shakercoola
Soylent Green is one of several 'far out' films made in the early-to-mid 1970s, like Omega Man, The Terminal Man, Westworld, Zardoz etc. The concept of this story is a terrific one: an overpopulated earth and a highly civilised society copes with food shortage and civil unrest and resorst to drastic measures.
It is a peculiar film, much to its credit, but it suffers from not giving us enough scale for what it promises: a future world with enormous difficulties. Not enough is given over to a sense of space and imaginable futursitic locations, and so instead we have a standard detective story of an archetypal cop, drab fistfights, occasional shootouts, and small apartment melodrama.
Heston's frame and acting presence does provides good distraction though, as does the regrettably brief support from Edward G Robinson. Some scenes are sublime too, especially the music and visual montage sequence at the 'departure' lounge.
The art direction detail seems a bit dated now, in the same way as A Clockwork Orange, but the matte special effects of New York skyline are good. All in all, it is a striking sci-fi adventure.
nicholasttalbot
Of the few science fiction films starring legendary actor Charlton Heston, Soylent Green (1973), directed by Richard Fleischer, is perhaps the most plausible. It depicts a not-so-distant future 2022 New York as a city plagued by overpopulation, pollution, and food-shortages. In the film, the industrialization of the 20th century has rendered the earth untillable. Food is -allegedly - obtained by harvesting phytoplankton from the ocean, through an operation headed by the mysterious and omniscient Soylent Corporation. Their product, a synthetic food called Soylent Green, feeds most of the city. The plot follows NYPD detective Frank Thorn, (Heston) investigating the murder of William R. Simonson, a wealthy lawyer and former member of the board at Soylent. As Thorn delves further into the case, he discovers a disturbing conspiracy between the Soylent Corporation and the world's government to keep the human race ignorant of a horrifying truth: Soylent Green is not as it seems.
The film opens with an artful and effective montage, charting the destructive power of humanity's technological development. Within the first few minutes we understand the director's intent: to warn audiences of the environmental destruction humans are imposing on the planet. As a result, the forty million residents of 2022 New York live in squalor. Crowds of homeless bodies litter the sidewalks and fire escapes. Food and water is distributed through measly rations. Human 'progress' has pushed past the point of no return, where all of earth's beauties have been destroyed. Sol Roth, Thorn's good friend, played by Edward G. Robinson, remembers what life was like before the devastation. In the film he frequently recalls the beauties of the natural world, acting as a bridge between the past and future. His most memorable line is, "People were always rotten but the world was beautiful." The audience, as citizens of a not-yet-destroyed earth, represents the Sol of the past. We take for granted clean air, clean water and fresh food. To us, our environment is a novelty- something that provides some modicum of pleasure, only to be discarded when forgotten. In one of the more powerful scenes of the film, Sol and Thorn witness images of the natural world, set to Beethoven's pastoral symphony and Edvard Grieg's Peer Gynt, just as Sol is euthanized. He says to Thorn, "I told you!" to which Thorn replies, "How could I know? How could I ever imagine?" True beauty, the type of sensual pleasure felt through listening to classical music or observing nature, is a mere memory - it is Fleischer's dissatisfaction with the direction of modern culture, being transposed onto a science fiction future - the idea that true romanticism is no longer appreciated. This scene challenges the audience: in fifty years will we end up like Sol, reminiscing of the long-lost awe-inspiring beauty of our earth?
The implications of this post-apocalypse reach further than environmentalism. Incumbent Governor Santini, has connections with the Soylent Corporation and police department. After catching wind of Thorn's meddling, Santini orders the investigation to be closed. An observant viewer will notice Santini's campaign poster hanging in the office of Chief Hatcher (Brock Peters). As nature deteriorates, so does the status of women. Almost every woman in the film is a prostitute, including Thorn's love interest Shirl (Leigh Taylor-Young). She serves the men of high society, staying in one apartment as different tenants come and go - hence 'furniture.' These luxury apartments are stocked with video games, liquor, beef and even strawberry jam - something Thorn had never heard of before tasting himself. The poor live on the streets, in tenements or shelters and can look forward to eating their Soylent Green, which is sold every Tuesday. The film, which premiered post-civil rights movement, does not shy away from showing a brutal police force bent on riot control. Fleischer and company's pessimistic view of the future is a product of the perceived deterioration of the American dream, as witnessed by so many disillusioned Americans in the early 1970s. Government corruption, sexism, and inequality are not science fiction, they are modern fact, and according to Soylent Green things are only going to get worse.
The question remains, why is this film important for environmentalism? Why not just watch An Inconvenient Truth for the tenth time? The answer: how faithfully it captures the human spirit, for better or for worse. We are selfish and destructive, yes, but we are also inquisitive, freethinking, moral beings. Thorn fights against complacency in pursuit of the truth. As a species united, it is no longer acceptable for us to stand idle while our environment crumbles around us, nor should we allow the continued mistreatment of women, minorities and the poor. We have a right to information, and, in the eyes of environmental philosophers like Richard Hiskes, we have a right to clean air for our generation and our children's generation. In other words, do not eat Soylent Green, before you know what is in it.
Not once in the film do you see the barren wastes outside the city or the dying oceans. The focus is on us, the human race - the only ones capable of preventing a Soylent Green future from happening. Now, the camera is rolling and we are the stars of the show. Will we step up to the mark and perform, or collapse under the weight of our own hubris? Let us ensure that Soylent Green remains fiction, before we all become Sol Roth.
