Block Cinema
40 Arts Circle
847.491.4000
This event has passed.
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Soylent Green
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Wednesday July 23, 2008 (9pm)
- Where
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- Price
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Note: The film screens at dusk on the Norris University Center East Lawn, just north of the Block Museum. Bring blankets and chairs for comfortable viewing.
Two centuries ago, political economist Thomas Malthus predicted that unchecked population growth would eventually outpace global food production, resulting in worldwide poverty, hunger, and environmental degradation. Translating Malthus' ominous prediction onto the silver screen, dystopian sci-fi flick Soylent Green (1973) depicts an overpopulated, over-polluted, and overheated future where electricity, living space, and food are in short supply, and the impoverished masses subsist on "miracle food" rations produced by the Soylent Corporation. When a Soylent executive is assassinated, Charlton Heston investigates his murder and makes a horrific discovery about the origins of the food substitute. The film is charmingly outdated, but the concerns it raises are eerily topical.
