This is part one of a three part series, reviewing classic movies that use 2017 as their setting. This is a comparison to their fictional setting to current events. I don’t cover any pacing, dialogue, or the cast. This is just my personal musings. I hope you enjoy the read, and are moved to share or leave a comment. I appreciate your visit to my column, Real Movie Chick™. Without further adieu, here ‘s a review of Cherry 2000.
As I reflect on the close of 2016, I thought of the classic movies that used the year 2017 for its post-apocalyptic setting. In Oscar Wilde’s, The Decay of Lying: An Observation, he wrote, “Life imitates Art far more than Art imitates Life.” So, I wondered, what if it was the opposite? What if Art imitates Life far more than Life imitates Art? Life? I slid my trusty black, thick frame glasses up my nose and entered a few keywords into Google. Soon I was scanning a list of classic movies using 2017 as a setting. My eyes landed onto Cherry 2000, a story by Lloyd Fonvielle (The Mummy) released on VHS in 1988, starring Melanie Griffith (Hawaii Five-O), David Andrews (Murder in the First), Laurence Fishburne (Matrix). The setting is 2017. The United States divided into several post-apocalyptic wastelands, with limited areas of civilization. There’s an economic crisis, where manufacturing has been reduced to recycling 20th century mechanical equipment. The world is ran by bureaucrats and society has become hyper-sexualized. Sex requires a contract drawn by attorneys before it can be initiated. However, society has managed to make great strides in artificial intelligence. Female androids known as gynoids are created to be a spousal substitute.
Before you start crying rip-off of every other post-apocalyptic, sexually-starved fembot movie, allow me to make some comparisons to our current world affairs. Many countries are experiencing third-world conditions – no water, food shortages, and buildings ravaged by war – in comparison to a wasteland. The United States, Russia, United Kingdom, and China, to name a few, could equate to the limited areas of civilization. We experience economic challenges in housing, employment, and financial. Many manufacturing jobs left the United States to operate in foreign countries. We do recycle metal in limited form, such as gold, copper,and aluminum. As for the state of bureaucracy, this system will undergo a transition, where some will say is an adhocracy – informal form of organization under minimal formal structure. Society is already hyper-sexualized. We are continuously bombarded with sexually-charged imagery. People are baring all via social media outlets, and are using their body to substantiate a position, like celebrities going nude to encourage their fans to vote. We haven’t reached pre-sex contracts, yet. However, 2016 has witnessed its fair share of baby daddy and momma dramas unfold. Onto the android spouse. You can purchase a life-like doll made of silicone. Yes, you can! I researched it, and I can’t unsee it. Darn! The doll even comes custom-ordered. It doesn’t speak, cook, or compute. It just lies still and remains motionless. Some of you may be into that sort of thing. I’m just saying! The things you can buy over the Internet never ceases to amaze me.
I really enjoy writing this series. It’s interesting to see how writers peer into the future, to create their version of Life. Cherry 2000 was way too imaginative for Orion Pictures. Too much forward in the thinking! Although the film completed in 1985, the release date was changed numerous times, until released on VHS in 1988. I enjoyed looking back and fast-forwarding to the present. It’s definitely fun to see how spot on the writers were. My next review is Blade Runner. There’s even a remake for 2017!
Watch the movie trailer for Cherry 2000 below.
Photo credit: Orion Pictures
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