SOYLENT GREEN Review

Just a heads up before we get started. I am not going to attempt to write spoiler free reviews. It's to difficult and I really just don't care. So if you see that I am reviewing a movie/show that you haven't seen and you don't want it spoiled just skip that entry. We good? Cool.

So Soylent Green. For the unfamiliar this 1973 flick stars Charlton Heston in a sort of post apocalyptic world, where he uses guns, and is overtly chauvinistic towards women. So pretty much every Charlton Heston movie ever made. But in case you are interested here is the trailer...

Well....nothing like a nearly 4 minute long trailer to give away the entire plot of the movie. What were they thinking? Did anyone in 1973 who had seen this trailer still not know what Soylent Green was. If the conveyer belt of cadavers and then the cut away to a conveyer belt of Soylent Green "crackers" wasn't enough of a hint they then go as far to show skid steer shovels picking people up and dumping them in the back. They had the potential, I guess, for a Fight Club/Sixth Sense kind of reveal but it didn't turn out that way. But yeah...in case you still can't figure it out, Soylent Green is made of people. But don't take my word for it...watch as Charlton Heston chews the scenery and reveals the not so secret secret of Soylent Green....

Not much else to say about this one. As far as Heston sci-fi flicks go this one ranks well above The Omega Man and far below Planet Of the Apes. That trailer pretty much sums it all up: the future sucks and people unknowingly eat other people...and oh yeah, women are literally equal to furniture...the end.

If you are curious what the professionals have to say,

"SciFi.com film reviewer Tamara Hladik calls the film a “basic, cautionary tale of what could become of humanity physically and spiritually [if humans do not take care of the planet.]". She points out that "there is little in this film that has not been seen in other films", such as the film's depiction of "faceless, oppressive crowds; sheep mentality; the corrosion of the soul, of imagination, [and] of collective memory". While she notes that the director has a "tendency... to overuse Charlton Heston" in scenes depicting this beleaguered, futuristic dystopia, she admits that the film "often succeeds despite [the missteps of] its director."

Hladik argues that the "most powerful moments do not belong to Heston['s]" police detective character Thorn, whom she calls a "dubious, ambiguous hero". Instead, she calls Robinson’s characterization of the aged police researcher Sol Roth the "most moving passages" which give the film "conscience and soul". She acknowledges that the film has "imagery [that] is powerful and haunting", such as the scenes in which riot control vehicles scoop up protesters with metal shovels, as if they were garbage. Her overall impression is that "the profundity of humanity's transformation [in the film] is dealt with in less than a masterful manner"."

Rotten Tomatoes has it at a 71% but I say skip it. If you are really in a Heston kind of mood, stick with Planet of the Apes, The 10 Commandments, or hell even Waynes World 2...

Until next time...