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.

While we are constantly bombarded with the terms "climate change" and "global warming" today from numerous media sources, rarely do we hear about one of the primary causes of these conditions, which is the explosion of the world's population, primarily on much of the Asian and African continents. Apparently, it is politically incorrect nowadays to mention uncontrollable, unsustainable population growth in these places because rarely is it ever mentioned as a direct contributor to environmental disaster. Although the setting of this apocalyptic movie is New York, and we know very well that the population of the Big Apple won't reach anywhere near 40 million in five years (2022), the population of many cities in Asia and Africa have in fact increased by five-fold since this film was produced in 1973. They include Shenzhen, Guangzhou, Chongqing, Beijing, and Shanghai in China, Bangalore and Delhi in India, Dhaka in Bangladesh, Karachi in Pakistan, Kinshasa in the Democratic Republic of Congo, and Lagos in Nigeria. I'm sure that there are many other cities that can be added to this list. While the population crisis presented by this film clearly did not occur in New York, it did in fact take place in many other cities over the past 44 years, and that is very critical to the movie's fundamental message, which maintains its vital significance today.The opening montage of still photos, first in black and white before shifting to more recent color, that depicts the world's environmental degradation during the past century is very powerful and very sobering. Any fan of Edward G. Robinson, and I am one of those, should have been deeply moved by his spectacular, symphonic farewell to us in the euthanasia facility only days before he passed away in real life.Considering all of the recent revelations about the debasement and humiliation of women throughout Hollywood history, I found the reference to young, abused women here as inanimate "furniture" to be true to life in a distinctly Hollywood kind of way. After all, who knows more about the "furniture" of Hollywood studios than Hollywood itself? There's an interior decorator on every corner.Just go easy on those odd, green crackers before you completely lose your appetite and hope to God that we never live to see this work of fiction become reality. Bon appetite!

It's the year 2022 and the world has fallen into chaos. Greenhouse gases have lead to widespread global warming, overpopulation and the fall of living standards. Humanity has to survive with the food they manage scrape together from the oceans and waste heaps. Enter the Soylent Corporation, the foremost provider of foodstuff.The film follows a corrupt cop named Frank Thorn (Charlton Heston), who investigates the death of William R. Simonson (Joseph Cotten), one of the wealthiest men in the nation. In the process we explore the world of Soylent and ponder the mysteries of just how much we're filling to bend for such basic commodities such as food or shower or soft bed.One of the people laying the theme thick on you is Thorn's roommate and investigative partner Sol Roth (Edward G. Robinson), a man old enough to remember the good old days when you could eat red meat, drink beer and not worry about the sun burning the skin right off your bones. Very nice role and the one with the best scenes in the film.As a whole the film is a nostalgic cult classic from the 70s. The themes and problems have certain patina to them, but at the same time they're closer to us than they've ever been. It's only five years to the events of this film and while we're not quite there, thankfully, the situation hasn't exactly improved since the 70s.Well worth a watch for fans of older science fiction. Good characters, interesting world and that end twist. It's hard to ask for more.

The film is worth it to see the performances by Heston and Robinson (especially Robinson, since it was his last film). However, it's hardly anything resembling an accurate prediction of the future. The events in it are obviously a reflection of the attitudes expressed by people such as Paul Ehrlich, who has made a career out of incessantly predicting dire consequences from having "too many people and/or too much technology and/or too much capitalism". His predictions have all turned out to be wrong, including his famous bet with Julian Simon about the future price of metals. There are actually MORE trees in the US than there were 100 years ago. The fruits of capitalism, such as smart phones, have hardly made us poorer, nor has the much ballyhooed rise in global temperatures had the predicted apocalyptic consequences. There is no mass starvation due to an environmental catastrophe, and the rather silly depiction of a New York City with a population of 40 million in 2022 is obviously wrong (the city has grown by a few hundred thousand since the movie was made). Unfortunately, many people don't allow a little thing such as reality to get in the way of what they believe.