If people were allowed to watch a sci-fi movie that could save the world
Author: Robert Skuch Published
Spoiler alert: Soylent Green is human. Still, since the film was released in 1973 and has been referenced countless times in pop culture, here’s what you’ve known Soy green That’s it. Unfortunately, the game isn’t available on any subscription streaming services and can only be purchased on-demand, which is an absolute shame. This is the kind of film that should be accessible to the masses, not hidden behind a paywall like an age-old curiosity.
An eerily prophetic dystopian science fiction thriller, soybean green The big reveal in the third act shouldn’t be what draws you in, as there are more socioeconomic ramifications to witness. Although the story is set in 2022 and real life has passed that point in time, the core of the truth explored in the book Soy green It still sounds disturbing today. I’ve pared down my physical media collection over the years, but I still keep it at arm’s length because it’s been a cautionary tale over the years.
It’s just suffering along the way
period Soy green “There’s no middle class, there’s just suffering along the way,” director Richard Fleischer said in his commentary, describing the world he created based on the source material of Harry Harrison’s novel. Make space! Make space!
Here we see an overpopulated New York City, with its 40 million residents living in squalor while an elite ruling class occupy fortified mansions with captive concubines they call furniture. Women involved in this arrangement are submissive, fearful, and treated as property. If someone moves out of a luxury apartment and someone else moves in, she becomes the property of the new tenant without any questions.
The lower class, which accounts for about 99% of the population, survives on products produced by the Soylent company, of which Soylent Red and Soylent Yellow are the most common food sources. A new product, Soylent Green, has been launched as a more nutritious option, said to be derived from plankton. Green wafers are so far removed from natural foods that they no longer exist unless you are extremely wealthy, but causing riots due to their scarcity, this is the lifestyle most people are forced to live.
When NYPD detective Robert Thorne (Charlton Heston) is assigned to investigate the murder of Soylent board member William R. Simonson (Joseph Cotton), he is introduced to the victim’s concubine, Cher (Leigh Taylor Young). Fearful of how her new owners will treat her, she succumbs to Thorne, who often ponders his cases in his shabby apartment with his older roommate, Solomon Ross (Edward G. Robinson).
Corruption has no end
Although Thorne was by most accounts a good detective, he took kickbacks whenever he could. His nightly “investigations” often involve raiding the cupboards of the elite for food, drink and soap, which he then takes home to share with Rose.
Ross remembers a time when overpopulation, scarcity and unchecked corporate greed didn’t rule the world. He insists that people have always been terrible, but the world itself was once a beautiful place until it reached the point of no return.
Thorne has reason to believe Simonson was murdered because he holds dark secrets about Soylent Corporation and needs to be silenced. Thorne suspects that his guilt will eventually push him to tell the truth, which brings us back to the spoilers in the opening paragraph.
What is the most disturbing thing? Soy green It is the huge gap between the dissatisfaction of the ruling class and the working class. Thorne heard waiters complain that the manufacturer of certain luxury items no longer existed, or that the items would take too long to repair.
Meanwhile, Thorne and Ross were generating electricity at home on their stationary bikes. Thorne didn’t even know how to eat an apple until he smuggled it home and watched Rose cry over the beautiful fruit, now so rare that it was considered a precious commodity.
We should avoid the worst future at all costs
Soy green It’s a brutal indictment of everything that goes wrong when power is completely unchecked in a corrupt capitalist society. Its message is never conveyed through didactic monologues, but rather by showing the audience how bleak such a future is. This world is conveyed through a smoky aesthetic, endless food queues, and expectations of perpetual scarcity, while the ruling class hoards resources and deprives women of their right to exist as autonomous human beings. This is an outdated future that we should avoid at all costs.
Sorry for the spoilers first, but Soy green There was never a big reveal about it. It’s about everything that leads up to it. This movie is over 50 years old and we all know who made it.
This knowledge should not stop anyone from listening to the ideas of Harry Harrison, screenwriters Stanley R. Greenberg, and Richard Fleischer. From a working-class perspective, the only real deterrent here is having to pay for a digital copy rather than using it on one of the dozens of streaming services we’re already subscribed to.
I know paywalls aren’t a surefire way to stop people from sharing their information, but for most viewers the default replay will be enough office instead. As of this writing, Soy green It can be purchased digitally via YouTube, Apple TV+, Amazon Prime Video and Fandango at Home.
