Soylent Green is a 1973 American ecological dystopian thriller film directed by Richard Fleischer and starring Charlton Heston, Leigh Taylor-Young, and Edward G. Robinson (in his final film appearance as well as his posthumous work due to his death …
Soylent Green is a 1973 American ecological dystopian thriller film directed by Richard Fleischer and starring Charlton Heston, Leigh Taylor-Young, and Edward G. Robinson (in his final film appearance as well as his posthumous work due to his death in January 1973). Loosely based on the 1966 science fiction novel Make Room! Make Room! by Harry Harrison, it combines both police procedural and science fiction genres: the investigation into the murder of a wealthy businessman; and a dystopian future of dying oceans and year-round humidity due to the greenhouse effect, resulting in suffering from pollution, poverty, overpopulation, euthanasia and depleted resources.
In 1973, it won the Nebula Award for Best Dramatic Presentation and the Saturn Award for Best Science Fiction Film.
Plot-
In the year 2022, the cumulative effects of overpopulation, pollution, and some apparent climate catastrophe have caused severe worldwide shortages of food, water and housing. There are 40 million people in New York City alone, where only the city's elite can afford spacious apartments, clean water, and natural food, and even then at horrendously high prices. The homes of the elite usually include concubines who are referred to as "furniture" and serve the tenants as slaves.
Within the city lives NYPD detective Frank Thorn and his aged friend Sol Roth, a highly intelligent analyst, referred to as a "Book". Roth remembers the world when it had animals and real food, and possesses a small library of reference materials to assist Thorn. Thorn is tasked with investigating the murder of the wealthy and influential William R. Simonson, and quickly learns that Simonson had been assassinated and was a board member of Soylent Industries.
