Never Let Me Go Vs. The Island

     One of the books I read this summer for summer reading was Never Let Me Go. From the moment I realized that the 'students' in the book were actually clones who were all made with the purpose of donating their body parts to the people in the outside world, my mind kept going back to a movie I had saw in English class my Sophomore year. This movie was called The Island. It too was about clones who were made to donate their vital organs to those in the outside world. In the book Never Let Me Go, it never specified that the clones were made as an exact clone of someone famous or wealthy enough to get a clone of them, that way if they became ill or something happened, they had a clone who could donate to them, but that is still what I kept thinking. This is because, if my mind serves me correctly, is how it went in the movie, The Island.
     My purpose of writing this blog originally was to show the similarities between the Never Let Me Go book and The Island movie, but the more I think back on each, the similarities end after maybe the first 30 minutes of the Island movie. While both are stories of clones who are made of people in the outside world, with the purpose of donating their body parts when they are needed, and both having a tied in love story involved where their relationship seems unlikely or against all odds, that is about as far as the similarities go. The Island is very futuristic, high tech, and more of a fast pace, action movie about the two clones escape.The main focus in this movie is about how they escape. The clones in this movie are completely unaware that they are clones, and are unaware of their future and what will come of them. To justify why some are disappearing and never coming back, they tell them that they have been released to live on some beautiful island. On the other hand, in Never Let Me Go, the clones are told their whole lives what they are and what will happen to them. All though they are told in ways in which it doesn't really occur to them, they are still informed, they know what will happen to them when they leave. The main focus in the book is not about a lot of action, or some elaborate escape plan, it focuses much more on the characters, their lives, and the love stories. This book, at least in my head, did not seem high tech and futuristic, but more casual, modern times, school kids kind of thing.
     While at first, I thought the two were similar, it is clear that there are also many differences. If I were to compare Never Let Me Go to just the beginning of The Island, then I would have something there, but I realize that the differences between the movie as a whole, are more than the similarities.