Review of Children of Men (2006) by Briank. — 31 Aug 2007

This movie was terrible. There were just too many plot problems. Children of Men takes place in Britain in a futuristic age where humans can no longer reproduce. The only thing keeping my attention was the hope that the cause of the infertility would be revealed.

However, the only provided explanation is that about 20 years earlier, there was a disease going around, causing the change. Since this phenomenon drives the whole plot of the film, I would have preferred to have been given an explanation lasting more than 20 seconds.

Also, I don't want to give too much away, but the ending isn't much of a conclusion. Rather, the camera just zooms out and no questions have been answered and the protagonist is still in the middle of his journey.

I'm not saying that I wanted everything to be wrapped up neatly; I just want to see at least some form of finality. Another problem of mine was the characterization. In the middle of the film, people try to kill a woman because she's pregnant, yet, as soon as the baby's born, everybody suddenly becomes nice and peaceful.

I understand that the director was trying to show the innocence of children, but going from murderous to crying and hugging in a matter of seconds is just too ridiculous. In addition, I had some problems with the filming.

There were a couple of times when vision was distracted because of blood from the scene that splattered onto the camera. As a result, there's a whole scene in which the characters are running around, but I was fixated on the drops of liquid that were dripping down the screen.

(Trust me, the blood was not there for a symbolic purpose.) In short, the idea of a futuristic world without fertility may have been a good idea, but the execution was dreadful.