I can't see what the excitement is about ...

Rating: 5/10 (19 January 2007)

Let me start by saying I am a huge SciFi fan and will watch anything of the genre. I went to see Children of Man because I heard somewhere that it was the Bladerunner for this decade or something like that. Well I don't know what the fuss is all about. This movie was certainly not up to Bladerunner. Sure it has a life message for humanity as Bladerunner did, but not much substance. There were so many holes in the film. We are never really satisfactorily told why there are no more babies. We are never told why there are mounds of burning animals and stuff all over the fields of England. We are never given any reason why they are rounding up foreigners. One would think with the human race dying off already we would not need to round up immigrants and kill them thus accelerating the problem. Plus there was nothing really techno in the movie at all. We are never told what the 'Human Project' is trying to do. We are never given a clue what is going on in other parts of the world other than they are evidently worse of than England. I think the movie fails as a SciFi movie, I think it fails as an action movie and some of the acting just fails. Hello Clive! Show some range will you. He does get better as the movie goes along.
I think the movie was simply a plea to our humanity to live in peace or face the consequences of the end of that humanity mixed with a little 'children are our future ... let them lead the way ...". That message is clear. There is also definitely more than a tinge of anti-totalitarianism and anti-terrorism in the film, so that works as part of the overall message as well. Maybe that is what amazes so many critics, but I left feeling a little cheated.