This kind of movie is typically not my fare - and as usual, it's been so long since I added it, I have no idea why I did. Post-apocalyptic science fiction, I would normally leave on the shelf. That's probably why (and yes, I know I'm doing this more and more often) it's been sitting here since the beginning of March.
Before I go on, I have to admit: I am really fuzzy on what post-apocalyptic is intended to mean. I have read the Bible, for what it's worth. From what I recall and have heard, it involves the "End of Days." And Judgment Day is in there, where humans are confronted about their beliefs and sent to heaven or hell. I guess I have two points where I get confused. My first is, I have for whatever reason understood that Earth would also be destroyed in the apocalypse. My second is, I have always thought the people would be destroyed in the apocalypse.
These bring me to my main problem with post-apocalyptic movies. Unless they take place on another planet (I suppose I could understand a few people escaping, but if God knew about it, wouldn't he go after them?), it really lowers the believability of the movie AND the Bible for me.
Science fiction, I mean. I'm not that into science fiction.
Anyway, I had to watch this in order to send it back to Netflix.
The film's main character, Lina Mayfleet (Saorse Ronan,
Atonement) is a teenage girl living with her mother (Mary Kay Place), crazy Granny, and little omnivore sister in an underground city in a "post-apocalyptic" situation. As glamorous as this sounds, it actually sucks, because there's very little freedom and kids are given jobs by picking them out of a bag on a special day. None of the jobs sound very fun, either. Nobody gets to be, say, PR executive for cruise ships. One of my sorority sisters does that and it sounds awesome.
Ember's Mayor (Bill Murray) is a benevolent-dictator type, and when Ember's generator (which keeps the entire city in play) goes on the fritz, he allays concerns by appointing a new (pretend) task force to investigate. This is not enough for little Lina, and she and her friend Doon (Harry Treadaway) decide to seek further truths...encouraged by Doon's father, Barrow Harrow (at this point, I was too invested to get irritated with the cheese), played by Tim Robbins.
I won't ruin the ending for you, but I ended up finding it engaging and interesting - AND wanted to see how it ended. It would also make for a fun amusement park ride.
Availability: DVD only
Released: 2008
Added to my queue: 10/10/2010
Reason added to my queue: Oh who knows.
