Features







2007-08 Oscar Calendar



[Monday, December 3, 2007]

Official Screen Credits
Forms Due.


[Wednesday, December 26, 2007]

Nominations ballots mailed.


[Saturday, January 12, 2008]

Nominations polls close
5 p.m. PST.


[Tuesday, January 22, 2008]

Nominations announced
5:30 a.m. PST
Samuel Goldwyn Theater


[Wednesday, January 30, 2008]

Final ballots mailed.


[Monday, February 4, 2008]

Nominees Luncheon


[Saturday, February 9, 2008]

Scientific and Technical
Awards Dinner


[Tuesday, February 19, 2008]

Final polls close 5 p.m. PST.


[Sunday, February 24, 2008]

79th Annual
Academy Awards Presentation
Kodak Theatre

Powered by
Movable Type 3.2


« Charts!… | Main | "Tech Support": Best Soun… »

"Children of Men" (****)

men3.jpg


Alfonso Cuarón’s is one of the most singular voices in the filmmaking community. Along with longtime collaborator, cinematographer Emmanuel Lubezki, the director has ushered forth textured visions of skewed fairytales for over a decade.


With “A Little Princess,” he took audiences into the mind of a little girl and her trying tenure at a miserable boarding school. In perhaps his most underrated work, “Great Expectations” (a loose adaptation of the Charles Dickens novel), he unveiled the mysterious and fateful journey of a dreamer. “Y tu mamá también” brought the director’s choice of material into a more mature light, still keeping the exuberance of youth, while “Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban” became one of the most adult installments in a series aimed at a younger market.


“Children of Men” fits rather paradoxically into these otherwise whimsical endeavors. Another sort of fairytale altogether, one cloaked in the mystique of dystopia, it is a film as unflinching in its bleakness as it is penetrating in its deep-seeded sentimentality. And in manifesting one of the most horrific visions of the future yet committed to film, Cuarón has given us his masterpiece, the crowning achievement of 2006.

men1.jpg


Adapted from the P.D. James novel of the same name (and, through much arbitration, crediting some five writers on the screenplay), “Children of Men” reveals the hellish world of 2027. Baby Diego has died, the affectionately labeled youngest person in the world – 18 years old. Fertility is an aspect of the past, and humanity’s time is clearly borrowed. The world’s nations have crumbled to apocalyptic ruin. England remains the last refuge for potential stability and order…but those days are quickly slipping away.


Theo Faron (Clive Owen) is a man lost in this sea of chaotic apathy, sliding amongst the beleaguered masses, one of the hordes, most concerned about his morning coffee and skipping out on work than with finding something of considerable happiness. His best friend, Jasper Palmer (Michael Caine), is a stoned hippie who listens to the oldies and laughs away the final years of human existence in the woods, surrounded by marijuana and nostalgia.


An immigrants’ rights terrorist organization headed by the mysterious Julian Taylor (Julianne Moore) kidnaps Theo in broad daylight one day in order to attain transport papers for an unnamed woman. Julian and Theo, we learn, once had a child together, a child they lost and whose memory haunts them equally.


men5.jpg


The unnamed woman is soon revealed to be Kee (Clare-Hope Asitey), a refugee holding the potential key (I feel as though I’ve just discovered the point of the character’s name) to the future of man: miraculously, she is pregnant, waiting to give birth to the first baby the earth has seen in 18 years. It soon falls to Theo to protect Kee and her unborn child, a veritable political football, and smuggle her to the Human Project, a scientist organization bent on curing the world’s infertility crisis.


Through sheer drama and brutal tension, Cuarón sets about weaving a blistering yarn that draws parallels to current political climate. Truly penetrating visual cues bring the viewer’s mind to everything from ground assaults in Iraq to conditions at Abu Ghraib prison.


Clive Owen’s portrayal is largely physical, as Theo is an elusive character (even by the actor’s own admission). Even still, this is one of the year’s great performances, an immediately believable portrait of a hero called to unconscionable task. Asitey is equal parts preciousness and irreverence as Kee, and Caine has far too much fun for his own good in the role of Jasper. Moore’s turn is fleeting, but elevated by her own angelic screen presence.


men6.jpg


Elsewhere, Peter Mullan has a great second act performance in store as one of Jasper’s amigos, while Chiwetel Ejiofor offers up yet another controlled supporting turn, this time as part of Julian’s terrorist organization. It is, however, the technical elements of the film that propel it head and shoulders above anything else in the market place this year.


Some of the set pieces Cuarón orchestrates are the most electrifying, living and breathing sequences ever imagined in the history of cinema. Much credit here is due to Lubezki and camera operator George Richmond, not to mention a meritorious technical and stunt crew who must have rehearsed these moments into the ground. You’ll hear it for the rest of the year, the cinematography on display in “Children of Men” is God-like in its skill and quality.


Equally impressive is the production design of Jim Clay and Geoffrey Kirkland. Dreary, decaying urban landscape spans the frame. Graffiti and bullet holes decorate sets constructed with a defining clarity of intent, and ultimately the world envisioned on the drafting table becomes a character in its own right.


men7.jpg


The most interesting aspect of the mise en scène, however, has to be the director’s decision to litter the frame with various animals, usually dogs and cats. Representative of humanity’s longing and desperate need to replace children with something else, it is one of the more subtle aspects that isn’t brought out into the open for inspection, but upon examination is all too brilliant an element in the director’s arsenal for this, his finest film to date.


“Children of Men” is a shocking portrait, indeed. From an opening scene that grips you by the collar and never lets you turn away, it is stomach-churning in its abjection, and it is resonant in its refusal to buckle under the cynicism with which Cuarón paints his canvas. It is stark and it is pointed, but it is warm and full of hope all the same. It is a miraculous achievement.

Comments

A fervent admirer of all of Cuaron's films (at least the ones I've seen, the 4 mentioned above, inlcuding the best Harry Potter movie of the series to date), this one is by far the best! (and one of my favourite movies of 2006)
The whole story just creeps under your skin while watching the movie. Everything feels so "alive" that you get completely caught up in the characters' lives.
Unfortunately the whole theme behind the movie might be a bit too dark and negative for it to be a big hit with the general public or AMPAS... :(

I knew it, yesterday when you wrote on your blog "Bold.Bleak.Brilliant"I knew you were talking about this film, I can't wait to see it. From your review I got the feeling you almost called this the best film of the year...

And Emanuel Lubezki must get the Oscar NOW... he is the god of contemporary cinematography, and but I'm very excited for Cuaron, the guy is a genius

Little Princess ****1/2
Y Tu Mama Tambien *****
Solo Con Tu Pareja ****
...Prisoner of Azaban ****1/2

the best Mexican contemporary director right now...

Yeah, I saw this a while back and gave it an A- and still believe in that grade. It was stark, but electric and filled with hope. The best perf I thought was Ashitey, and yes the cinematography was bliss (love the blood on the camera).

Cuaron is the best! I am so pleased to hear you love this movie.

Post a comment

(If you haven't left a comment here before, you may need to be approved by the site owner before your comment will appear. Until then, it won't appear on the entry. Thanks for waiting.)

Contact Us

Search


2008 Year in Advance Predictions


UPDATED: 2/25/2008





Main Charts | Tech Charts



[Motion Picture]

“The Curious Case of Benjamin Button”

“Doubt”

“Frost/Nixon”

“Revolutionary Road”

“The Soloist”



[Directing]

David Fincher
“The Curious Case of Benjamin Button”

Ron Howard
“Frost/Nixon”

Gus Van Sant
“Milk”

Sam Mendes
“Revolutionary Road”

Joe Wright
“The Soloist”



[Actor in a Leading Role]

Benicio Del Toro
“The Argentine”

Jamie Foxx
“The Soloist”

Frank Langella
“Frost/Nixon”

Sean Penn
“Milk”

Brad Pitt
“The Curious Case of Benjamin Button”



[Actress in a Leading Role]

Vera Farmiga
“Nothing But the Truth”

Angelina Jolie
“Changeling”

Julianne Moore
“Blindness”

Meryl Streep
“Doubt”

Kate Winslet
“Revolutionary Road”



[Actor in a Supporting Role]

Josh Brolin
“Milk”

Russell Crowe
“Body of Lies”

Robert Downey, Jr.
“The Soloist”

Heath Ledger
“The Dark Knight”

Michael Sheen
“Frost/Nixon”



[Actress in a Supporting Role]

Amy Adams
“Doubt”

Kathy Bates
“Revolutionary Road”

Cate Blanchett
“The Curious Case of Benjamin Button”

Catherine Keener
“The Soloist”

Carice van Houten
“Body of Lies”



[Writing, Adapted Screenplay]

“Body of Lies”

“The Curious Case of Benjamin Button”

“Doubt”

“Frost/Nixon”

“Revolutionary Road”



[Writing, Original Screenplay]

“Changeling”

“Hamlet 2”

“Milk”

“The Soloist”

“WALL·E”



[Art Direction]

“Australia”

“Defiance”

“Indiana Jones and the Kingdom
of the Crystal Skull”

“Red Cliff”

“Revolutionary Road”



[Cinematography]

“Australia”

“The Dark Knight”

“Defiance”

“Indiana Jones and the Kingdom
of the Crystal Skull”

“Revolutionary Road”



[Costume Design]

“The Curious Case of Benjamin Button”

“Doubt”

“The Other Boleyn Girl”

“Red Cliff”

“Revolutionary Road”



[Film Editing]

“Body of Lies”

“The Curious Case of Benjamin Button”

“Defiance”

“Frost/Nixon”

“Indiana Jones and the Kingdom
of the Crystal Skull”



[Makeup]

“The Curious Case of Benjamin Button”

“The Dark Knight”

“Red Cliff”



[Music, Original Score]

“The Curious Case of Benjamin Button”

“Indiana Jones and the Kingdom
of the Crystal Skull”

“The Soloist”

“Revolutionary Road”

“WALL·E”



[Music, Original Song]

coming soon



[Sound Editing]

“Defiance”

“Indiana Jones and the Kingdom
of the Crystal Skull”

“Iron Man”

“Speed Racer”

“WALL·E”



[Sound Mixing]

“Defiance”

“Indiana Jones and the Kingdom
of the Crystal Skull”

“Cloverfield”

“The Chronicles of Narnia:
Prince Caspian”

“WALL·E”



[Visual Effects]

“The Chronicles of Narnia:
Prince Caspian”

“The Incredible Hulk”

“Iron Man”



[Animated Feature Film]

“9”

“Kung Fu Panda”

“WALL·E”



[Foreign Language Film]

coming soon



[Documentary, Features]

coming soon



[Documentary, Short Subjects]

coming soon



[Short Film, Animated]

coming soon



[Short Film, Live Action]

coming soon