Movie of the Week: “What Happened to Monday?”
When I read the synopsis of “What Happened to Monday?” (USA, 2017), I was immediately interested in the film, especially when I learned that the lead actress was Noomi Rapace, the exotic Swedish who shone on the original version of “Men Who Hate Women”.After checking the film I was a bit divided, no doubt about the star’s brilliance, but troubled by the verisimilitude of the story.
In a not too distant future, we find humanity in a worse situation than it is today. As the population increases continuously, the environmental degradation causes the productive areas to become smaller and smaller, implying a lower production of food. Industrial intervention in the form of transgenics and other means can increase production, but brings as a side effect the unexpected generation of multiple gestations. That is, the initial solution created other problems.
At this point, the scientist Nicolette Cayman (Glenn Close) proposes a radical solution: each couple can only have one child.If any family disobeys this rule, the surplus children will be frozen to be awakened when the world situation is propitious to welcome them. All citizens have to wear a special electronic wristband, which is constantly supervised by soldiers from the Child Allocation Agency, the powerful agency controlled by Cayman.
But, someone always tries to circumvent the law, when it comes to giving up one’s own child. This is what happened to the daughter of Terrence Settman (Willem Dafoe), who died giving birth to seven children in a clandestine clinic. Settman, who did not have good relations with the daughter decides to keep them and creates a sophisticated scheme to protect the children.
Since there could only be one child, she is officially Karen Settman. However, each child gets the name of a day of the week, and it will only be on that specific day that they can leave the house and interact with the world.This has unexpected implications. One day, one of the girls runs away from home to skate and has an accident, and all of them are required to have the tip of the finger amputated, because the seven should be physically identical.
At thirty, the seven girls continue to strictly follow the same pattern. Yet under the strict control of the Child Allocation Agency, the world does not seem to have improved, and clandestine children are still captured and sent to cryogenics.
Karen Settman (Naomi Rapace) works as a bank manager, and is at a crucial point in her career, about to take on a new position. Always working together, the sisters use their individual skills to keep their outer personality always on the rise.
But the unexpected happens when, on the same day that she participates in the selection for the new post, Monday simply disappears, does not return home or give any news. Concerned, the sisters begin to investigate through Tuesday, who in their day seeks information on the whereabouts of Monday.
In fact the sisters were in the sights of Nicolette Cayman herself, who wanted to eliminate all of them without using the official resources of the agency. From then on everything goes frantically in a cat-and-mouse fight where not everything is what it seems, and the consequences can be catastrophic.
The film is very well done, with excellent visual effects, but nothing to excess. Naomi Rapace, as one might expect, works perfectly to give life to the seven sisters, each one with its own characteristics. Willem Dafoe, in his small appearances shows why he is capable of acting as Green Goblin to Jesus Christ without big efforts. Glenn Close, however, looks like a shadow of her seductive psychopath of “Fatal Attraction” (USA, 1987).
But, the problems of “What happened to Monday?” are not in the cast, but in the story. It is hard to imagine a worldwide consensus on such a controversial topic. Knowing how politicians’ heads work, it would be more likely to apply this law to poor countries. It is even harder to imagine China re-adopting a law that is already being abolished now.
Inconsistencies aside, “What Happened to Monday?” is an action movie set in the future, with the differential of a multiple protagonist, and that can awake some discussion about the real interference in the life of the citizen, either from the state or a company controlled by individuals with their own agenda.
Already anticipating the question, the movie is available on Netflix.
Original Title: “What Happened to Monday?”