Ever feel like a turd in a punch bowl? So there I am, floating around the ice and chunks of pineapple, wondering what’s wrong with me. My crime? Did I try to outbid Michael Jackson for Mother Theresa’s bones? No. Did I walk into a nursery and ask who the parents of the ugly baby were? No. Did I force patients in a coma ward to suffer through A Simple Life marathon? No.
I didn’t care for Children of Men. If I take off my shirt, you can still see the welts on my back where my colleagues beat me with Madonna’s riding crop. I know I should be ashamed, and please don’t tell me it’s because I didn’t get it. That was my major beef. There wasn’t much to get. I don’t believe Children of Men is a bad film, or even a badly made film. Instead of engrossing me with its powerful message and gripping imagery, it just meandered along like my grandfather’s Rascal on a low battery.
[ cf Crowning a king and queen ]
Which was so reassuring...
What I found really compelling about the rerview was the pitch towards Idiocracy from the maker of Office Spaces even if there is clear and compelling Evidence that Mike Judge SHOULD be shoved out the Air Lock into deeper space for Beevis And Butthead. It is a tragedy that so few americans had a chance to see Idiocracy, and it appears that Children of Men is getting only a slightly better release...
The movie was interesting, but it was missing that part where there is really some hope, some something going forward. For those who were old enough to remember seeing The Graduate, in the cinema, you remember getting to the end, the boy gets the girl, and there has been this great emotional upheveal - and.... they get to the back of the bus, and while the credits roll there is that look, where they wonder, and we do what now? which was the REALLY SCARY PART of that film... Children Of Men fortunately avoids that, since we get to the end of the movie, and the film director rolls the credits over a black background, with some fun music. The Movie IS there, it is just there, it is what it is... Good Luck, and God Bless... and all that jazz...
{ ok, so getting the Music Sound Track is clearly a must do... }
Some will argue that the ending should be left open, as a place to start the actual dialog between those who saw the film, and what they would like to see the film mean, and more importantly drive the crowd to become constructively engaged in...
At a technical level, perchance, but the film had been so disconcerting, that it really does not leave it open for folks to just crawl across the way into the Pub, and drink happy drinks, while chatting happy chat, and being the typical Intellectual du Gauche types.... It brought up all of the old classical 'liberal agenda items' - and then the somewhat Inappropriate "immigration issue" - I say Inappropriate, since, it is rather RUDE to point at the current Nationalist Turd Floating in the National Body Politic Punch Bowl. If only folks would be polite, and not speak about the obviously bad things, then of course everyone would be able to be happy about the things that they are suppose to be happy about....
Which I think is a part of the VERY UNSETTLING sub-text of the film. Clearly some percieve the sense of almost modest joy that the voters in america have put some distance between themselves and 'the dominator theory' ( cf PNAC ), in the most recent political elections. So in some sense folks are SUPPOSE to be getting that Stuff Is Getting Better feeling... But is the World 'back on track' again??? Are Things Really Getting Better???
I think the film would have been clearly percieved as FAR DARKER a film, had the voting been another way around, and the currrent american government, with some 51% would be talking about the clear and compelling mandate..... So in the proper context the film is on the verge of being the Next Ian Flemming's Chitty Chitty Bang Bang! about the happy fun filled trip to the beach... since, well, we can all conceive how much worse it could have been recieved.
What really bothers me, is that the author of the less than supportive film review, may be pointing at the most important part of the whole problem - that folks have 'fallen in love' with the film and some symbolism, without actually worrying about the transition from "art" to "realism". The last time around, when there were such fun filled eco-tastrophy dystopias, such as the almost lost, No Blade of Grass (1970) which is based upon John Christopher's 1956 novel - and it did a charming turn as an art house film while the Nixon Administration Kow-Tow'd towards the First Earth Day and brought us the EPA... Gosh, and, Golly... What if horrifically, in some 36 years from now, folks are looking back at us, and wondering WHY didn't we get up off of our Sitting Portions and Get Suited Up and into the Game, when films like, Children of Men, were raising some of the unpleasant issues of the era that most folks mostly know about...
Without any doubt the film is a MUST SEE IN THE CINEMA, with friends, and preferably at an early matinee performance, so there is still day light out to help steady up your nerves, just in case one's ability to fall into the film overwhelms one, and that 'ability to suspend disbelief', doesn't just pop back, as it occasionally does when watching "Bevis and ButtHead"....
Small Piece Of Advice, do NOT mix this Film with Constantine (2005) - there may be visibile side effects and contraindications.