children of men

on christmas night, i went to see "children of men" with a bunch of boys (sorry, i mean "men" :) ) in san jose. it was the first time in i cant remember how long that i spent time with friends instead of family on christmas night. being a product of a two family system, usually i have two christmas', but my mom is in ohio this year, so we only had one. so i got the chance to join some of the san jose men for what seemed to be a yearly tradition they have of seeing a movie on christmas night. we ventured to the ultra hip CineArts theatre on santana row and sat in a sold out audience to take in what has to be one of my favorite movies of the year.

not many people have heard of this film, which is a shame, because its elegant and jarring, epic and subtle, and all those other great reviewer words that will get attached to it eventually. the premise is that in 2027, the world has crumbled into chaos because humans have become infertile - the youngest person on earth, at 18, has just died, causing worldwide mourning. the last "civil" country is the UK and they have become a police state, deporting or detaining all illegal immigrants into refugee camps and closely monitoring the population through survelliance cameras and and an oppressive military presence. we dont know why humans have become infertile, nor the details of what the rest of the world even looks like or how exactly it has deteriorated. mostly what we know is that things are not good- so not good that they cage people at train terminals, force fertility tests and sell home-suicide kits like claritin.

the main character, theo (clive owen, who i have decided is an incredibly striking and engaging actor, and well, pretty darn hot) is a depressed government worker sullenly drinking himself to death to dull the reality of what the world has become. but he must awaken himself from the numb when his ex-wife, julian, enlists him to help transport an illegal immigrant to the coast. julian and theo used to be activists when they were together, but theo seems to have defected and detached from everything he used to be when their son was killed in the flu pandemic that struck just before the infertility. it seems that in getting theo to help her, julian is able to uncover the part of theo that used to be passionate about something-- and that part slowly becomes inflamed once julian is murdered and his mission to bring the immigrant to the coast becomes illuminated- we find out that this immigrant is in fact pregnant with the first baby to be conceived in almost 20 years.

the movie becomes their mission to get this pregnant girl to saftey. and slowly, in all the madness and in all the violence and all the chaos, this one life becomes the single hope for the rest of the world.

yes, yes, the parallels to christmas/mary/jesus are obvious once you start looking for them - but the brilliance of this film is that they dont hit you over the head with it at all. once the concept is fully realized, you are so moved by the subtly in which its been presented and by the freshness of seeing it in a new context, that you cant help but be changed.

this movie does something to you-- the setting and imagery is so familiar and the imminent threat of a world becoming this chaotic is so believable-- that the movie gives this insane sense of urgency. urgency that we need to live as we were created to live--well, more specifically to seek out the thing that created us to live and to pursue it with everything we have, at any cost.

despite the urgency i feel, i am still left feeling somewhat inadequate in my current state. does everyone wonder if they are doing enough?

see that movie.