CHILDREN OF MEN

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GB / US
2006
1hr 49mins
Dir: Alfonso Cuarón
Starring: Clive Owen and Julianne Moore

In 2027, human infertility creates anarchy and fear

This aggressive science fiction thriller based on P. D. James’ novel of the same name has one rather interesting scene. Clive Owen is onboard a very heavily graffitied Class 117 DMU complete with grilles over the windows. He alights at a station that has been transformed in an eastern bloc, Soviet-style checkpoint. This scene was filmed at Alresford on the Mid-Hants Railway and a sign reading ‘Alresford The Watercress Line’ can quite clearly be seen in the car park! During the journey anarchist youths are seen chucking rocks at the train from a goods yard and this was filmed as it departed Medstead & Four Marks. Finally, in the scene where Clive Owen gets dropped off at the junction of Cable Street and Dock Street, London E1, he is beneath the Docklands Light Railway viaduct near Tower Gateway and a DLR unit can be made out running along the viaduct in the distance.

Clive Owen sat onboard the Mid-Hants Railway’s Class 117 DMU. Note the television screens mounted to the ceiling displaying live news feeds! The train is pulling out of Medstead & Four Marks station.
Looking through the window grilles, youths pelt the train with rocks. The billboard has been tagged with the slogan ‘Last One to Die Please Turn Out the Light’. These are the engineers sidings just to the west of Medstead & Four Marks station.
Clive Owen gets off the heavily graffitied DMU at Alresford station, transformed in to a police checkpoint as part of ‘Holding Zone 2’.
Michael Caine greets Clive Owen in the car park of Alresford station. The offending station sign can be seen directly above Michael Caine’s outstretched arm. Could something as obvious as this really be overlooked by the film crew? Or was it delibrately left in at the request of Mid-Hants management?
This is the depressing scene looking down Cable Street, London E1. The white light on the viaduct in the middle distance is an approaching DLR train.