An Orwellian low-budget thriller, Code 46 sets itself up as a noirish romance in a near-future where cities are heavily restricted and people cannot travel to and
from them without special travel permits called "papelles." An unseen totalitarian entity called the Sphinx issues papelles and strictly controls their distribution. Outside of the cities, miles of barren desert dominate and refugee towns are overpopulated with non-citizens who have no access to papelles and live nomadic primitive lives. Even worse, an overabundance of cloning has restricted people’s ability to marry as they might have common genetics which would destroy a birth. As a result, a “Code 46” regulation has been put in place which predetermines people’s ability to mate.
Directed by Michael Winterbottom (2002’s 24 Hour Party People - about the 1970s real-life Factory Records - and 2003’s In This World – an engrossing drama about two refugees from Afghanistan who trek across Asia and Europe), Code 46 is a second cousin of sorts to Blade Runner. As
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dreamed up by Winterbottom and screenwriter Frank Cottrell Boyce, they pieced together a future “bit by bit,” according to Winterbottom. After filming In This World with a crew of only “eight or nine,” Winterbottom again chose a minimalist approach to his material with Code 46. Selecting practical locations in Shanghai and Africa, Winterbottom decided not to build his vision of the future with complicated sets, but rather “rely on imagination and available architecture and light sources.” For instance, after filming In This World largely in the Middle East, he was “fascinated by the desert and determined to make the environment a key element of Code 46’s scenario.”
Essentially, Code 46 focuses on the story of Willam (Tim Robbins), an insurance investigator from Seattle, and the woman he is tracking, Maria (Samantha Morton), a worker bee from Shanghai who is forging papelles. In the course of his investigation, William and Maria fall in love, which eventually becomes a Code 46 violation, leading to their escape from the city. Winterbottom sets his love story against the backdrop of a dictatorial existence in which the unseen but all-knowing system is prone to minor corruptions but has absolute power. The director uses intimate interiors and handheld camerawork to bring us close to the hopeless lovers who are doomed to a controlling power structure, memory erasures, and a global economy that is bigger than any one individual.
In fact, though William is an American, there is a curious lack of US-based companies which decorate the landscape of Code 46’s cities, implying that the eventual multinational nature of corporations may end up rendering
America insignificant. In the end, there is a glimmer of hope in Winterbottom’s future, but the film serves more as a warning that corporations, which may already be out of control, will end up becoming self-serving entities that no longer have the need for human interaction or the necessity of human experience to perpetuate.
Though the handheld nature of Code 46’s cinematography can sometimes be a jarring distraction, Winterbottom effectively integrates his vision of our collective future with the intense passion his leading characters feel for one another. In lieu of grand futuristic setpieces as in another Morton film, Minority Report, Winterbottom creates verisimilitude with existing locations and minimal props, choosing to shuttle us to the near future with feeling over precision. Although he claimed not to have another futuristic story in his queue – his next film is a music-based piece called Nine Songs – it would be intriguing to witness what future Winterbottom, 43, could dream up with a budget equal to Minority Report. One would hope that he would still not allow spectacle to overwhelm story.
Scott Essman is a freelance writer from Los Angeles
who can be contacted at scottessman@yahoo.com.
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