Visually stunning, emotionally sterile

Rating: 6/10 (17 April 2008)

One of the arguments (in my mind, anyway) against "A.I." was that the project, long-gestating with Stanley Kubrick prior to his death, and taken over by Steven Spielberg after, was at odds with the former's emotionally sterile obsession with style, and the latter's fixation with sentimentality and family values. And in a sense, that film-making dichotomy is just as much on display in "Children of Men," only instead of Spielbergian emotion, director Alfonso Cuaron opts for the frustrating detachment of Kubrick, to the point where no matter what fantastic visual is being displayed on-screen, it's hard to care all that much because the characters--no matter how well-played--are little more than genre ciphers. The film forgoes whatever literary quality P.D. James' source material possessed, instead going for gritty, in-the-moment documentary realism; and while Cuaron shows impressive skill with long, complex takes and CGI, the film feels shallow (and sometimes shrill) in its overall narrative. What we have is essentially the tale of mankind's death knell due to women becoming infertile (it's none-too-subtly implied that this is the source of terrorism, death, and destruction the world over), until an immigrant girl (running afoul of some eco-terrorist types) turns up pregnant, resulting in an unbroken chase to get her to the "Human Project," a fabled safe haven that may not exist. The performances are excellent if not truly transcendent--Clive Owen as the reluctant protector; Julianne Moore as his radical ex-wife; and Michael Caine as the cerebral, aging hippie who clings to hope--perhaps because the characters don't get the faithful fleshing-out they deserve (some only get a few minutes of screen time before making their exit--is this a comment on the film's own "time is fleeting" theme?), leading to an experience that kept me at a distance. Don't get me wrong--"Children of Men" is a well-done film, albeit sometimes a bit thick with its philosophy, but a step away from Kubrick would have been a step in the right direction.