British Sci Fi never ceases to amaze me-the same people who bring us Doctor Who and Space:1999 also bring us The Prisoner and Outcasts. From the very silly to the simply baffling, British Sci Fi is never predictable.
Never Let Me Go
The film opens with a little slug card telling us there were some serious advances in medicine in 1952 and that by 1967 life expectancy was 100 years. We are never told what exactly these advances are, but it soon becomes apparent that organ transplantation and cloning are the keys to a longer life.
We follow around one of the clones as she tries to come to grips with the limited choices she has and the foreshortened life that she is forced to live. Unlike other clone stories, there is no attempt at escape, no wailing of the unfairness of it all when they discover the truth, no reaction to speak of at all. They have been brain washed their entire lives and they walk willingly to their deaths.
The clones are treated like property, given no rights, and there is some question as to whether or not they have souls. Of course, they are never actually called clones and they never talk about their impending deaths-only that they will reach completion. They were created so that their organs could be harvested-and they go through several procedures before their finial organs are harvested and they reach completion.
Here we find a sci fi story without CGI, aliens, or thirty foot tall monsters. It should be a heart rending tale of cruelty and heartlessness, but I found that I cared very little for the passive lambs who walked knowingly to their own slaughter. There was never any real reason to hate the monsters who created the clones either, as we never really saw any of them. The closet we get to a villain is a Head Mistress at an English boarding school-and well, have you ever seen a Head Mistress as a hero?
In the end, Never Let Me Go left me with nothing but questions. Why preform three operations on the clones instead of harvesting all the organs at once? Why were some of the clones Carers who stood around and watched as the other clones died? Why did the clones think they were copies of homeless people? What was the point of this story, anyway?
Never Let Me Go was a beautiful film, the acting was great, and the music fit will with the somber tone. But maybe it would have been a bit better if it had had CGI, aliens, or a thirty foot tall monster. . .
