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Spoiler Alert! Theo's view vs a perception of a positive ending

posted 8 years ago by spielberto
4 replies | jump to latest

So the implication of the ending (for some people) is that with Kee and her baby being saved that the future of humanity is also saved.
However, early in the film, Theo states (and I'm paraphrasing here), "It wouldn't matter if we started having babies now anyway. There's no world for them anymore." in reference to the global political-economic meltdown. Britain is civilization's last hold out and not for much longer by the look of it.
Sure, you may have built a house on the earth's tallest mountain, but God is still flooding the world and your house may last a little longer than everyone else's, but you're still going to be treading water along with everyone else soon enough. (so to speak)
So, for the people that saw a 'happy ending', isn't that just a self-deceptive illusion? A conditioned response without seeing the bigger picture? Of taking the surrounding context into account?
Aren't fertile women (Kee, Dylan, any other female children they have...) just going to be reduced from people to birthing chatel for the rich? Look at how the rich lived in Britain compared to the poor/middle class.

[–] greg-233 8 years ago

"Aren't fertile women (Kee, Dylan, any other female children they have...) just going to be reduced from people to birthing chatel for the rich?"

I suppose that's a possibility. That scenario eventuated in the D.F. Jones novel Implosion - Britain's few remaining fertile women were put into "communities" and forced to breed. But it wasn't just to benefit the rich.

Being forced to produce children would make for a pretty dismal future. On the other hand, it might be a better situation than the alternative, in which there is no future at all.

[–] galligankevinp 8 years ago

Why would fertile women become "birthing chatel" for the rich? They're not being used that way in the real world. There's no reason to suppose that they would be used that way in the world of the film.

As for the global crisis, it won't be solved by a cure for fertility, but at least a cure would bring back hope to humanity.

In the battle scene, everyone stopped fighting when they saw the baby. Maybe a similar effect would be seen across the globe if people could have children again?

[–] Michael_Essien 8 years ago

That society is too far gone but in fifty years time when everyones too old to be rioting and fighting then if this human project can make human fertility viable then they can start to re populate these areas and rebuild society

[–] smoko 8 years ago

@spielberto That's why it's great that they kept the ending vague. We hear the sound of children playing, which is enough to tell us that things will at least be better than before, even though we may not necessarily get a happy ending.

I didn't see it as a happy ending so much as a less-sad ending.