"As the sound of the playgrounds faded, despair set in."*
What a visceral, terrifying film. Transcendent beauty and devastating violence in the same breath. It fills one up to near over-saturation with intense, gut-wrenching emotion. The year is 2027 and the human race is on the brink of extinction, no babies having been born for over 18 years anywhere. The place is a dystopic Britain where fascism has taken hold of the last place on earth clinging to something like civilization. Director Alfonso Cuaron (Y Tu Mama Tambien) has populated his film in such a manner that this world looks merely an extension of that which we already inhabit, so realistic are the settings and disparate acts of its people. How much can be said with so few words.
Violence exists just below the surface of every frame in this film, ebbing and waning in threat within the viewer’s consciousness. Then it will suddenly explode to the forefront, shrapnel-ing across the screen. And layers of sweat, grime, and blood bespatter the lens — the one thing seemingly separating us from being inside the scene ourselves, in the action, also on the brink of the violence.
Beauty resides there too, though it is often so quickly extinguished by the action. Most of that beauty comes from the characters emerging from their surroundings. They stand, stride, limp, and bend in this world, unknowing of the moment of grace they are suddenly involved in — just through simple acts and words. But they are unmistakably present and alive — quick, quiet and over before we can fully grasp their significance.
*dialogue from the film
