Les Fils de l'homme

I never saw it in 06, Only just watched it. I am not going to go on about it much. But its relevance to todays world is astounding.

The action is impeccably done. The battle scenes are mind numbingly realistic. I still can't believe it was made in 05/06. Characters are so real. The atmosphere the attention to detail in scenes are incredible. Things happening in the background out of focus etc is just another layer of a real world that's been created. A huge epic movie with a hero who doesn't ever shoot a gun.

I will give it a week or so and watch it again. The director should've one an academy award.

This futuristic thriller disposes of much of the sci-fi jargon we've come to expect from Hollywood films. There are no outlandish gadgets or chases through CGI-created landscapes; CHILDREN OF MEN, based on a novel by P. D. James, is a realistic thriller through and through. It's set in a recognisable dystopia (full of violence, poverty, disease, segregation and warfare) and the story follows a strict 'journey' template, following a group of characters as they travel through myriad locales, suffering death, defeat and adventure along the way. So far, so predictable. However, this film works because it's literate, it's intelligent and the focus is on storytelling over flashy special effects or action nonsense.

Mexican director Alfonso Cuaron (HARRY POTTER AND THE PRISONER OF AZKABAN) is a force to watch out for on the strength of his work here: this is the best direction I've seen in a long while and the film is chock-full of great tracking shots which really emphasise the excitement and danger around every corner. The view of a future UK is nightmarish and believable and the backgrounds and locations are as much a character as the protagonists themselves.

I also enjoyed the fact that the film remains as unconventional as possible as it moves along. Clive Owen, the heroic protagonist, never fires a gun and is definitely an everyman character rather than a hero: he's utterly believable and this is the best role I've seen the actor in yet. Supporting actors are good, but it's the older heavyweights who give the best turns: Julianne Moore, as likable as she's ever been, as a terrorist leader; Pam Ferris as an ally; Michael Caine as an aged John Lennon-type. Chiwetel Ejiofor is also very strong in a minor role. The film does have action, including a ferocious fire fight at the climax, but it's never an action film per se. It's just a great movie that avoids pigeon-holing and never left me bored or underwhelmed once.

Alfonso Cuaron has given us a very clever rendering of a very English dystopian novel. P D James, the "Baroness of Bad" is famous for her well-written and absorbing police procedural novels ("Inspector Dalgliesh") but in the early 90s she produced a vision of a world only 20 years into the future in which for unspecified reasons all the women on earth have become infertile and no babies have been born for the last 18 years.

The rest of the world has lapsed into chaos but the British, stoically, have put the remainder of their civil liberties into the fire and have settled down under an oppressive dictatorship to ward off foreign boarders and await inevitable extinction, though there are some violent dissidents called the fish.

Theo (Clive Owen), a journalist with connections to the top, is "persuaded" by his ex-wife and fish member Julian (Julianne Moore) to obtain some exit papers for Kee (Claire Hope Ashity) a young black woman, who, it turns out, is pregnant. Theo is swept up in Kee's escape across a grim decaying landscape. Not only are there the security forces to contend with, but some equally ruthless insurgents. Cuaron builds the tension exquisitely, interspersing the adrenaline fueled bits with quieter bits.

Kee' projected saviors are a mysterious group called the Human Project who conveniently sail their well-maintained Greenpeace style ex-North Sea fishing trawler past offshore light buoys in the hope of rescuing the human race. But the improbability of this doesn't matter much because by the end of the movie Cuaron has effectively demonstrated what the world would be like if humankind suddenly stopped reproducing. Having children is our way of cheating death, without them there is nothing but death, and in this future there are none about but the living dead.

The casting is pretty well perfect. Clive Owen as Theo puts his haunted good looks to good use as he turns from cynical reporter to a hunted enemy of the state. The motley characters he meets along the way – his ex-wife, the fish rebels, the refugees who help him, the "fascist pig" border guard and above all Michael Caine's aging hippie are all wonderfully realized.

It has been suggested that Cuaron has really made a film about today, not 20 years into the future. The rampaging security forces we see might as well be in Bosnia or Iraq, or even Northern Ireland. In an age of terrorism, order without law very quickly becomes tyranny, which has never been the answer to terrorism. What he and PD James do demonstrate is just how fragile our civil society is.

As a film this is a very fine piece of work. The sets exude grimy Britain, the battles are hair-raising, the quieter moments intense. Cuaron would do a great James Bond movie. He has turned a rather rarefied novel into an exiting and engrossing thriller without obscuring the original message. He is a very versatile and enterprising film-maker and I'm sure he's going to do lots more good stuff.

The apocalypse arrives on film once again in a plot so simple it's horrifyingly believable. It's 2027 and the world is close to annihilation because no child has been born in 18 years. London office worker Theo (Clive Owen) is offered cash by a radical ex-girlfriend to escort a refugee (Claire-Hope Ashitey) to safety. Their lives are soon at risk from both government and revolutionaries.

Although the camera work and cinematography is nothing short of stunning the focus always with our protagonist, ensuring we're kept in the middle of the action throughout. It is also undoubtedly one of Owen's finest performances to date. Theo is never far from danger yet he struggles on with convincing dignity. Occasionally baffled but far from stupid - Theo is essentially a reckless, underplayed action hero that doesn't jump at every opportunity to arm himself with a gun. This works well with the international ensemble of incredible talent: Michael Caine's charming pot dealing hippie, feisty Julianne Moore, key role Claire-Hope Ashitey, the wonderful Pam Ferris, the increasingly busy, excellent Chiwetel Ejiofor, Danny Huston and writer/director/producer Peter Cullen (gloriously sadistic Syd) to name a few... This is surely a casting coup to be jealous of.

The episodic nature of the story makes Children of Men difficult to place into one genre alone. Briefly glimpsed futuristic sci-fi technology is grounded in reality and looks entirely achievable while grey, graffiti ridden concrete locations provide an excellent backdrop for the near satirical look of our current social and political climate. There's poignant drama interspersed amongst exhilarating action and yet enough twists to call it a thriller.

This is not to say it's flawless. Some exposition is handled better in places than others for instance. However Alfonso Cuarón has achieved a completely remarkable experience. Arguably the film could have been longer given how strong most of it is. The only really hard pill to swallow is the comedy juxtaposed with some stark imagery that looks all too familiar to anyone who has ever seen the News from the past few decades. Nice to see a Pink Floyd reference though (pigs might fly!), and someone finally found a use for Battersea Power Station.

Ideally an audience should see this film with no preconceptions and know as little about the plot as possible. This will be unlikely though due to a staggered box-office release schedule, word of mouth and a plethora of reviews and trailers that are eager to give much of the game away. Ironic then perhaps that it must be said - Children of Men is a cinematic milestone. Great special effects and an effective soundtrack accompany this heartfelt, moving and thought-provoking film. Easily one of the best films in recent memory.

I first saw 'Children of Men' when it came out, 10 years ago, and while I liked it a lot, I kind of forgot about it soon. At the time, it failed to resonate with me on a deeper level - which in hindsight I find astounding.

Last month, a decade later almost to the day, I suddenly felt the urge to revisit the film (because it was mentioned in an article about "long takes"), and upon re-watching it, it just blew my mind. This film is so, so, good!

It not only manages in many aspects to be the most prophetic - and most shockingly realistic - sci-fi film I have ever seen: it achieves that feat with a level of style and through such an abundance of fantastic creative choices and innovative camera techniques that I was simply left in awe.

I was forced to conclude that this film was a visionary piece of art (and how that fact had eluded me the first time around I couldn't - and still can't - explain). It's a cinéphile's dream come true; it's a masterpiece in the true sense of the word.

'Children of Men' is a gut-wrenching look at an all too possible future, but it also works as a heart-stopping, adrenaline-rush-inducing piece of entertainment featuring some of the most breathtaking camera work you'll ever see.

The performances are flawless. The artwork, the production design, the music; I could go on and on: this is one of those few real masterworks where everything just comes together right. And I believe the final 30 minutes of the film rank among the finest achievements in the history of Cinema. Period.

10 Stars out of 10.

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Favorite Low-Budget and B-Movies: imdb.com/list/ls054808375/

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