On Saturday a couple of the older urchins and I went to see the movie Children of Men, based on a book by P.D. James by the same name. It’s rated R and deserves the rating. The language is monotonously foul, and there’s an inordinate amount of blood and violence. I also think the powers-that-made the movie tried to inject a political message into a story that was not originally about homeland security or illegal immigration.

Nevertheless, the movie has a message that shines through the language, the violence and the political agenda. A fallen world without children is shown to be a world without hope, and the birth of a child brings back hope despite the darkness and despair that permeate the movie’s near-future setting. The baby, as a living, breathing symbol, is so powerful in contrast to all the shooting and profanity of a world gone mad. I can see why the movie was released on Christmas; there are definite echoes of the Christmas story in the movie’s setting, characters, and plot.

The two main characters, Clive Owen as Theo and Clare-Hope Ashitey as Kee, were well acted and emotionally engaging. While it was obvious that Michael Caine as an aging hippie-type was playing a part and enjoying it immensely, the two actors that had to carry the movie did so with a verisimilitude that made me feel as if they were the characters they were portraying. They should both be nominated for an Academy Award.

I would suggest that reading the book by P.D. James would be twice as beneficial as seeing the movie, but the movie has a value of its own. I don’t see how even liberal, anti-Bush, pro-immigration activists could miss the central idea that “salvation” comes not by revolution or by journalistic propaganda (power to the people), but by means of a child, a child of promise. Much of the Christian symbolism and truth was drained from James’s story as it made its way from book to movie script, but the twin truths of the hopeless state of our world and the only source of renewed hope are at the heart of the story and couldn’t be completely disguised or eliminated.

See the movie only if you have a high tolerance for violence and profanity, although again it has redeeming value; read the book by all means.