Moreau. Gothic Studies 2002; 4:99-115.
http://dx.doi.org/10.7227/GS.4.2.2
Higashi S. Invasion of the body snatchers: pods then and now. Jump Cut 1981; 24/25:3-4.
Jackson K. Splice: the modern prometheus. HOST 2012; 3:125-138.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1386/host.3.1.125_1
Katovich MA, Kinkade PT. The stories told in science fiction and social science: reading The thing and other remakes from two eras. Sociol Q. 1993; 34:619-637.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/j.1533-8525.1993.tb00109.x
Lakoff G, Johnson M. Metaphors we live by. Chicago: Chicago University Press; 1980.
Magnusson M (ed.). Cambridge Biographical Dictionary. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press; 1990. p. 1544-1545.
Marsden S. ‘Dr. Moreau’s crimes. H.G. Wells and the victorian vivisection controvery.’ En Mordavsky Caleb A (ed.): (Re)Creating science in nineteenth-century Britain. Newcastle: Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2007; p. 116-127.
McLean S. ‘I flung myself into futurity’: Wells studies for the twenty-first century. Lit Compass 2001; 8/7:476-486.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/j.1741-4113.2011.00818.x
McLean S. Animals, language and degeneration in The Island of Doctor Moreau. En McLean S (ed.): H. G. Wells interdisciplinary essays. Newcastle: Cambridge Scholars Publising; 2009. p. 25-33.
Meinecke-Tillman S, Meinecke B. Experimental chimaeras – removal of reproductive barrier between sheep and goat. Nature 1984; 307:637-638.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/307637a0
Meningaud JP, Moutel G, Hervé C. 2001. Ethical acceptability, health policy and foods biotechnology based foods: is there a third way between the precaution principle and an overly enthusiastic dissemination of GMO? Med Law 2001; 20:133-141.
Otis L. ‘Howled out of the country: Wilke Collins and H. G. Wells retry David Ferrier.’ En Otis L (ed.): Neurology and Literature, 1860-1920. Newcaste: Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2007; p. 27-51.
Parish JR, Pitts MR., The Great Science Fiction Pictures. Metuchen: Scarecrow Press; 1977.
Passarge E. Genética. Texto y atlas. Panamericana: Buenos Aires; 2004. p. 5-8.
Pearson M. Mimic. En Astonishing stories 1942; 4 (2): 58-62. [El film tuvo dos secuelas, Mimic 2 (2001) y Mimic 3: sentinel (2003)].
Porter R. The greatest benefit to mankind. A medical history of humanity. Nueva York: Norton and Co; 1997.
Real Academia Nacional de Medicina. Diccionario de términos médicos. Madrid: Editorial Médica Panamericana; 2012. p. 1386.
Robert JS, Baylis F. Crossing species boundaries. Am J Bioethics 2003; 3:1-13.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1162/15265160360706417
Rodríguez G, Baños JE. Frankenstein: un mito más allá de la ciencia ficción. Rev Med Cine 2014, en prensa.
Rollins BE. Ethics and species integrity. Am J Bioethics 2003; 3:15-17.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1162/15265160360706435
Rose C. How to teach biology using the movie science of cloning people, resurrecting the dead, and combining flies and humans. Public Undestand Sci 2003; 12:289-296.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/0963662503123007
Rose CS. Biology in the movies: using the double-edged sword of popular culture to enhance public understanding of science. Evol Biol 2007; 34:49-54.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s11692-007-9001-8
Soto-Nieto F, Fernández FJ. 2010. Entre Dios y los hombres. La práctica médica y científica a través del cine. Madrid: Dykinson, 2010; p. 251-270.
Wells HG. The Island of Doctor Moreau. Londres: William Heinemann; 1896 [Se ha consultado la edición publicada por Everyman en 1993].
Wells HG. The limits of individual plasticity. Saturday Review, 19 de enero de 1885.
Baños, J.-E., & Rodríguez, G. (2015). Genetic engineering in film: the case of chimeras. Journal of Medicine and Movies, 10(3), 102–117. Retrieved from https://revistas.usal.es/cinco/index.php/medicina_y_cine/article/view/13509
Most read articles by the same author(s)
- Josep-E. Baños, Gemma Rodríguez, «Frankenstein»: a myth beyond science fiction movies , Journal of Medicine and Movies: Vol. 10 No. 1 (2014)
- Fèlix Bosch, María Luisa Ferrándiz, Josep-E. Baños, «The faithful gardener» (2005) and the complex debate on drug research , Journal of Medicine and Movies: Vol. 10 No. 3 (2014)
- Gemma Rodríguez, Josep-E. Baños, Replicas and human perfection: «The Brazil Boys» and «GATTACA» , Journal of Medicine and Movies: Vol. 10 No. 2 (2014)
- Irene Cambra-Badii, Elena Guardiola, Josep-E. Baños, From Marcus Welby, M.D. to The resident: The changing portrayal of physicians in TV medical dramas , Journal of Medicine and Movies: Vol. 16 No. 2 (2020)
- Josep-E. Baños, Irene Cambra Badii, Elena Guardiola, From movies to medical tv series, through literature , Journal of Medicine and Movies: Vol. 15 No. 4 (2019)
- Gemma Rodríguez, Josep-E. Baños, The fear of the biological effects of radioactivity: «Humanity in danger» and «Japan under the terror of the monster» , Journal of Medicine and Movies: Vol. 10 No. 4 (2014)
- Josep-E. Baños, La larga relación entre medicina y literatura (y viceversa) , Journal of Medicine and Movies: Vol. 11 No. 4 (2015)
- Josep-E. Baños, Elena Guardiola, Medicina y Literatura: el valor de las palabras , Journal of Medicine and Movies: Vol. 11 No. 1 (2015)
Downloads
Download data is not yet available.
+
−