Children of Men

Twelve years ago, I spoke on this program about a novel by P. D. James titled The Children of Men. I said then, “P. D. James . . . seems to be warning us that we might just destroy ourselves from within—if we continue to embrace a culture of death.” It was a great book.

I wish I could say as much for the new movie version of Children of Men. Its story and themes are so completely different, it’s just like somebody set out to make a movie of Adam Smith’s famous The Wealth of Nations, the conservative book, and wound up making instead Karl Marx’s Das Kapital.

The premise is the same between P. D. James’s book and this movie: For no clear reason, infertility strikes the entire world. The story is set among what appears to be the last human generation, until one woman inexplicably finds herself pregnant and has to flee to protect her child.

But there all similarities end. James’s insightful tale—a “Christian fable,” as she called it—has been transformed into something unrecognizable. The Christian faith that was central has all but vanished. Many once-Christian characters now talk in a mixture of obscenities and Buddhist chants.

But that’s not the half of it. Infertility, the blight on humanity, is little more than a side issue. Director Alfonso Cuarón and his screenwriting team have hijacked the story to score political points, making it mostly about crackdowns on illegal immigration and terrorism. (It couldn’t have been easy to take potshots at the Bush administration in a movie set in Britain in 2027, but somehow Cuarón manages it.) Even when the miracle child is born, the warring factions of the population take one quick break to honor her before getting back to wiping each other out.

Why would the adapters of this story do such a thing? Well, as I said, they wanted to make their own political statement. But it goes deeper than that. Listen to what James wrote in her wonderful novel:

“Pornography and sexual violence . . . had increased and become more explicit, but less and less in the West we made love and bred children. It seemed at the time a welcome development in a world grossly polluted by over-population. . . . We thought we knew the reasons, that the fall [in fertility rates] was deliberate, a result of more liberal attitudes to birth control and abortion, the postponement of pregnancy. . . . But as I remember it, no one suggested that the [actual] fertility of the human race was dramatically changing.”

Now, how many in Hollywood want to make a movie about how sexual hedonism and the devaluing of human life could play a role in our own destruction? Much more palatable to make the story into just another swipe at conservatives.

The film has earned critical praise, but to me it represents an opportunity lost and a perversion. It has become just another chance for the entertainment industry to proclaim, “It’s the rest of the world that’s the problem; any way we want to live is just fine.” Poignantly and ironically, that’s the exact attitude that P. D. James portrayed as leading to the end of humanity.

Here’s my advice: Obviously, skip the movie, and instead, read The Children of Men. The worldview behind the work makes a world of difference.

Right to Know: An Intellectually Honest Look at the Abortion Debate (booklet from Stand to Reason).

P. D. James, The Children of Men (Vintage reprint, 2006).

Jason Guerrasio, “A New Humanity,” Filmmaker Magazine, 22 December 2006.

BreakPoint Commentary No. 941003, “A World without Children: P. D. James Gives a Warning.”

BreakPoint Commentary No. 050314, “Toys without Children: Demographic Suicide.”

BreakPoint Commentary No. 011025, “Where Have All the Children Gone?: The Dangers of Anti-Natalism.”

Anthony Sacramone, on Children of Men, First Things, 27 December 2006.

Ralph Wood, “The Mystery of Iniquity: An Interview with P. D. James,” Modern Age, 7 August 2000.

Jessica S. Kranish, “Cuarón’s Children of the Future,” Daily Free Press, 7 December 2006.

Diane Singer, “‘Children of Men’—Don’t Bother,” The Point, 5 January 2007.

Travis McSherley, “Re: ‘Children of Men’,” The Point, 8 January 2007.

Catherina Hurlburt, “More on ‘Children of Men’,” The Point, 12 January 2007.

Gina Dalfonzo, “Re: More on ‘Children of Men’,” The Point, 12 January 2007.

Cher Smith, “Flick Chick: Children of Men,” Culture Beat, 9 January 2007.

Review of The Children of Men by P. D. James, Brothers Judd, 27 March 2005.

Roberto Rivera y Carlo, “An Empty Future?” Boundless, 2005.