I did have the experience of hanging out with Michael Crichton back in the late 70s on a flight from Tahiti to LA, we were seatmates. I didn't recognize him but after we traded names it was like so cool, I've read this guy's books and love 'em! But had to be cool of course. He asked me a bunch of questions about freight (was a freight forwarder/customs broker)....he was working on Congo at the time IIRC. One of those nice small world moments.
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The best science fiction movies of all time
- Thread starter Keith_W
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kemmler3D
Master Contributor
The graphics were good, but as a fan of the original cartoons I couldn't even watch it stuck on a 4 hour flight. It butchered the source material beyond all reason.
OP
Keith_W
Master Contributor
- Thread Starter
- #123
One wonders how Ridley Scott made both the original Alien and Prometheus. What Prometheus did right: the filmography and sets were fantastic. Some actors turned in incredible performances, e.g. Michael Fassbender, Noomi Rapace, and Idris Elba.
What they did wrong: terrible make-up for Weyland, he looks like his head was dipped in wax and they called it a day. It asked questions that it never answered. It showed characters doing incredibly stupid things, like running into a corridor alone when there was approaching danger, or getting trying to pick up a space snake. And its sequel was even worse - killing the main character off-screen, people running around an alien planet without protection, splitting up teams into small groups that can be easily killed, etc. Ordinary people aren't so stupid, let alone a bunch of supposedly highly trained professionals facing an unknown threat.
BTW I should add another sci-fi movie that has largely been forgotten: Event Horizon.
Yeah, Hollywood has a tendency to do that, they tried to compress too much into to little.
I was still happy with it though, could have been a lot worse. This comic would need at least a serie of 10 movies to deploy it's plot.
Frankly the aesthetics alone are enough to like it, that's what HD has been invented for.
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Bro, I have to say someone invited me to the cinema to watch prometheus, I had no idea what it was about, I really liked it and only realised at the end it was part of the Alien franchise, it litteraly blew my mind, and I think that's the way this movie should've been watched. If I knew it was an Alien movie I wouldn't have liked it half as much.
kemmler3D
Master Contributor
The original comic, I actually haven't read, but the original Anime movie from 1995 is not even 90 minutes, and manages to be pretty visually compelling, if not in the vein of modern CGI stuff. Definitely worth a watch either way! Also, well worth watching just to see a few things the Wachowskis lifted wholesale for The Matrix, and I say this as a big fan of The Matrix.
kemmler3D
Master Contributor
I think Event Horizon is OK, but Sunshine is basically the same movie done better IMO.
Unrelated: Not that I think this belongs on a straight Best Of list, but has anyone seen The Core? It's far and away my favorite "so bad it's good" movie. UNDERGROUND LASER TRAINS, ALL ABOARD!!
My advice, try to watch it again at home on your big HD screen, it's just so stunning visually you'll have to change your mind.
kemmler3D
Master Contributor
Honestly, the good production values just makes it worse. They took a crap on a story I actually like, then spray-painted the crap gold. Insult to injury. I don't even remember what they changed that ticked me off so much, but I remember feeling personally insulted.
And this was after I went around defending the choice of Johansson for a Japanese character on the grounds that canonically the character has been 100% cyborg since birth, so her body's appearance is sort of irrelevant, so it was OK. What a chump I was. I was really excited for that movie. I am not sure I will ever watch it.
However, they're remaking / rebooting the anime and the studio doing it is quite good, so it's not all bad news.
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I've read the comic, and the fashions seem a bit dated, but then I realize that it was being inked more than 30 years ago, when the cyberpunk phenomenon, and William Gibson's Neuromancer was just a few years old!
Vuki
Senior Member
I would add Clockwork Orange and Planet Of The Apes to the list.
Johnkeizer
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Does Apollo 13 count, or too much science, not enough fiction?
dougi
Addicted to Fun and Learning
I've got Logan's Run, the Omega Man and Soylent Green arriving tomorrow by coincidence in a triple pack. Half watched Logan's Run last week on terrestrial television, but the channels BVOD service didn't actually have it to watch online.
Fantastic Planet is one of my favorite animated sci-fi films:
I think Gandahar is another classic:
Wizards never gets old, in fact these themes all seem relevant today:
I think Gandahar is another classic:
Wizards never gets old, in fact these themes all seem relevant today:
KenMasters
Active Member
I may have missed it, but I was surprised nobody mentioned Planet of the Apes earlier.
kemmler3D
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fatoldgit
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Seven pages and you are still discussing this!!!!
2001: A Space Odyssey ...end of discussion...mike drop.
Putting aside the actual movie, the making of the movie without all the modern CGI crap doubles it's appeal.
The visuals are stunning despite the old skool techniques they used (like stunt guys flying on wires)
It's the only space movie where you actually feel like you are in space.
I re-watch it every year in a double bill of 2001 and the first Blues Brothers movie.
Peter
2001: A Space Odyssey ...end of discussion...mike drop.
Putting aside the actual movie, the making of the movie without all the modern CGI crap doubles it's appeal.
The visuals are stunning despite the old skool techniques they used (like stunt guys flying on wires)
It's the only space movie where you actually feel like you are in space.
I re-watch it every year in a double bill of 2001 and the first Blues Brothers movie.
Peter
phoenixdogfan
Major Contributor
I don't see a lot of discussion about it, but one of the things I really like about 1950's SciFi movies is the retro-futuristic set design. Movies like Forbidden Planet, This Island Earth, Planet of the Vampires, World Without End, and any number of the Toho films like Battle in Outer Space embody that whole flying car, bulbous and pastel colored interiors look of what we imagined the future might be in 1956. Since Star Trek everything looks like an Apple Computer showroom in these movies and it's just not the same, even if many of the scripts are better. Here's something from a site I found showing off that aesthetic as it would apply to suburban America in an imagined retro future. Enjoy.
I was born in the 50s so no direct experience with how that came off in its time....but in the 60s when I first saw several of those I thought they looked dated/hokey (but a lot of the 60s stuff wasn't tons better otoh). They did have a nice glamorous kind of shtick going, tho.....
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