This weekend I watched Soylent Green for the first time. The movie takes place in 2022, a scant 10 years from now. There are a few funny elements, like how low-tech their future tech is and some of the acting. The 70s really were a wacky time, but this is serious dystopian science fiction.
I think most people know the reveal, so I won’t go into that. Since that line has become so iconic, it turns out that that’s not even that big a part of the movie. After showing how the world changes to bring us to the year 2022, the movie tells the story of Detective Thorn, played by Charlton Heston, investigating a murder. I will focus instead on some of the movie’s themes that have relevance to issues facing us today.
The Environment
The issues of pollution, food scarcity, and overpopulation shape the world of Soylent Green. There’s a permanent haze, people shouldn’t go out without dust masks and there isn’t enough housing so the poor are living in stairwells or are crammed into churches. Along with that, the pollution levels seem to be making food production harder. Fresh vegetables, fruit and meat are prohibitively expensive for most people and processed food rations sustain most of the population. Running water is a luxury for the richest elements of society.
These themes seem eerily prescient. Today, we’re continually recalling food because it’s not safe to eat; weather changes are destroying crops, causing rising food prices; cities around the world have unhealthy air quality on a daily basis; and fights over water occur not just in the poorest of African countries but in American cities drawing from the Colorado River.
The environmental fears first addressed in the 1960s novel weren’t allayed in the early 70s by the time the film was made and seem even further from being addressed today.
Corruption
It’s striking to see the blatant police corruption in the movie. While investigating a murder, our protagonist takes a pillowcase and fills it up with goods from the deceased man’s home. He takes books, liquor, food and soap—all scarce items in the larger world—without even trying to hide what he’s doing. The coroners, detectives and police bureaucracy all skim off the top as well. Murders are given flimsy resolutions to cash in on them. Most people are too busy trying to survive, fighting off hunger and disease, to fight for any kinds of rights. And those who do fight are rounded up in dump trucks, presumably never to be seen again.
But this isn’t relegated to low-level corruption. The Soylent Corporation clearly controls their world. They’ve bought off police departments and the politicians are merely pawns in their global domination. It turns out their take-over has been implemented over several decades and runs up through the NY governor’s office. Soylent has the power to get Thorn’s investigation shut down.
The fears expressed through Soylent remind me of modern fears like genetically modified crops from Monsanto and food safety issues around Chinese imports.
Humanity
In one scene, a woman lies dead in the street and nobody notices. Our protagonist does, taking her now-orphaned child to an over-crowded church. There’s a priest at the Church, the same priest who heard confession from Thorn’s victim. The priest clearly seems shell-shocked, as though the horrors of this world—and the victim’s revelations—are too much to deal with. The priest isn’t the only one who can’t deal with the knowledge of Soylent Green’s composition. Thorn’s friend, the elderly “Sol”, finds out the truth and turns to assisted suicide rather than continue to live in this world.
The emotional center of the movie comes when Thorn visits Sol at the assisted suicide center. As he says goodbye to his friend, he cries. This is the only real emotion we see in the movie, these two friends saying goodbye. Even when Thorn becomes intimate with Shirl (“furniture” at the deceased man’s apartment), he doesn’t show an emotional connection. Perhaps he doesn’t see her as human, only as “furniture”, as he eventually abandons her to her fate.
Apartments come with furniture, such as sofas, bedroom sets and companions. When a new person moves in, they can decide what they want to keep, including the companions. Are these women full citizens or are they merely accessories? And what happens when a new tenant doesn’t want the companion that comes with the place? It’s not said, but building managers seem to double as pimps.
So, if your only interaction with this movie has been from The Simpsons or Saturday night live, I’d suggest taking some time to watch it. It’s a slower pace than you’ll be used to from current movies, but it has some thought-provoking themes.
With Sprinkles on Top 