The year is 2022. Clean living is a luxury only the 1 percent can afford, as our planet is experiencing catastrophic climate change, megacorporations have excessive power over the government, and the population is increasing.
The predictions were made in the film "Soylent Green" half a century ago.
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Most of the films that tried to visualize the future didn't do well. "Freejack" and "The Postman" both predicted that by 2009, time-traveling assassins would be widespread.
Hollywood's predictions seemed to hit on the truth about 50 years ago.
"Conquest of the Planet of the Apes" was the fourth film in the "Planet of the Apes" franchise. The year 1991 is when it was set and imagines Earth in the grip of a deadly epidemic. You can draw your own comparisons.
"Soylent Green" was based on a novel by Harry Harrison. It's in the future of 2022. Heston is best known for his roles in "The Ten Commandments" and for being the five-time president of the National Rifle Association. The planet he is on looks a lot like ours.
The murder investigation is the focus of the plot. Now that we've reached the year of the film's setting, let's look at which of the social predictions have come true.
Synthetic food.
TV shows and movies depict humans abandoning meals for nutrition pills. In "Soylent Green," we make a switch out of necessity because of overconsumption. A head of lettuce, two tomatoes, and a leek costs $279 and is the ultimate luxury.
The general public is forced to live off products from the Soylent corporation, whose wares contain "high-energy vegetable concentrate" and are dismissed by one elderly customer as "tasteless, odorless crud." Soylent Green is a "miracle food of high-energy plankton gathered from the oceans of the world." Thorn discovers that it's not what it seems to be, even though it's popular enough to be rationed to a single day of sale per week. If you know anything about the film, it's probably the horrifying revelation about Soylent Green.
Rob Rhinehart's real-life Soylent meal replacements didn't deter crowdfunders from investing in them. Soylent is available in powder and bar form. Ars Technica reported that it met the Food and Drug Administration's standards for a whole raft of healthy claims. Soylent Nutrition temporarily stopped selling its products in 2016 after reports of gastrointestinal illness were linked to the use of flour made from algae. Soylent is available to purchase online and in chains, but it has yet to spark the same frenzied feeding riot of its name in the movie.
Overcrowding is a problem.
Photographs show how modern Americans evolved from settlers to fishermen, farmers and early town-dwellers. The slide show goes into a rush of cities with heaving sidewalks, smog-cloaked traffic jams and even Tokyo-style "professional pushers" cram commuters onto subway trains. There are 2 million men out of work in Manhattan alone, Thorn remarked at one point, as he pointed out the 40 million population of New York City.
There are similarities between the movie's universe and New York today. In June of last year, Manhattan saw an influx of homeless people. Police can be efficient when clearing protesters, as shown on screen. The city logs 137 homicides per day, while NYPD's CompStat report lists five from December 27 to January 2.
The super-rich get a better deal in reality than in the film, where they're confined to the apartments if they want to stay out of the public eye. There is a fresh shower in the tower block, the door is automated, and the butler is dressed in garish hunting pink. Not exactly the private wine cellars and porte-cochere that you'll find today in buildings such as 15 Central Park West.
Climate change.
The first oil crisis of the early 1970s and the 1972 heat wave in the Northeast are thought to have influenced "Soylent Green". The city's last remaining trees are protected by a tent because of the sickly fog and spoils in the fridge. In the source novel, it's implied that the disasters are the fault of humankind.
Thorn grew up in the sticky 21st century and still finds it normal to have a scorched existence, but when he discovers the wealthy murder victim's fresh soap and an air conditioner, he's still fascinated.
The climate catastrophe isn't limited to cities. A huge swath of the West, from New Mexico to Idaho, is in the grips of a megadrought, while hundreds of homeless people are left in Colorado.
Britain's New Year's Eve was the warmest on record. Delhi entered a temporary lock down last November to combat air pollution.
- assisted dying
Life in "Soylent Green" isn't a picnic because of the food shortages, inequality, oppressive temperatures and stairwells lined with sleeping homeless people. In the movie, assisted dying is legalized.
One scene shows widows collecting "death benefits," implying that your family will be rewarded if you opt out. It's a moment that catches the attention of Sol Roth, who is at a clinic. He's asked to choose his favorite color and soundtrack, take a mouthful of medicine, and be placed in bed while an orderly pushes two buttons on a console. A wall-sized TV plays a bunch of soothing imagery as the character exchanges a tender "I love you" with Thorn. Robinson would die 12 days after shooting.
In Canada, Australia, and parts of Europe, assisted dying is legal. 142 people traveled from Germany, France and Britain to Switzerland's Dignitas facility to use the country's physician-assisted suicide policy that does not set a minimum age, diagnosis requirement or qualify symptoms.
Screen time.
Thorn's leisure time is spent eating beans, apples and lettuce, but the elite of "Soylent Green" have a more novel way to relax: video games. In the luxurious apartment of a Soylent board member, a sleek cabinet contains Computer Space, which was the first coin-operated arcade game.
Thanks to the foresight of the present day, we now have a wide array of high-tech escapism. 49 years ago, the film predicted a bleak world.
"Soylent Green" is not the most unnerving look at tomorrow, but it is one that guessed how ugly we might become if we continued to allow ourselves to. We have avoided pushing the big red launch button. We're happy to keep pushing the buttons.
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George Bass is a feature writer based in Britain who has contributed to a number of newspapers.
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