Children of Men
Review by Fritz Esker
Thankfully, after a mostly lackluster year for films, director Alfonso Cuaron’s Children of Men, which received a limited release in December to qualify for this year’s Oscars, is every bit as excellent as one could hope it would be.
The film takes place in London in the near-future. For almost twenty years, women have grown infertile. The world has collapsed into complete despair. Most of the world’s cities outside of London have been destroyed and refugees pour into London, only to be herded up and put into prison camps. The situation in London is so bleak the government-sponsored suicide kits are being marketed on television just like drugs like Prozac get marketed today.
Theo (Clive Owen) is a formerly passionate radical turned into a despairing, hopeless drone by the situation around him. One day, he finds himself kidnapped by his ex-wife (Julianne Moore), who now heads a terrorist organization that aims to free the refugees and topple Britain’s fascist government. Through his connections, Theo can get transit papers for a refugee (Claire-Hope Ashitey), who happens to be eight months pregnant. The goal is to get her to the Human Project, a scientific group aiming to solve the world’s infertility problem.
The scariest thing about Children of Men’s relentlessly bleak futuristic world is that, aside from the infertility problem, most of the horrors feel like only slight variations from present-day atrocities involving government-sponsored torture, terrorist groups, refugee camps, and disease pandemics. Most impressively, the film ladles out this atmosphere in doses, never making the audience feel like the film is atmosphere over everything else (like Blade Runner – I’m now ducking under my desk to dodge all the stuff sci-fi geeks are throwing at me for that comment).
Children of Men is what more films should aspire to be – it has important things to say, but it does so via a compelling, entertaining story. In fact, even if the film is viewed purely as an exercise in the thriller/mystery genre, Children of Men delivers more thrills and suspense than most Hollywood genre efforts. In addition to the riveting story, Cuaron (Y Tu Mama Tambien) will have film students amazed at the skill with which he executes the film’s many tracking shots.
Kudos must also be paid to the film’s marketing team. More often than not, movie trailers reveal far too much about the film they advertise (the worst offenders would be those for the films of Robert Zemeckis). However, Children of Men’s trailer is everything a trailer should be. It makes you want to see the movie without spoiling any of the film’s numerous surprises. That is an accomplishment in and of itself.
The film’s bleakness might scare off some viewers, but the overall message is still one of hope. Granted, the film unflinchingly shows the losses that occur when people do make a stand in an effort to make the world around them a better place. But, in the end, the film is about hope more than anything else. Do yourself a favor and check it out.