Cheryl and I watched Children of Men last night. In a post-apocalyptic world only England has any sense of normalcy (aside from violently deporting all aliens), while fertility has dropped world-wide to zero. Let me say up-front that I have not read the book upon which the movie is based, but the movie was not great. It didn't have enough action to be an action movie, but it wasn't cerebral enough to be a thinking-man's movie. Apparently it was intended to be a criticism of the US and President Bush specifically, but that criticism was far too subtle to truly be effective (or even noticeable most of the time).Cheryl and I also didn't like the fact that the apocalypse was never explained. There was a 10-second news program you glimpsed that had names of places (like New York) with pictures of destruction (like a mushroom cloud over Manhattan) but nothing more specific, and nothing on why England was apparently spared. I realize that the world-wide destruction may have been secondary to the fertility story, but if you have a movie where the world has pretty much ended I want to at least know what happened.
To me, it was too slow to be an action film and too subtle and vague to be a commentary on society. Cheryl (and I) went in with high expectations based on reviews (and the subject matter is highly relevant to her work), and the movie didn't live up. We will, however, probably read the book now.
Two thumbs sideways (Cheryl even said maybe three-quarters up).
NYC
1 comment:
It's been awhile since I saw this movie but I remember liking it alot...or maybe that was just Clive Owen.
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