Review of: Children of Men

I have to say, Peter Suderman's review of the best movie I've seen in at least a year, Children of Men, doesn't do this powerful film justice. But he and I do agree on a few things: Clive Owen is understated and brilliant in this film; and it's visually extremely compelling, even unique.

Suderman's main gripe is that this movie doesn't "mean" enough; that is, Children of Men throws out or touches on many important themes, like the War on Terror, Islamic radicalism, tradeoffs between freedom and security, etc., but doesn't stop to dwell on them. Personally, I found that one of the film's secret strengths.The pacing is steady, the action sequences gripping and believable, and the story refuses to get bogged down in heavy, preachy messages and monologues, like so much familiar muddy English countryside.

This is a film -- thanks to its perfect cinematography and good score -- that's more about mood and emotion than selling ideas. It is a "smart" movie that lets you know it's considered all the moral and contemporary angles, but it doesn't try to corner you into any of them. What you take away from this film depends very much on what ideas and beliefs you bring into it. Director Cuaron's approach seemed to be, to swipe a slogan from FOX, "We film, you decide." I find that refreshing. Peter Suderman of the political mag National Review finds that annoying. He wants strident (preferably conservative) political statements artfully wrought, like: "Abortion is murder;" and "Immigration dilutes our nation's resolve." Yawn.

For sure you can watch this film with just about anyone, and afterwards have a lively, interesting debate. But the film itself doesn't lower itself to petty didactic arguments: it has a story to tell. Again, how refreshing!

Moroever, this film is not "just" genre entertainment, although it is part action and sci-fi escapism. (Despite plenty of shooting and violence, Owens' character never once picks up a gun, even when one would seem to come in handy.)

Refusing to beat you over the head with messages, Children of Men nevertheless does stand for some important things which, upon further examination, humbly approach the universal. Without being hackneyed or trite, Children quietly and movingly stands up for the sacredness and dignity of each human life. Owen's character is the only one who "gets" this. Both the liberal-lefty terrorist "Fish" fighting for immigrants' rights, and the fascist security forces using violent, repressive means to stave off anarchy, lose sight of dignity and preciousness of life in pursuit of their zero-sum goals.

Even I was tempted to think Owen just didn't get it when the motley Fish leaders, the erstwhile protectors of a young pregnant African refugee, asked him what he thought should be done with her, i.e. how best to use her for the Cause. "I think she needs a doctor," he answers immediately, "I think she needs proper care." The Fish can only scoff at such short-sighted naivete. With humanity on the brink, I thought to myself then, surely Owen's character was missing the big picture, the pressing political fate of millions? But as events prove, Owen is right and the Fish are wrong. I ended up reproaching my initial reaction as the film reached its climax. Owen is the only one, absent a few non-English speaking refugees, who recognizes the moral imperative to protect innocent life.

The awesome, unifying moment of this film, when time slows down several dozen heartbeats, takes place in a tenement building in a refugee city. Suddenly, both jackbooted soldiers and dreadlocked terrorists lose the will to fight each other when they're abruptly face-to-face with a miracle: a real live crying infant, the first in 18 years. The truth's liberating effect on them is fleeting, however, as characters revert to form. The moment passes and the fighting resumes in earnest, continuing a masterpiece of real-time, first-person-view urban warfare, but it gives Owen just enough time to stumble away to safety with the future of humanity in his arms.

Owen's character also embodies another significant but understated theme, related to the above: politics without a hope & vision for the future is a footrace to the grave. Owen is a "retired" liberal activist who retains strong sympathies for the old Left, including his politically active ex-wife (Juliette Moore), and forest-dwelling hippie mentor (Michael Caine). Director Cuaron contrasts Owen's liberal simpatico with his apparent resignation to "sell out" and work in a dull, gray government bureaucracy for The Man. As the action unfolds, Cuaron makes us think that Owen will surely have to choose: either the unstable leftist Fish, or the fascist forces holding anarchy at bay. Yet Owen's actual choice -- the correct choice -- is neither.

Owen, unlike the radical and increasingly violent Fish, has realized that once hope for life is out of the picture, his liberal politics stops meaning anything. For that matter, when life consists of waiting to die, everything stops meaning anything. More broadly, this film shows us that when politics become divorced from mankind's real circumstances -- which have a knack of ignoring our left-right paradigms and pre-conceived notions -- society becomes grotesquely pointless, even dangerous to itself.

You nihilists out there who are tired of "dark" Hollywood heroes being redeemed in the end may choose to hate this film. But if you do, you'll be missing the point. It's not so much that Owen's character changes, it's that circumstances do -- and amazingly so. He shows that he is really the same man he always was, and, once his (and mankind's) outlook suddenly changes, he becomes his former self.

Giving us spare but effective snippets of Owens' bland, rote, hopeless existence at the start of the film, Cuaron invites us to believe that Owen is a washed up drunk beyond renewal. But Owen's character shows his true mettle as soon as he realizes that, quite literally, hope has been reborn. Without fake bravado, or "dramatic" bouts of doubt a lesser film might give us to increase the suspense, Owen simply and unhesitatingly does the right thing: protecting against all comers the mother-to-be of humanity's first baby in 18 years.

I never read the novel upon which this movie was based. Maybe it's great; and I'm sure it's different than the film. But all that is irrelevant. Children of Men stands alone as a great film, and the building inertia of its simple but irresistible narrative and momentous power of its visuals carry all the meaning a viewer can hope for in a film.

Finally, not to ruin the ending, but it's just not true that "everyone dies in vain" in this film as Suderman claims. Maybe the ending is not suitably Hollywood enough for Suderman, but that's his problem. Even if everyone did die in this film, and all of Owen's selfless bravery and humanity sans sappy sentiment failed to carry the day, it wouldn't mean that hope was in vain. If there's one thing this movie shows us, it's that hope is the sin qua non for humanity. And like Owen's character, we can only do our humble, stumbling best, as Jesse implored, to keep it alive.