Anna to the Infinite Power

Despite being filmed on a small budget, "Anna to the Infinite Power" is a wonder. Produced, written and performed by a talented cast of newcomers and veteran actors attracted to the story of a young girl, a genius, who has to face the truth of her origins and forge her own identity and place in the world. A terrific and timely film, made with both love and insight.

I just caught this on Showtime this morning as well. This movie redefines hiding from senior citizen nurses, as in it's never been less thrilling. Also, whats up with the rotary phone that looks exactly like a normal handheld touch-tone wall phone? This movie is so lousy i wouldn't even see the point in writing about it. But Showtime felt it was good enough yo air at least twice so i'm just balancing out the universe here.

I first saw this movie over 20 years ago. My memory was of the basic plot, but I had forgotten all the subtleties as well as the film's brilliance. I honestly can't think of a film that is as haunting and captivating as this wonderfully told tale. Martha Bryne puts in an all time great child actor performance and Donna Mitchell plays a great mentoring taskmaster. I can only imagine that the premise of this story while probably completely fiction would be well within the realm of possibility in the modern world. As scary as the film is, it gives great hope for the human spirit to overcome pre-disposition and also shows the importance of heart and feeling over mechanical perfection. I recommend this movie to anyone who enjoys thought provoking and well written movies.

I caught it last night, and was struck immediately by the very direct similarities between it and "Eve", a first-season X-Files episode, about (you guessed it) little girl clones who have many of the same problems as Anna, only they also kill people, and don't seem to have human emotions. And an older clone shows up to monitor the progress of her "sisters". And the evil scientist (played by Jack Gilford!) has a greenhouse almost identical to an evil Nazi scientist who appeared in a later X-Files episode. The plot points in common are too numerous to be coincidence, and I kind of gasped at the end when Anna says she's going to change her name to "Eve".

Obviously Chris Carter saw this movie, and passed the ideas on to the writers who did "Eve". It's an old pattern for him.

I think directing was poor, acting severely lacking. But the story premise was 20 years ahead of it's time. A clone movie dealing with a girl as the heroine, the contextual elements of parentage and coming of age. The bones are there to be a good movie, and scifi that when it was released nothing near it for at least a decade though some argue about the ethics and scientific merit of much of this, it's still about as topical today? I really would like this re-made and I think it would do well.