MOVIE REVIEW A better ending would have been a godsend

Did cloning a child ensure a horrible fate for him?
By BETSY PICKLE
SCRIPPS HOWARD
The most important thing to realize about "Godsend" is that it isn't about science; it's about emotion.
Yes, there's science in this thriller about human cloning. But if science alone provided the foundation for "Godsend," it wouldn't be nearly as scary as it is, or at least the scares would be quite different -- like the kind college students have a few weeks before the end of senior year when they start panicking about whether they have earned enough science credits to graduate.
It's disappointing that "Godsend" abandons its scientific thrust because it stops being frightening and starts being derivative at that point. But close scrutiny shows that the science is AWOL long before the movie makes its wrong turn.
Family at center
The Duncans, biology teacher Paul (Greg Kinnear) and full-time mom/part-time photographer Jessie (Rebecca Romijn-Stamos), have a happy life in the city with son Adam (Cameron Bright). Then, a day after his eighth birthday, Adam is killed in a tragic accident.
The grieving parents are visited by Dr. Richard Wells (Robert De Niro), a fertility specialist and genetic researcher who was Jessie's professor at college. He tells Paul and Jessie that, if they agree quickly, he can take cells from Adam and clone him. They'll have their family back. The process would be illegal, of course, and they'd have to move to be near his clinic and sever all ties with kin and friends so that no one will notice that Adam is alive again.
Paul objects violently to the offer. Jessie is less resistant. Instead of sitting down and discussing the consequences of taking such a course, Paul and Jessie mope and weep, and they finally call Richard.
Losing a child is one of the most painful experiences a human can go through, but it's hard to imagine people agreeing to clone their child without having one real conversation about it. Yet that's what Paul and Jessie must do in order for there to be a movie, and the actors help viewers buy it.
The new Adam
The new Adam is born and grows up to be just as cute as before. Oddly, when he turns 8, he starts having horrible dreams and changes overnight from a sweet child to a boy possibly possessed.
Paul wonders if this was a latent problem that didn't have time to evolve in the first Adam or if playing God simply ensured a horrible fate for the cloned child. The guilt the Duncans feel about their morality call raises a wall between them and Adam and makes it harder for them to help him through his crisis.
Director Nick Hamm and screenwriter Mark Bomback come up with plenty of jumps for Kinnear, Romijn-Stamos and the audience. The music and camerawork achieve maximum "Get out of there!" tension, and young Bright does a great job at playing up the different sides of Adam.
However, the twist that comes to light kills the momentum. It isn't even disguised particularly well, not when a certain character keeps having Captain Queeg moments. So instead of sending the audience home thoroughly creeped out, "Godsend" reminds viewers of a campier kind of horror film before wrapping up with a return to eeriness.