Children of Men: Brilliant But Expensive

At the Children of Men after party [see Borys's chat with Cuaron below] in Westwood last week it struck me that the Universal executives had already written off the movie, which opens on Christmas Day, as a failure. While many critics were impressed by the film's virtuosity and bravado, the industry types were seeing a downer film that was going to lose money. The movie is a brilliant exercise in style, but it's another grim dystopian look at our future--like Blade Runner or Fahrenheit 451---that simply cost too much money (between $72 and as much as $90 million, I've heard) to make a profit. (I'm reading the 1993 P.D. James novel with pleasure.)

So what if it makes money or not? It matters because we want smart, risky movies to return some cash so that the studios are encouraged to make more of them. One could look at this as the passion project that Alfonso Cuaron finally got to make after delivering a blockbuster like Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban. That's how things work. He can afford a noble failure. The studios all want to be in business with him.

But what made the movie so frigging expensive? Clive Owen, Julianne Moore and Michael Caine don't cost so much. It's shot with amazing hand-held cameras and boasts some astonishing long action takes that took days to set up. The filmmakers shut down sections of London to shoot some of the street scenes. There are extras and tanks and pyrotechnics and enormous sets. It's still hard to imagine how the studio could justify spending so much on this movie. But in the long run, they could eke out some coin if this movie lasts in the culture the way Blade Runner or The Road Warrior did.

Here's the trailer:

UPDATE: Here's Borys's interview with Cuaron:

At Thursday night’s Children of Men post-LA premiere/private screening/tastemaker screening afterparty, Cuaron said that he wanted to create a future that was very much rooted in today’s society, which seemed to go against the instinct of many a production designer.

“When I arrived to work on the film, the art department dusted off all these amazing designs they had from all these futuristic films that they had done. Really beautiful things like supersonic cars and cool buildings. And I said, ‘Guys, this is absolutely beautiful but this is not this film. The film is this:’ and I brought my file of photographs of the Middle East, Baghdad, Iraq, Sri Lanka, the Balkans, Palestine. This is the film we are going to do. I told them everything you present to me must have a reference to today.”

His point is that, despite all this talk of a dystopian future, the dystopia is here already: and he wanted his filmmaking style to put you into that world.

“Character has the same weight as social environment. So you don’t do close ups, because then you are putting more weight to character, so you keep everything loose, so your characters blends with environment. We didn’t want to have many cuts or any montages. We said, ‘Let’s try to create a moment of truthfulness, and have a camera that is just registering from an objective distance.”
His filmmaking amigos - Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu and Guillermo del Toro – were on hand for the event, their bottomless well of support for each other never drying up. Cuaron said del Toro was to have left for a film festival in Europe that very day but changed his plans so he could be there that night. “We are always sticking our forks into each other’s salads,” he commented on the friendship, revealing that Inarritu went into the cutting room with del Toro to cut 7 minutes (of “Pan’s Labyrinth”), and del Toro went to Inarritu’s cutting room to cut 12 of his movie (”Babel”).

“I consider ‘Babel,’ ‘Children of Men,’ and ‘Pan’s Labyrinth’ sister films. The three of them are so different because we are such different minds, but at the same time, I think it deals with similar subject matter. The themes of the three films is how ideology gets in the way of communication between people… The films are connected, even though we never intended them to.”

UPDATE: Jeffrey Wells interviews Cuaron.

Comments

[Sergio]

I'm really surprised that the film cost that much to make because I sure didn't see that kind of money on the screen. (I was guessing maybe around $40-45 million) But I have to disagree that the film is a downer. True, it is a grim, grey film, but I found it also as well film about hope and life and the final shot of the film is one of the most uplifting final scenes in a film I've seen in a long time

[Christian Johnson]

I was surprised when I saw the previews how different the film looked from what I imagined when I read the book. Seeing scenes of overcrowding, even in immigrant areas, didn't seem congruent. Nor did using Michael Caine in the role of the mentoring professor, a far too sympathetic actor for the role.

As brilliant a director as I think Cuaron is, and I do think he is quite talented, I think he attempted to make the film too much his own and about the issues he finds most important. That is, naturally, his prerogative as a director, and an action that I think will still make for a good movie, but I would have like to see PD James' version of the tale.

The representation of the nihilism of the modern era, and its ultimate manifestation in the final children born, are significant in the book, as is the religious imagery.

In the end, I think the film will be like Blade Runner in my mind, a very good film that was inspired by a book I loved, but which had very little to do narratively with what I had read.

[T.H. Ung]

Is it possible to put the budget into perspective? There was a lot of action on screen and fully drawn environments (I don't think the word "sets" does it justice). And, I find it hard to understand how a film that makes you want to hug somebodies children, maybe your own, or cherish life just a little more, can be a downer. It's just a story, a very, very good story. And considering what Christian Johnson said, I wish some attention would be paid the the adapter and screenplay writers of this film.

[Alan]

agree, it's a pretty heavy film (and x-mas is a strange time for release). 'munich' is another (very) heavy movie that ended up opening at x-mas last year -- and did terrible business.

i don't quite see where all that money went -- or why this project cost so much.

personally, i'm looking forward to getting this disc - but don't see big box office

this is a very apt subject for a novel, but not so much for a movie. would be more successful as a pbs mini-series

[anne thompson]

I don't think the movie is a downer. This is one of those cases where I see a smart house success story snatched from the jaws of victory by an inflated budget.

[Jonathan]

Good post!http://www.chinatraderonline.com/Men-Subject/

[Glenn]

Saw the movie tonight in North Hollywood... this movie is flat-out brilliantly executed, everything I want from a 10 minutes-into-the-future science fiction thriller. You have to get the story from the sets and backgrounds, there's no pseudoscientific exposition by two gus in lab coats talking to each other.

The film is set in a hyperrealistic tomorrow, and shot with such daring... there are at least 2 amazing sequences that run near 15 minutes each, shot in one take.

As for the acting, Julianne and Clive learned a stunt that I as a long-time juggler and dexterity play aficianado truly envy, Michael Caine channels the late great John Lennon for his role... ("cough... now what do you taste? Right, strawberries... this stuff is called 'Strawberry Cough'...) as a ganja farmer, who points out "they sell suicide drugs over the counter but ganja is still illegal"

The film ends with an almost religious experience, like seeing the birth of Jesus in person.

If you want to see one of the most technically brilliant pieces of cinematic art ever made, this is it. Comparing it to Blade Runner is a deep disservice.

That said, this movie IS NOT the book and might as well not have been based on the book, so don't go to see it expecting to see a movie version of the book. It's quite another story which merely uses the book as a point of departure.

[Peter Rogers]

Dear Anne,
Pretentious and self-indulgent movies like Children of Men, Flags of our Fathers, Catch a Fire, Last King of Scotland and the horribly miscalculated take on Miami Vice, are exactly what audiences DON'T WANT to see. Audiences go to movies to be ENTERTAINED, not witness some out of touch "artist's" work out his/her issues. Thank God we are moving away from such movies and entering, full force, the tentpole game.

PR

[krzys]

Dear Peter, your post is moronic and you have no clue about what makes a good film. I like pure, light entertainment too, but not only. If I like oranges I cannot like apples too? I suspect you are self-indulgent yourself. This is one great, ass-kicking movie.

[Ellen]

You must all be smoking strawberry pot.
This is not a great movie and I don't think
it was even a good movie. It's preachy
as all get out and isn't good science fiction. I found it not only dark but
boring. A terrible movie for a Christmas
release. Give it cudos for camera work
but certainly not story. Are you telling
me you cared about any of the people in the
movie?