Comments on: Children of Men is totally like Half-Life

By: PJ

PJ — Mon, 21 Jul 2008 22:59:34 +0000

And just to correct Steve, no the blood doesn’t disappear when he enters the passageway (because there wasn’t a cut) - the blood starts to fade inside - because it was digitally painted out when Cuarón decided it became to distracting.

By: Devin

Devin — Thu, 10 Jan 2008 06:25:41 +0000

I know this is a really old thread, but i just played half-life 2: episode 2 and its on my mind again. The first thing i said when i came out of children of men was “alfonso cuaron had to have played half life 2. The similarities were so scary. It cant be coincidence. It’s been on my mind lately, and now i really want to watch children of men again.

By: Dr. Ob

Dr. Ob — Wed, 28 Feb 2007 22:33:48 +0000

I totally agree. I was watching Children of Men last week with a friend and I said to him: “this looks like Half-Life 2!”. Funny you find that also.

By the way, have you noticed that long and incredible shot inside the car when Julianne Moore gets shot? Me like.

By: Marek

Marek — Tue, 27 Feb 2007 09:11:50 +0000

You may be right about the terrorist bombing scene. It may have been partly my perception at the time. You know how that can play tricks on your memory.

I noticed the blood specks and their subsequent disappearance. A common bit of trivia for this film is that initially the director wanted to re-shoot the scene (the blood spatter was an accident), but the DP convinced him to keep it in. I’m still not sure whether to love it or not. When I saw it I thought it was awesome but it did make me overly aware of the camera. However, as Jake pointed out to me when we discussed the film, this blood spatter is about as good as a blood spatter can be. If it had been intentional, they’d probably have made a very elaborate and good looking splash on the lens, not three vague drops of red.

By: Steve

Steve — Tue, 27 Feb 2007 00:32:28 +0000

I’ll agree with you on these points, and I think they’re pretty apparent to anyone who’s played games like HL2, Call of Duty, and so forth. I know that multiple people around my work have said the film is “like a video game” after seeing it, though in my experience they meant it rather derogatorily; one of my co-workers was unimpressed by the movie “just being about getting the guy from one point to another” without feeling emotionally invested in any of it. I enjoyed the film and can’t really agree with him, but whether the parallels work for or against the success of the movie in the end, the parallels themselves are hard to deny.

I’ll argue that the terorrist bombing during the opening was protrayed with less detachment than you imply, though. When the bomb goes off, the protagonist drops his coffee & liquor bottle and stumbles to the ground in shock; the cameraman sprints past him to the site of the bombing, catching the dismembered woman in the center of the frame before a sudden cut to the title screen. I found it very emotionally affecting, and it’s something that couldn’t have happened in HL2– there is no “cameraman” nor is the point of view ever wrested from the player. Would the scene have been less effective if the camera had stayed perched on Theo’s shoulder? I’d argue so.

Also as a silly little nitpicky point, one detail I liked about the “5-10 minute tracking shot” near the end of the film was that, early in the shot, specks of blood stick to the camera lens; about halfway into the tracking shot, as the camera passes through a dark alcove when Theo enters the apartment complex, the blood disappears. Stealth cut

By: Marek

Marek — Fri, 23 Feb 2007 16:55:02 +0000

Heh, that *is* very off-topic.

I enjoyed taking that interview. It was pretty informal and we just kept talking when the tape ran out. If there’s one thing I still really enjoy in game journalism, it’s doing proper face-to-face interviews.

CCP is showing some new Eve Online features at GDC, so maybe I’ll do another article on it for ShackNews. (But I might be too busy.)

By: BigJKO

BigJKO — Fri, 23 Feb 2007 16:46:21 +0000

Completely off-topic, ’cause I haven’t seen Children of Men yet, but I was reading your CCP interview. It was quite lovely to read because he sounds like a very nice fellow and because I remember when CCP was started 10 years ago about all the buzz in Icelandic news papers about this huge MMO they were making.

I remember thinking “Sounds awesome. But it’s never going to be huge..” Guess I was wrong.

By: Jordan Dennis

Jordan Dennis — Fri, 23 Feb 2007 00:37:31 +0000

I will definitely check it out. This also highlights the power of the cinematics of Half Life, I remember suspending disbelief very quickly during the opening sequence.