'Children of Men', the new Alfonso Cuaron sci-fi flick

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I thought others were saying that it was cheesy? Or maybe they were referring to that "escaping from the gunfight" bit. It did leave me with a sense of hope, that the Human Project were going to be decent folks, or at least a better life for Kee than the Fishes or the Government. Or, at least that they were *real* when there was so much fear that they weren't. But now you've stripped me of that hope... waaahhh!

― Virginia Plainsong (kate), Monday, 2 October 2006 10:28 (nineteen years ago)

there were some very clear references to christ's birth throughout the film, it's just obtuse to say otherwise.

― jed_ (jed), Monday, 2 October 2006 10:55 (nineteen years ago)

the only defense of cgi you will ever need = the ping pong ball! (it HAD to be, rite???)

― Euai Kapaui (tracerhand), Monday, 2 October 2006 11:00 (nineteen years ago)

the concept of the future salvation of humanity being born amid muck and violence and war has a history, to say the least, but i don't think the film went much beyond that

― Euai Kapaui (tracerhand), Monday, 2 October 2006 11:04 (nineteen years ago)

the ping pong ball was great.

― jed_ (jed), Monday, 2 October 2006 11:09 (nineteen years ago)

ok, i thought the meeting bit was cheesy (in that the acting was, it was a bit stagey) and the laying down their arms was (sure, the ones that saw them would prob have stopped firing, but the ones who couldn't see and they yelled "ceasefire!" at and they just did? no fucking chance), but that was it really... i liked the end, that it was quite murky.

― emsk ( emsk), Monday, 2 October 2006 11:23 (nineteen years ago)

Yeah, actually that's one thing that's maybe not been said yet, how completely convincing Julianne Moore and Clive Owen are as exes.

xpost - soldiers be following orders.

― Andrew Farrell (afarrell), Monday, 2 October 2006 11:26 (nineteen years ago)

the one huge plot hole was that there would have been no chance whatsoever of them escaping after the baby had been revealed.

also it's not been said yet how totally hott Owen is in this.

― jed_ (jed), Monday, 2 October 2006 11:28 (nineteen years ago)

did anybody else see the banksy stencil in richy-cousin's battersea fortress? it looked as though an entire wall had been removed and relocated - i think that and the guernica overloaded my little brain with danger levels of mirth

― Euai Kapaui (tracerhand), Monday, 2 October 2006 11:30 (nineteen years ago)

I, too, wondered how they managed to get away after the baby had been revealed. I thought Syd's reaction was far more natural than the soldiers'. That was a rather terrible plothole. Especially as it was the baby that they were all supposed to be fighting over!

Err, yeah. I didn't want to be the one to mention it, though. I was watching the whole film going "err, is it me, or is Clive Owen really hott in this? Coz I didn't think he was all that in King Arthur, but errr, hottt."

x-post yes, I laughed out loud at the Banksy in the Tate. (And it was the Tate for that sequence, weirdly, even though the outside was Battersea Power Station.)

― Virginia Plainsong (kate), Monday, 2 October 2006 11:33 (nineteen years ago)

Okay okay I did think it was cheesy not just that everyone stops fighting, but also that they're struck dumb. I would have thought that at least one senior soldier would have tried to provide an escort.

(xposted to fuckery :)

― Andrew Farrell (afarrell), Monday, 2 October 2006 11:36 (nineteen years ago)

Are you calling me fuckery, sir?!?!

― Virginia Plainsong (kate), Monday, 2 October 2006 11:37 (nineteen years ago)

emsk and jed and Andrew i felt that, too, even before they'd met the soldiers - surely ONE of the holed up fugees, or ONE of the soldiers would have had their "take charge switch" flipped by the sight of that baby and taken it upon themSELVES to escort this precious cargo to whatever authorities they felt could handle it best, i mean cutie owen is practically hopping on one foot! i can just buy the reaction in the film though - humanity has been seriously re-superstitionized (who can blame them) and i can easily imagine everyone simply being struck dumb with religious awe just as they are

xpost kate - the soldiers were just fighting to suppress the fishes; the fishes had blasted into bexhill to get the baby in order to lend mystical authority to the anti-government/pro-immigrant uprising they wanted to trigger; it turned out that the blast triggered the uprising, which i'm not sure they were counting on... anyway i think the only people "fighting" over the baby were the fishes?

― Euai Kapaui (tracerhand), Monday, 2 October 2006 11:39 (nineteen years ago)

Yeah, the Battersea thing is cool, he goes over the right bridge for the Tate Modern, and down the Tate's ramp, and end up a different reused power station on the south bank :)

― Andrew Farrell (afarrell), Monday, 2 October 2006 11:40 (nineteen years ago)

yeah that's right. the battle wasn't over the baby.

― jed_ (jed), Monday, 2 October 2006 11:42 (nineteen years ago)

I suppose the principle fishes had all got shot, hence why Owen was able to get out of the building at all.

― Virginia Plainsong (kate), Monday, 2 October 2006 11:45 (nineteen years ago)

really good moment in battersea when owen asks the danny houston character how he copes

"i just [pops pill] don't think about it"

― jed_ (jed), Monday, 2 October 2006 11:47 (nineteen years ago)

Another plothole: wouldn't it have been a hell of a lot easier to get a boat from a bit further down the coast and row all the way to the bouy?

― chap who would dare to contain two ingredients. Tea and bags. (chap), Monday, 2 October 2006 12:07 (nineteen years ago)

one month passes...

Finally saw a 'coming soon' poster for this over here.

― Ned Raggett (Ned), Monday, 20 November 2006 15:41 (nineteen years ago)

Almost 2 months later, I am still thinking of this movie, plot holes and all. It'll be interesting to see how it does in the States. Ned, what does the poster look like there? The UK posters were a bit cheap-o and generally unrepresentative, I thought:

http://www.thehollywoodnews.com/images9/children_of_men_poster.jpg

― Tiki Theater Xymposium (Bent Over at the Arclight), Monday, 20 November 2006 16:06 (nineteen years ago)

A quick GIS search didn't turn it up -- it's black with a few lines about how it's twenty years in the future and babies aren't being born anymore but something's about to change etc. etc. A small figure of a fetus in vitro, then the credits. (Amusingly one line reads 'from visionary director Alfonso Cuaron' -- nice way to oversell, folks!)

― Ned Raggett (Ned), Monday, 20 November 2006 16:10 (nineteen years ago)

I still love it, I really want to see it again.

― Andrew Farrell (afarrell), Monday, 20 November 2006 16:24 (nineteen years ago)

it will prob be on at prince charles soon. next time i see it i am going on my own, the better to let the utter misery and hopelessness seep into me. rah.

― emsk ( emsk), Monday, 20 November 2006 16:27 (nineteen years ago)

great movie. yeah.

― sean gramophone (Sean M), Monday, 20 November 2006 16:35 (nineteen years ago)

one month passes...

Okay, so, revive.

― Ned Raggett (Ned), Thursday, 4 January 2007 05:57 (nineteen years ago)

(I still haven't seen this but some friends and I have made plans for next week at long last.)

― Ned Raggett (Ned), Thursday, 4 January 2007 05:57 (nineteen years ago)

Consensus from ILX Prime: very good, then Morbius starts talking about Steven Spielberg (may only happen in selected theatres)

― Andrew Farrell (afarrell), Thursday, 4 January 2007 08:31 (nineteen years ago)

selected brains.

― there to preserve disorder (kenan), Thursday, 4 January 2007 08:38 (nineteen years ago)

i still don't know how they did the ping pong ball thing. I loved that. There's something that seems specifically French about having people show off some athletic or physical trick for the camera (Denis Lavant in Les Amants du Pont-Neuf, or the guy who mimes blowing up a balloon in Ma Vivre Sa Vie) .. it just occurred to me that the ping pong ball thing might actually happen in the middle of that long unbroken shot?? unpossible

― Euai Kapaui (tracerhand), Thursday, 4 January 2007 11:18 (nineteen years ago)

(sorry) Long unbroken shot in the car = clear 'omage to Spielberg's War of The Worlds!

― Andrew Farrell (afarrell), Thursday, 4 January 2007 11:29 (nineteen years ago)

phew it is out on dvd soon, with this iffy cover

http://ec2.images-amazon.com/images/P/B000J4P9YO.01._SS500_SCLZZZZZZZ_V34326216_.jpg

― benrique (Enrique), Thursday, 4 January 2007 11:32 (nineteen years ago)

the only defense of cgi you will ever need = the ping pong ball! (it HAD to be, rite???)

I'd say so -- along with the rest of that sequence.

But the movie did not need another half hour.

pity I don't know who you are, farrell (most folx only get interesting when they talk shite about oneself).

― Dr Morbius (Dr Morbius), Thursday, 4 January 2007 14:54 (nineteen years ago)

oh bollocks i missed this

― lex pretend (lex pretend), Thursday, 4 January 2007 14:58 (nineteen years ago)

well i guess there's only so much time.

― benrique (Enrique), Thursday, 4 January 2007 14:59 (nineteen years ago)

wow that case is an eyesore

― Dominique (dleone), Thursday, 4 January 2007 15:10 (nineteen years ago)

lex it'll be at the prince charles soon enough

― emsk ( emsk), Thursday, 4 January 2007 15:16 (nineteen years ago)

This movie was just incredible. It seemed like there were at least 2 or 3 sequences where there was just one long 5-10 minute running shot (I especially like the Bexhill blood-spattered camera chasing Theo). So full of details worth remembering - "strawberry cough", Marika carrying her dog, field of charred animal remains, etc.

― stoked for the madness (nickalicious), Friday, 5 January 2007 14:13 (nineteen years ago)

I liked the deer running through the school.

― Euai Kapaui (tracerhand), Friday, 5 January 2007 14:22 (nineteen years ago)

Is four stars from the Sunday Mirror really the best review they could rustle up?

As someone who doesn't like Julianne Moore's work that much, this film used her exceptionally well!

― Pete (Pete), Friday, 5 January 2007 15:51 (nineteen years ago)

US poster, awful in a completely diff way: http://www.worstpreviews.com/images/posters/childrenofmen/childrenofmen3_large.gif

Will probably go see this next week. Oscar noms for this then?

― Edward III (edward iii), Friday, 5 January 2007 16:04 (nineteen years ago)

An amusing review from Seattle who extrapolates all his problems in the film from the first line of the film:
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/movies/296992_children25q.html

― Pete (Pete), Friday, 5 January 2007 16:19 (nineteen years ago)

I can exrapolate all my problems with William Arnold from the last paragraph of that review.

― Alex in SF (Alex in SF), Friday, 5 January 2007 16:23 (nineteen years ago)

Oscar noms for this then?

Best bet is technical awards like cinematography and art direction. Maybe adapted screenplay -- but I doubt it'll get anything more major than that.

― jaymc (jaymc), Friday, 5 January 2007 16:26 (nineteen years ago)

As someone who doesn't like Julianne Moore's work that much, this film used her exceptionally well!

OTM.

― M. White (Miguelito), Friday, 5 January 2007 16:28 (nineteen years ago)

Oscar noms for this then?

Ditto on jaymc -- Lubezki's cinematography seems certain (he was nom'd for New World which died at the box office) and maybe editing as well as adapted screenplay, i.e. nothing the general public cares about. Universal is generally thought to be dumping it in the US, though it's opened well in 16 theaters so far.

― Dr Morbius (Dr Morbius), Friday, 5 January 2007 16:34 (nineteen years ago)

16 theaters????

Jesus

― Euai Kapaui (tracerhand), Friday, 5 January 2007 16:39 (nineteen years ago)

it opened here in SF, but I've been put off by a coworker's negative review and my own perceived dopiness of the fertile-black-woman-saving-the-white-man angle

― Shakey Mo Collier (Shakey Mo Collier), Friday, 5 January 2007 16:41 (nineteen years ago)

re: 16 theatres - wasn't that just the limited Xmas release? It's playing at the downtown Providence megaplex, and we're not exactly a major market.

Plus I can't seem to watch TV without seeing an advert for it.

― Edward III (edward iii), Friday, 5 January 2007 16:41 (nineteen years ago)

I had to take the train all the way downtown to see it the other day. I didn't expect a wide release, but I was hoping it'd at least be at Pipers Alley or in Evanston.

― jaymc (jaymc), Friday, 5 January 2007 16:43 (nineteen years ago)

yes, 16 screens as of last weekend (this is SOP for 'difficult' or arty films); congrats to Providence on being a rollout market for dystopian chase films.

http://the-numbers.com/charts/thisweek.php

― Dr Morbius (Dr Morbius), Friday, 5 January 2007 16:49 (nineteen years ago)

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