EQUILIBRIUM

With Christian Bale, Emily Watson, Sean Bean, Taye Diggs, Angus MacFadyen
Directed by Kurt Wimmer

Here you have an amalgamation of several themes we've seen before. A Clockwork Orange, 1984, Logan's Run, Minority Report, The Matrix. Future societies and the attempts to make a better life for all usually leads to fascist means and the question whether the attempt to attain this Utopia isn't more of an intrusion into our human rights and free will. It is post-WW3. Here society has been numbed by the mandatory personal dosing of Prozia II, a drug which numbs the emotions. Ruled by The Father, he believes that human emotion has been the cause of all the world's ills, pains and atrocities. Remove the emotion, remove the problem. Those who refuse to take their "medication" and are open to feel and creatively express themselves, laugh and cry are "sense offenders". An elite police force, Grammaton Clerics track these sense offenders down with extremely accurate and deadly means. When a top Cleric misses a dose, his life starts to change as he gets second thoughts on the effectiveness of this new "peaceful" order. He goes on the run, siding with the underground to bring it all down. Equilibrium finds itself very closely related to its title in that it had me balanced between enjoying its action sequences and scoffing at its far-fetched premise. The Nazi-ish insignia, dress and philosophy is pretty obvious but necessary. Once you've seen the film, the film list mentioned at the beginning will make sense.

3 / C
- PB

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