Is the future worth saving?
1 comment June 1st, 2009
In her review of TERMINATOR SALVATION over at Parallax View, Kathleen Murphy (in the process of panning the movie), brings up an interesting point. Namely, in sci-fi movies where humanity is fighting to exist, it’s important to make it seem like something would be lost if humanity didn’t exist…
If you’re making a film about a cosmic struggle between men and machines for dominion of the earth, the question of what makes human beings valuable, special, worth saving, is crucial. In SALVATION, there’s no punch–no flesh and blood–to that question. Clichés like “We bury our dead” are trotted out, but SALVATIONnever jacks us into the psyches of the non-machines we should be rooting for.
When you think about it, most sci-fi movies show a world so close to the brink of devastation that it hardly seems saving. MAD MAX is pre-collapse, but already most of the way down the hill; BLADE RUNNER is high-tech but hopelessly sad; I AM LEGEND (and the others based on Richard Matheson’s novel) are grim indeed, with few humans left; and SOYLENT GREEN is just the opposite — way too many humans. So many, in fact, that you can see why Edward G. Robinson took the trip to the suicide parlor.
In fact, the only exception I can think of is CHILDREN OF MEN — grim indeed, but with a glimmer of hope, a sign that humanity that can still be redeemed. (Think of the scene — SPOILER ALERT — where everyone stops fighting at the sound of a baby crying.)
I must be missing some, though — any suggestions?
