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Written by Robert Scucci | Published
Spoiler alert: Soylent Green is about people. Although, since the film came out in 1973 and has been referenced many times in pop culture, you already know what Soylent Green it’s about. Unfortunately, the title isn’t available on any subscription streaming services, only via in-demand purchase, which is a complete shame. This is the kind of film that should be readily available to the masses, not tucked away behind a paywall as an ancient curiosity.
A dystopian sci-fi thriller that is prophetic, Places to stay in Soylent Green revealing the third great should not be what attracts you, because there are many socio-economic anomalies to witness. While it is set in the year 2022 and real life has already passed that point, the true characters are explored Soylent Green it still sounds great today. I’ve whittled down my portable media collection over the years, but this is one I still keep at the top, because it’s a cautionary tale for the ages.
Just Suffering All The Way
during the Soylent Green comment, director Richard Fleischer said, “There is no middle class, and we just suffer all the way,” when he explained the world he created in the source, Harry Harrison’s novel. Make Room! Make Room!
Here, we have an overcrowded New York City with 40 million citizens living on the streets, while the elite ruling class lives in castle-like houses with concubines calling them furniture. The women involved in this arrangement are submissive, frightened and treated as property. If someone moves out of a fancy house and someone else moves in, it belongs to a new tenant, no questions asked.
The lower class, which makes up about 99 percent of the population, subsists on products manufactured by the Soylent Corporation, with Soylent Red and Soylent Yellow being the most widely available food sources. A new product, Soylent Green, was introduced as a nutritional option, said to be derived from plankton. Green wafers, far removed from natural food unless you’re filthy rich, cause riots because of their scarcity, which is why most people are forced to survive.
When NYPD detective Robert Thorn (Charlton Heston) is assigned to investigate the murder of William R. Simonson (Joseph Cotten), a member of the Soylent Corporation’s board of directors, he is introduced to the victim’s concubine, Shirl (Leigh Taylor Young). Terrified of how her new owner might treat her, she complies with Thorn, who often ponders her crimes in her rundown apartment next to her elderly roommate, Solomon Roth (Edward G. Robinson).
Endless Corruption
Although Thorn is, by most measures, a good detective, he takes action whenever the opportunity arises. His nocturnal “investigations” often involved raiding the closets of noblemen for food, drink, and soap, which he brought home to share with Roth. Roth recalls earlier times, when overpopulation, shortages, and unchecked corporate greed ruled the landscape. He insists that people have always been bad, but the world itself used to be a good place before it reached this point of no return.
Thorn has reason to believe that Simonson was killed because he was sitting on a dark secret about the Soylent Corporation and needed to be silenced. His case, Meva suspects, could eventually lead him to tell the truth, which brings us back to that spoiler from the first episode.
Which is very confusing to me Soylent Green the main difference between the grievances of the ruling class and the working class. Thorn hears the bellhops complaining about how the maker of some fancy item is gone, or how long it takes for these entertainments to be prepared.
Meanwhile, Thorn and Roth generate their own electricity at home by riding a stationary bicycle. Thorn doesn’t even know how to eat an apple until he smuggles one home and watches Roth cry over a beautiful piece of the fruit, now so rare that it’s considered a treasure.
The Kind of Worst Future We Must Avoid at All Costs
Soylent Green it is a brutal indictment of all the things that go wrong in a corrupt capitalist society where the powers that be are left completely unchecked. Its message is never delivered through spoken word, but by showing the audience how bleak such a future can be. This world is characterized by smoke-choked beauty, endless food lines, and the expectation of endless scarcity, while the ruling class hoards resources and deprives women of their right to live as independent individuals. It is the future of the past, and one that we must avoid at all costs.
Sorry to lead with a spoiler, but Soylent Green it’s never been about its big reveal. It’s about everything that leads up to it. The movie is over 50 years old, and we all know it’s man-made. That information should not prevent anyone from hearing what Harry Harrison, screenwriter Stanley R. Greenberg, and Richard Fleischer were trying to say. The only real drawback here, from a working-class perspective, is that you have to pay for a digital copy instead of shooting it at one of the many streaming services we’ve subscribed to.
I know a paywall isn’t an ironclad way to stop people from sharing information, but for many viewers, it’s enough of a burden to automatically revert to reruns The office in turn. As of this writing, Soylent Green can be purchased digitally through YouTube, Apple TV+, Amazon Prime Video, and Fandango Home.
