THE progenitor of Phillip Noyce’s film is a novel by Lois Lowry set in a world that might be the mirror image of the one that George Orwell envisaged in “1984”.

Jonas (Brendan Thwaites) is the only member remaining after the community’s elders have assigned future life roles to the 18 years cohort. Jonas is special. He alone is to receive knowledge of the pre-cataclysm world, the survivors of which have created a society in which nothing bad or unpleasant is permitted.

Post-cataclysmic totalitarianism has produced many movies of varying merit. “The Giver” is memorable because of Noyce’s sparse but elegant treatment of a community where everything looks the same, where everybody follows set rules and uniform practices. Movement beyond defined physical and behavioural boundaries is punishable. Anybody remember “Logan’s Run”?

The chief elder (Meryl Streep) sends Jonas to the Giver (Jeff Bridges), the sole repository of all pre-cataclysm knowledge. As mortality looms, he is to pass it to Jonas. He has the community’s only library. As he and Jonas interact, the established order begins slowly but inexorably to crumble in Jonas’s mind.

The film builds in a slow dramatic crescendo around the Giver, Jonas and Fiona (Odeya Rush) with whom he shares his doubts concerning the true value of their world, and the baby for whom Fiona is the designated carer. It’s scary and more than a little apposite for today’s world.

At Palace Electric, Dendy, Hoyts and Limelight