I only say this because nearly everyone claims the Sonmi portion as their favorite, it felt like the rest of the movie was going get it? Do you get it? Get it?
And I actually liked the movie.
I’m a little surprised. It’s pretty clear the Valley story was the main story of the movie. It was both the opening and the closing of the movie. The Sonmi story was there to set up elements whose meanings were revealed in the Valley story.
The makeup was horribly distracting, worst in the Sonmi portion where the non-asian actors …well they just looked so creepy and inhuman it was hard to watch! I’m not even clear on WHY they needed the weird makeup, like the rebel leader. I kept thinking watch out Sonmi those are Romulans! Don’t believe them!
But some other questions.
1.Are we really supposed to believe post-apoc Tom Hanks was seeing a evil spirit/satan(Hugo Weaving dressed up like that voodoo Loa guy whose name escapes me)? Or are we supposed to believe those lucid hallucinations were delirium tremens/mental illness?
2.What was the fall? Is the rest of the world in much better shape than Hawaii(makes sense that no supplies would reach there)? Why didn’t Halle Berry’s people just bring the Hawaiians back with her, since she offers them to come with them offworld should the colonies answer?
3.How many people are “fabricants” in Sonmi’s time? 10%, 60%? Are we supposed to infer that “the fall” was a worldwide fabricant rebellion?
it seams like everyone missed the film.
it was about an Anti-Materialism/capitalism philosophy , and about how our modernism will evolve in future.
I’ll admit I don’t completely understand the movie. I plan on watching it again when it gets released on DVD.
True. I think the problem was the filmmakers wanted to have a cast that crossed over between scenes and also wanted to have a universal setting that took place in different societies. This meant that actors had to play roles outside of their actual ethnicity. I agree that seeing Jim Sturgess and Hugo Weaving made up as Asians didn’t work but for me, Bae Doona made up as a redhead was just as disconcerting.
I think Old Georgie was supposed to be seen as a personification of Zachry’s doubts and fears and not an actual separate entity or a sign of mental illness.
I don’t think the cause of the fall was explained. During the movie, I expected it would be revealed that the California reactor had melted down but that didn’t happen.
I didn’t realize Zachry’s village was in Hawaii. I was assuming it was somewhere along the Pacific coast of North America. And I felt it was probably as well off as any place outside of Meronym’s homeland.
My guess is that Meronym’s people had limited resources - not enough to take in outsiders. That’s why they were looking for a refuge on another planet.
Hmm I never read the book but looking up info on the book is only raising more questions.
Meronym is a Prescient, which is claimed to be a species :dubious: most likely from the Aleutian islands. Seemed pretty clear she is just a human woman with some implants on her head.
Oh also the Sonmi story is very different in the book, just for example the fabricants can’t get human food and in the book Seoul is implied to be one of the few civilized areas left at the time and fabricants were created to do clean up work in radiation contaminated areas. Which implies a long period of worldwide nuclear war before the Sonmi period.
In the book, Meronym is from a small group that somehow managed to keep some of the knowledge lost to everyone else. Not a species, as far as I can remember, but a culture. She says something along the lines of Zachry’s group being one of the most advanced they’d run across. So apparently the whole world was completely affected.
I love the book, liked the movie, and think reading it then watching it very soon after is an amazing case study in adapting books to film. Full of good and bad examples of adaptation.
The Asian make-up was very jarring. Romulans, indeed.
Absolutely loved it. Only just caught one of the last showings where I live…seems to have had a really short run. Loved it so much I’m hoping to nip up to London tomorrow to see it again.
Tom Hanks was asked in an interview which role he enjoyed most…he said it was the one where he throws a critic off the side of a skyscraper