Æon Flux

In 2011, a deadly pathogenic virus killed 99 percent of the Earth's population, forcing the survivors to regroup and scatter across the Earth. A scientist named Trevor Goodchild developed a cure to the virus. Four centuries later, in 2415, the remaining five million humans inhabit Bregna, a dystopian walled futuristic city-state, which is ruled by a congress of scientists. Although Bregna is largely an idyllic place in the destroyed Earth, people routinely disappear, and the population is plagued by nightmares. The Goodchild dynasty has ruled Bregna for 400 years. But now, rebels have emerged to challenge the Goodchild regime. The Goodchild regime provides for the city, till they relinquish their freedom and agree to live quietly in a gilded cage. Relical, the dirigible, floats above the city to remind the people of what they have survived. The city is surrounded by an impregnable wall and citizens are not allowed to go beyond. A skilled warrior, named Aeon Flux (Charlize Theron), is a member of the Monicans, an underground rebel organization who communicate through telepathy-enabling technology and are led by the Handler (Frances McDormand). After a mission to destroy a surveillance station, Aeon comes home to find her sister Una (Amelia Warner) has been mistaken for a Monican and killed. Una was married to her husband Claudius (Nikolai Kinski). Aeon feels her life has been stolen from her and now she dedicates her life to her mission. Aeon is sent on a mission to kill the government's leader, Trevor Goodchild (Marton Csokas). Goodchild is addressing the congress of scientists at the citadel. Aeon has to cross the frontier garden and then cross a confusing maze inside the citadel. Aeon is told that Goodchild will be at the Forum. Sithandra accompanies Aeon for the mission, who has hands instead of feet. The Frontier Garden is defended by many autonomous defense systems, such as self-aiming darts and razor blades concealed in grass. At the Forum, Trevor is worried that his brother Oren is being too brutal against the Monicans and soon, brute force will not be enough to stem the rebellion. Trevor believes that the system they put in place was temporary and was meant to allow Trevor to continue his work. He knows that the control system is wrong, but Oren believes that the system can be controlled and be made permanent. Aeon finds Trevor alone, while he is practicing his speech to the Forum. But as she prepares to shoot Trevor, Aeon has flashbacks of kissing Trevor, and Trevor calls her by the name "Katherine". In her hesitation, Aeon is discovered and arrested. It is revealed that the attack on Trevor was organized by Oren who had passed on the information to the Monicans and allowed Aeon to overcome their defenses. Aeon escapes custody and finds Claudius alive inside the Citadel. Claudius tells Aeon that Trevor is trying to help by solving the problem of nightmares and memories that people have, of things that never happened to them. Aeon turns back into the Citadel and seeks Trevor. They end up having sex as Aeon has feelings when she is in Trevor's presence. Aeon finds Trevor's secret lab and is attacked by Oren's guards, forcing her to escape. Sithandra is livid that Aeon came out of the citadel without killing Trevor. Aeon tries to convince Sithandra to help investigate the matter further, but she refuses. Aeon breaks into the Relical. There she meets Keeper (Pete Postlethwaite), the old man who monitors everything. Aeon finds that her sister Una has been "recycled" and assigned a new identity. Meanwhile, Oren declares Trevor a traitor and assumes power. The Handler declares Aeon a fugitive on the basis on Sithandra's report. Trevor realizes that all the members of his test group 7B, of which Una was a part, have been killed in police action, by being labeled as Monicans. Aeon visits the address, where her sister had been reassigned, and only finds a newborn baby, with eyes exactly like Una's. Aeon questions the origins of everyone in Bregna and in particular, her personal connection to Trevor. Trevor arrives at the address and reveals the truth to Aeon. Everyone in Bregna is revealed to be a clone, grown from recycled DNA. With the dead constantly being reborn as new individuals and bearing partial memories of their previous lives, their troubling dreams have increased. Cloning was required because the antidote to the virus made humans infertile. Trevor's ongoing experiments were attempts to reverse the infertility. His preceding clones had all worked on this problem. Aeon learns that she is a clone of the original Trevor's wife Katherine and that she is the first "Katherine" clone in over 400 years. Una was one of Trevor's most successful experiments; part of a group of clones that proved to be fertile, with Una having been pregnant when she was killed. However, in order to keep the dynasty of Goodchild clones in power, Trevor's brother, Oren (Jonny Lee Miller), had Una killed along with the other members of the fertile experimental group. He ordered all of Trevor's research to be destroyed. In a confrontation with Trevor and Aeon, Oren reveals that nature has corrected the infertility problem and that some women are becoming pregnant without intervention by scientists. Oren has had them all killed to maintain the Goodchild reign. Aeon then goes against both Oren and her former allies, who want to kill Trevor and also kill her for not killing Trevor. Aeon convinces the other Monicans tracking her, including her friend Sithandra (Sophie Okonedo), to ignore the Handler and to help her kill Oren and his men. Aeon goes to destroy the Relical, the dirigible that stores the DNA for cloning. She discovers that he preserved Katherine's DNA for years, although an earlier Oren clone had ordered it to be destroyed so "Katherine" could not influence any Trevors. The dirigible crashes into the city wall, breaking it down to reveal the surrounding land for the first time in centuries.