Did Hollywood just figure out the solution to our world’s problems?
A week or two ago, I went to see Disney’s latest self-described “epic” sci-fi film, Tomorrowland. To be completely transparent, I didn’t go because I was hooked by the trailer—I wasn’t. Rather, I went because it promised to be an intriguing movie about ideas, worldviews and solving humanity’s problems—and it sure was!
Without focusing too much on criticizing the story, plot, and characters of the film (and giving away spoilers), I am going to dissect some of the ideas, concepts, and themes of the movie.
So, what was Tomorrowland?
Unlike Peter Pan’s pixie-dusted Neverland, which was, more or less, an escapist fantasy world where a boy would never grow up, Tomorrowland is different. It matters for the future and survival of the human species. It’s for real people, like me and you, who don’t fly (unless of course we have a jet-pack). But, similarly to how one had to “think of the happiest thing” to get to Neverland, Tomorrowland only admits intelligent, positive thinking, panglossian people—known as the “Dreamers.”
The city of Tomorrowland was secretly built in another dimension so as to be free from greed and politics. No ordinary person would even know Tomorrowland existed much less how to get there—unless he or she was granted an invitation token. In Tomorrowland, the Dreamers—the world’s best, buoyant, and brightest scientists—were working, without distraction from pessimists or doomsayers, to invent, create, have fun, and save humanity from itself.
Why? Because the rest of humanity is just too negative. That was the principal problem that drove the movie forward. That’s why Tomorrowland was built in the first place. As a matter of fact, the non-Dreamers complain so much about the world’s problems and “all the other bad stuff” that Frank Walker (George Clooney) says they’re creating “self-fulfilling prophecies” of doom.
While this theme unfolded I was reminded of a famous prediction from the “Doomslayer” himself—the late economist Julian Simon. “First,” wrote Simon, “humanity’s condition will improve in just about every material way. Second, humans will continue to sit around complaining about everything getting worse.”
Who was Julian Simon? He is most noted for his fight against the “doom and gloom,” Paul Ehrlich-ers of his day using economic truth. His keystone book, The Ultimate Resource (1981), documented how nearly every “important long-run measure of human material welfare actually shows improvement over the decades and centuries, in the United States and the rest of the world.”
So I was surprised when I found myself having a hard time disagreeing with that aspect of the movie. People are capable of not just wanton consumption and destruction, but production and reconstruction as well. Indeed people (like radical environmentalists) who sincerely believe that humans are a blight on the planet aren’t likely to make any significant contribution of time, money, or effort at long-run, constructive help for humanity. The same goes for people who think the world is unredeemable, only getting worse, and will end soon.
But it was the solution put forth by Tomorrowland that I found problematic. Because while the doom-and-gloom, anti-technocracy, dystopians underestimate the positive potential of man—what is in the Christian worldview known as the Image of God in man, plus the redeeming effects of the work of Christ—the overly optimistic technocratic utopians (like Casey and Frank in Tomorrowland) grossly underestimate the reality and effects of human sin.
Ironically, the movie itself practically proved this point when the governor of Tomorrowland, David Nix (Hugh Laurie), is the despairing, uncaring, selfish villain at the end of the film. No matter how much one tries to deny it or escape from it to another dimension, one cannot get away from the fact that we are all sinners. And where there’s sinners, there’ll be selfishness, corruption, and greed.
So no, Hollywood didn’t come up with the answer to the world’s problems. What is the answer? Biblically speaking, it’s to repent of our own sins and believe in the gospel of Christ Jesus. Only then can we look forward to a more promising tomorrow. And it starts with you. Are you a disciple of Jesus? Are you a disciple maker for Jesus? We all are called to be both.
