In the year 2027 as envisioned in Alfonso Cuaron's "Children of Men," most of the world's major civilizations have collapsed, global war rages on with no end in sight and the human race has become infertile. It's been 19 long years since a baby was born and scientists have neither an explanation nor a cure. Apocalypse now, indeed.
In Britain -- apparently the last country left standing, albeit under neo-fascist rule -- pencil-pusher Theo Faron (Clive Owen) continues to punch the clock at his 9-to-5ministry job, his resigned, weary air indicative of a man who's just going through the motions because he can't think of anything else to do.
The movie, which is based on P.D. James's novel, unfolds largely through Theo's eyes, charting his transformation from complacent office drone to political revolutionary willing to die for his cause. That brief description makes "Children of Men" sound a lot like Terry Gilliam's "Brazil," but the two films could not be any less similar in tone, design, sensibility or overall intention.
This unsettling, gripping, often astonishing movie, which catapults the Mexican-born Cuaron ("Y tu mama tambien," "Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban") into the front ranks of Hollywood's most imaginative filmmakers, is primarily devoted to creating a highly detailed dystopian future with ominous resonance to our present day. Despite the bleakness of that vision, "Children of Men" is also thrilling, both for its groundbreaking style (there are action sequences here unlike any filmed before) and its complex, vividly realized ideas.
Cuaron, who also co-wrote the screenplay, doesn't spend a lot of time on exposition: He uses visual cues to provide the particulars of this nightmarish, somewhat Orwellian England, with everything from graffiti sprayed on walls to headlines on tattered newspapers to scrolling news tickers at the bottom of TV screens filling you in as the action moves along.
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It says a lot about our post-9/11 reality that the viewer doesn't need much help to fill in the blanks. Terrorism, prejudice, racial profiling and martial law are all matter-of-fact in "Children of Men," and one of the most frightening things about the movie is how natural an extension of contemporary reality it all seems. Some science-fiction requires a considerable leap of faith in the viewer, or a forgiving nature in matters of credibility: "Children of Men" only requires the viewer has not lived in a cave for the past five years.
The plot is kickstarted after Theo reunites with his former lover Julian (Julianne Moore), now a revolutionary who seeks his help in smuggling an illegal refugee, Kee (Clare-Hope Ashitey), out of the country. Once Theo learns who Kee is and why she is so important, it is practically impossible for him to say no.
The rest of "Children of Men" is essentially one long chase, with several prolonged sequences -- like the roadside ambush of a car by a motorcycle gang, shot in one long uninterrupted take -- that would be ridiculously exciting if they weren't so terrifying, too. "Children of Men" is essentially an action film, but it's the stakes Cuaron places on his protagonists and the heartbreaking plausibility of its scenario that turn the picture into something far more substantial: A harrowing nightmare about what we could become.
