Movie Review -- Children of Men

Once in a while a film comes along that you hope is going to be as good as you think it is. Funny things about us humans -- we're not very good at predicting the future. Things turn out to be much better or much worse that we think they're going to be.

"Children of Men" is both much better and much worse than I anticipated.

Director Cuarón's ("Prisoner of Azkaban", "Y Tu Mama Tambien") has taken P.D. James novel and made a movie that works on all ways -- chase movie, cautionary tale, human drama -- which is consistent and coherent on all levels -- emotional, personal, political, and technically. That's the good part.

It is set in a world in which women stopped having children eighteen years ago. This has plunged the world into chaos. The UK has been able to shut the rest of the world out most literally, hunting down and deporting illegal immigrants. In the most personally disturbing part of the movie the director takes us first person through a deportation, using images and sounds that invoke Abu Ghraib prison, the Holocaust, and "Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome". It's just far enough in the future that this could all start happening tomorrow. The film is so well crafted, so believable, that this is our world. That's the bad part.

Through this world Theo (Clive Owen) shepherds the pregnant Kee (Claire-Hope Ashityey) through police, freedom fighters, terrorists, psychotic internal security guards, and his own personal demons. Everybody wants a piece of her, and everybody else has guns. The only way to survive is by knowing who to trust and by letting those others -- known and unknown -- throw themselves in front of the bullets.

The writing, direction, and acting are all first rate. Cuarón is fast becoming one of my favourite directors, and I can't wait to see what he comes out with next.

Go see the movie. This one is definitely going on my "buy" list.