Why babies?
A curious question. Several of the best movies over the last two years have featured infants. Babies. Not just children, but the real deal–snotty, wailing babies. And in every movie they are essential to the plot and thematic sensibilities. Usually the infant represents hope for the future. I am reminded of David Patterson’s idea in When Learned Men Murder, that seeing and knowing a child’s face may prevent evil or unlock compassion.
Here are the movies I’ve recognized this recent pattern in:
Children of Men, Eastern Promises, L’Enfant, Juno, Knocked Up, Pan’s Labyrinth, Tsotsi.
Are there any others? Is this pattern really recent, or have I missed a longstanding tradition? And why (or why not) does it exist?
P.S. I heartily recommend all the listed movies, except: Tsotsi and Eastern Promises are rather uneven and only half-good. And Knocked Up is rather depressing.
January 22, 2008 at 7:02 pm
Interesting post and interesting questions. I would say that the idea of children being in films so much recently does tie in directly to the idea of hope and, perhaps more importantly in the films you’ve listed, redemption.
Youth in general has always been very prevalent in films from the dawn of the cinema age. Films about having babies, babies in general, or even talking babies have long been a part of the pantheon of Hollywood and international film history. What is happening now (2007) in films, to me, seems to be a trend of “having babies” and the situation of pregnancy moreso than infants themselves. The idea of youthful responsibility is especially present.
It also depends on the genre. The comedies, especially those on your list of examples, often deal with the issue of responsibility. In Juno and Knocked Up, the characters elect to “keep the baby” and deal with the consequences. In some of the other films, like Children of Men and Tsotsi, the child or the birth of the child represents hope for the future of either the world, as in Children of Men, or the individual, as in Tsotsi.
So there’s really no question why these elements exist in film and I’m not sold on the idea that it’s a trend quite yet. Those films you’ve listed have been spread over a few years, with Tsotsi being from 2005, and most film trends are more closely grouped (take for example the disaster trend involving Deep Impact, Armageddon, and other films from 1998).
As an aside, I couldn’t disagree with you more on Tsotsi. I didn’t find it “half-good” at all, as the whole film was, in my view, incredible. I have yet to see Eastern Promises.
January 24, 2008 at 6:50 pm
Yes, very good: children demand responsibility, something our current culture would do well to attain. Reminds me ironically of the Rugrats movie, and the baby’s learning of Sponsatility.
I’m still interested to hear what other examples in movie history there are of infants playing a central role.
As for “Tsotsi”, I enjoyed it in parts but found the overall character development of “Tsotsi” incredulous. When I think of a great story of bad men becoming better, I think of Walker Percy’s The Moviegoer, with only small steps of redemption taken in sacramental bites; the overhaul “Tsotsi” undergoes is too quick. And Roger Ebert (whom I respect and admire) is wistful in his interpretation that “Tsotsi” is merely delayed from being a bad man. If that movie and “The Shopkeeper” (short film included on the DVD) are any indication, Gavin Hood paints with wonderful colors in bombastically broad brushstrokes. For example, “The Shopkeeper’s” gruesome ending that merely disturbs in the most freakish sense, and the romantic subplot of “Tsotsi” that tries so hard to avoid triteness and foils the movie’s sense of violence’s effect on the home; the young woman’s affection for Tsotsi, while cutely curbed, is adolescent wishful thinking at its worst. I cringe to think of what Gavin Hood did with a movie about torture in “Rendition,” and will have trouble keeping an open mind if I ever watch it.
January 28, 2008 at 11:20 pm
You’re such a dork. Why are you pictured in a lifejacket ?
January 29, 2008 at 11:03 pm
Because I am a dork.