Alfonso Cuarón must have been to busy printing cash to read the book

Rating: 1/10 (2 February 2007)

I highly recommend that you watch the movie before reading the book. The movie is almost nothing like the book, they only share a title, character names, and the most general tag-line of a plot "In the near future, people are no longer able to have children...". If you read the book first the problems with the movie make it hard to enjoy.
Acting:
Clive is pretty good, I am assuming he was doing exactly what the director wanted (which is nothing like the character Theo).
Julianne Moore's 'Julian' is a very shallow character (as directed I assume), would have been a much better performance if she had been given the role of Julian in the book.
Michael Caine plays a caricature of a ridiculous hippie (again, as directed), he does it well. It has absolutely nothing to do with Jasper.
Cinematography - reminded me of 28 Days Later, not better, not worse, just similar, color and angle are the main things they share.
Writing - This is pure writing by committee, there are 5 writers (other than the author of the book this movie is supposedly based on). I would be inclined to guess that none of them actually read Children of Men, and what they came up with is basically framed in our current political climate and will not endure as an important work.
Directing - Well, he has a writing credit and should be blamed along with them for this travesty. I am sure he is a fine director, but let someone familiar with the subject matter assist with the storytelling.
**Major spoilers for the book follow, but hell, who out here actually reads books?**
(they have nothing at all to do with the movie I just watched)
Theo is supposed to be the anti-hero, the elitist self-serving Oxford history prof, who doesn't want the inconvenience of having old friends (Jasper and veggie wife, Jasper is another history prof, not a hippie) move into his 5-story apartment in the city, he is not the drunk/trustworthy guy. He is not poor. He is not a drunk. He is a smart-ass, who is always talking down to people.
Theo's cousin is the 'Warden of England' and rules very harshly with the council. Julian's group approach Theo to bring a list of complaints to the Warden.
After he takes the complaints to the Warden he goes on a very long vacation, after he returns the mid-wife shows up and tells him that Julian needs him.
Julian is not Theo's wife, and Julian is the one that ends up pregnant, and white, and the baby is male. The mid-wife is black, and there is no weird religious aspect to her, in fact she like many others in the book are agnostic, if not full blown atheists.
The 'fishes' main complaint is the 'suicides' that are called Quietus, where old people are drowned at sea, some forcibly (one that Theo witnesses which is why he decides to help the group). Other complaints are the treatment of criminals on the Isle of Man (lawless prison colony, think - 'Escape from New York'), forced (futile) reproductive testing on men and women, the treatment of foreign workers (nothing like the movie), and the state sponsored porn shops.
The main mention of religious extremists, are of the white variety, think televangelists, there is no parade of Muslims with ak-47s in the book.
When Theo was a young husband and father, he backed over his baby by accident, he wasn't wild about the baby and his wife knew it (which is why they got divorced). His wife is not a terrorist, she lives in a nice house in a nice neighborhood with her new young husband and their cats.
Julian, who Theo does end up loving, is deformed (physically), the priest/father (not her husband) is epileptic. That is why their fertility was unknown, they were exempt from testing.
The last generation of children are called 'Omegas', some of them rove about the countryside in gangs and kill people, but they only want to kill one person from a group, they also like to torch cars.
They never pretend to be illegal immigrants, they are never in custody, Theo is never in the vicinity when a bomb goes off. The 'fish' only blow up docks where the 'suicides' would be taking place.
Jasper kills his wife and commits suicide. He commits suicide by shooting himself in the head, and Theo takes the gun (only one bullet).
Julian, Theo, and the Midwife never get to the water, they turn back when Julian's husband abandons them and goes to turn them in to the Warden.
Julian with the help of the mid-wife gives birth to the baby in a woodshed (which is secluded). Theo, Julian and the baby are the only main characters that live, and they all live, and Theo becomes the 'Warden of England' after shooting the Warden with his one bullet.