Predestination

The 2014 Australian science fiction thriller directed by Michael and Peter Spierig is based on the 1959 short story “All You Zombies” by Robert A. Heinlein. The story follows a time-traveling agent (Ethan Hawke) who works for a covert government program designed to prevent crimes before they occur. The plot begins with the agent suffering severe burns during a failed attempt to stop a bombing by the elusive “Fizzle Bomber.” After undergoing reconstructive surgery, he is sent on one final mission. Disguised as a bartender in 1970s New York, he meets a mysterious customer who writes confession stories under the name “The Unmarried Mother.” Over drinks, the customer reveals a life story that begins with growing up as a girl named Jane in an orphanage, being recruited for a space program, falling in love with a mysterious man, and then becoming pregnant. Following childbirth, Jane is told that due to a rare medical condition, she must undergo gender reassignment and becomes John. The child is stolen, and John spends the next years adrift. As the story unfolds, time loops and paradoxes reveal that the bartender, Jane/John, and the child are all the same person—each version of the character traveling through time, creating a closed loop of existence. The film delves into themes of identity, fate, self-creation, and loneliness, offering a profound narrative that blurs the lines between protagonist and antagonist, past and future, love and betrayal, all within a tightly structured temporal paradox.