Go See “Children of Men” in the Theater

28 January 2007 | Culture, Eventness, Media, TV & Movies | Comments

Note: This is the first of two related posts. #1 is about a brilliant film, and #2 is about the eventness of seeing film with other people.

Last night, my dad and I went to see a late screening of “Children of Men,” the new Alfonso Cuarón film that has been compared to “Blade Runner.”

We walked out of the theater drained but pleased: it’s a lean-forward, eyes-wide, gnawing at your cuticles experience — grueling, intense, violent, compelling and characteristically Cuarón in the rich visual detail with which the world is imagined.

The conceit of “Children of Men” is a marvel of narrative concision: imagine what the world would be like 18 years after the human race became infertile on a planetwide scale. Imagine life without the laughter of children and the sense of being connected to a future as well as a past. Imagine how despotic regimes would become without the future to consider.

The film stars Clive Owen, a magnificent, Alec Guinness-like actor who disappears into roles so utterly that he’ll probably never be a major movie star, since the whole point of movie stars is that you remember their cross-movie starshine while also watching the character they play at any given moment. Have you ever watched Tom Cruise and NOT thought of his other movies at some point? That’s a movie star. In “Children of Men” I wasn’t even sure who the actor was playing the lead, and I had to check IMDB today to remind myself of where else I’d seen Clive Owen before.

Like “Blade Runner” or “Minority Report” this is a near-future dystopia, but it’s much more like “The Handmaid’s Tale” (both Margaret Atwood’s novel and the movie) and “1984″ than the former pair.

“Blade Runner” and “Minority Report” are both terrific Hollywood tentpole movies — I own both on DVD — and both are alternately about the characters and the worlds within which they live. Both have James Bondian technoporn sequences and cartoony Big Movie Action Sequences.

There’s a LOT of action and violence in “Children of Men,” but it’s harrowing: more like the action in “Saving Private Ryan” or “Farenheit 9/11.”

I don’t want to tell you anything else about the movie because you should GO SEE IT, in the theaters, with other people around.

You don’t want to have a pause button handy while watching this, because you’ll pause it. You’ll confect a reason to take a break and go get a glass of water, check the kids to make sure their blankets are on or take the dog out to pee.

Don’t.

“Children of Men” deserves a higher profile than it has been getting. Clive Owen deserves an Oscar nomination for Best Actor, and Cuarón deserves one for Best Director. Instead, it received nominations for cinematography, film editing and adapted screenplay.

And, of course, being me, I’ve been pondering WHY the movie hasn’t been getting more play. I think what’s true of Clive Owen is true of the movie: it’s too realistic, too convincing in its distressing vision of the future, and it doesn’t give enough big movie distance. I don’t like horror movies, but even if I’m watching one I feel anxious but safe. I KNOW that the creature isn’t going to get me, even if my empathy with the characters keeps my heart inflating and contracting madly in my mouth.

I wasn’t safe watching “Children of Men,” but I’ll never forget seeing it. “Schindler’s List” had an even more intense version of this, at least for me, watching the movie as an American Jew.

Go see it.

P.S. The next post talks more about eventness.