So this is obviously where the phrase comes from. The thing is though that you have to wait until the last minute to hear it and to get there you have to wade through a strange, awkward movie which seeks to combine a detective thriller with sci-fi.
Charlton Heston is yet again the out-of-time main character as he plays a police detective Thorn who lives in near-penury with his old chum, forensic investigator Sol, played by Edward G Robinson, in what sadly proved to be his final movie role. It's 2022, the population has clearly boomed with New York now containing 40 million inhabitants and it and everywhere else is in an ecological crisis with abnormally high temperatures and good and water shortages. I almost expected appear to tuck Chaplin-style into a pair of old boots at one point.
Thorn is assigned a murder case of a prominent individual named Simonson played by Joseph Cotten, which is linked to the production of the mass-made artificial food known as Soylent with its new flavour Soylent Green having recently been launched on the public. Cotten lives in relative luxury with a young live-in mistress / concubine, Leigh Taylor-Young's Shirl, it seems that all the best apartments have one. These women are quite literally part of the furniture. Also on the scene is Chuck Connors Fielding bodyguard, who Thorn suspects as the inside man on the job.
Anyway his and Sol's investigation leads them literally up the food chain to a revolting truth which is only revealed at the enigmatic conclusion of what was for me, a rather weird abd confusing viewing experience. There are some interesting predictions in the narrative which are now having their day, such as global warming and assisted suicide, but the idea of women being relegated to a property add-on fit only one purpose is certainly a distasteful one, especially considering that women's liberation was picking up speed at the time the film was made.
I found the direction to be a little stilted throughout and would have welcomed a little more exposition at times. Heston, Robinson and Cotten do their best with this unusual material but in the end I just found the film to be literally too distasteful for my palate.
Charlton Heston is yet again the out-of-time main character as he plays a police detective Thorn who lives in near-penury with his old chum, forensic investigator Sol, played by Edward G Robinson, in what sadly proved to be his final movie role. It's 2022, the population has clearly boomed with New York now containing 40 million inhabitants and it and everywhere else is in an ecological crisis with abnormally high temperatures and good and water shortages. I almost expected appear to tuck Chaplin-style into a pair of old boots at one point.
Thorn is assigned a murder case of a prominent individual named Simonson played by Joseph Cotten, which is linked to the production of the mass-made artificial food known as Soylent with its new flavour Soylent Green having recently been launched on the public. Cotten lives in relative luxury with a young live-in mistress / concubine, Leigh Taylor-Young's Shirl, it seems that all the best apartments have one. These women are quite literally part of the furniture. Also on the scene is Chuck Connors Fielding bodyguard, who Thorn suspects as the inside man on the job.
Anyway his and Sol's investigation leads them literally up the food chain to a revolting truth which is only revealed at the enigmatic conclusion of what was for me, a rather weird abd confusing viewing experience. There are some interesting predictions in the narrative which are now having their day, such as global warming and assisted suicide, but the idea of women being relegated to a property add-on fit only one purpose is certainly a distasteful one, especially considering that women's liberation was picking up speed at the time the film was made.
I found the direction to be a little stilted throughout and would have welcomed a little more exposition at times. Heston, Robinson and Cotten do their best with this unusual material but in the end I just found the film to be literally too distasteful for my palate.