Sci-fi in films

[Just Bob]

What are the best science fiction films you have ever seen? That is to say, what films have made the best use of science to create a fascinating story, while crucially staying within the laws of nature as far as we know them? Ignore, for the moment, the OTT space-operas like Star Wars and The Fifth Element that make no attempt to follow any kind of scientific orthodoxy, but play for drama, excitement and plot. They can be very good (or very bad) but they're a different beast altogether to what I'm thinking of.

[-H-]

Gattaca (i think thats how its spelt?)

Released at a time when the ethics of Genetic Science, research and manipulation was a hot subject ...

The film captured the ethical dilema facing society if it should go to far in the application of genetic screening, whilst also telling the story of 2 men as they come to terms with their own ambitions and lives ... even if they are living the others ....

its a very complicated plot to sum up, but a very good film to watch...

Brings to mind a book by Robert Heinlein that dealt with similar issues .... cannot for the life of me remember what it is at the moment ... but i shall post details at some point when i go home tommorow and dig it out of my book collection .. :D

[Bronze-Dragonrider]

I can't think of any sci fi movies that stick completely to the laws of nature, that I've seen anyway. Like space travel over galaxies, thats impossible unless you're going to have a colony living there and traveling for thousands of years. So many other sci fi movies have some sort of discrepancies, but I guess that's why they call it science 'fiction'.

[Just Bob]

A few of my favourites:

Pitch Black
A Clockwork Orange
Ghost in the Shell
The Andromeda Strain

Okay, I have to admit that movies always have to gloss over things a bit, but some movies do space travel (for instance) very badly, in ways that annoy anyone who knows science, while others do it well.

[granath]

Can't think of a single one. Most movies I've seen have at least one point where you have to suspend your disbelief to get to the plot.

Day after tomorrow, the changes happened far too fast. Glaciers don't hit that quickly.

Jurassic Park, I still doubt you can get a viable organism out of dna from an animal that's been dead for millions of years. Never mind several different species.

FTL space travel - most space movies.

In fact, the one movie I can think of where they stuck pretty well to the real science was Apollo 13. At least I couldn't find any major discrepancies... The best thing was that they shot the zero-g shots in the "vomit comet" for realistic effects.

[Bronze-Dragonrider]

Theres a movie for The Andromeda Strain? I gotta see that.

I liked the movie Pitch Black, but what bugged me is why a photophobic crature would develop on a world that is in nearly perpetual sunlight? Not just nocturnal, but the light actually hurts them. Sure, they have their underground buroughs, but it just doesn't make alot of sense, personally. And is it possible for a planet to orbit 3 suns and still maintain any continuum of inhabitable climate? A good movie nonetheless.

I haven't seen it in awhile, and I'm not sure how it holds up realistically, but one movie I liked was The Arrival where aliens were warming the earth to their preferred temperature.

Granath - I didn't know Appollo 13 was sci fi, I thought it actually happened. :erm:

[-H-]

I didn't know Appollo 13 was sci fi, I thought it actually happened. :erm:


i agree, wouldnt apollo 13 be classed as a true life reenactment ?

:confused:

[Berd]

Stargate :bouncy: with Kurt Russel and James Spader.

[Bronze-Dragonrider]

Stargate :bouncy: with Kurt Russel and James Spader.
Now THATS a good one! :D

And who can forget Alien and Aliens? Those were great movies and didn't seem too far fetched.

[McClance]

What about 2001: A Space Odyssey? Or Fight of the Navigator?

[Bob12]

The Abyss - Extended Version

[granath]

i agree, wouldnt apollo 13 be classed as a true life reenactment ?

:confused:

It probably would. Or at least a dramatization of true events.
:blush:

Alien and Aliens still had FTL travel, which isn't possible without stretching the known laws of physics beyond stretching point.

[Just Bob]

Day after tomorrow, the changes happened far too fast. Glaciers don't hit that quickly.

Jurassic Park, I still doubt you can get a viable organism out of dna from an animal that's been dead for millions of years. Never mind several different species.
True, but Jurassic Park and The Day After Tomorrow are rubbish anyway.

[Just Bob]

Theres a movie for The Andromeda Strain? I gotta see that.
The Andromeda Strain (http://imdb.com/title/tt0066769/)
I didn't find the idea of a whole ecosystem evolving out of reach of the suns as implausible as that, although it may seem a bit odd. Still, nature goes with what works, and that particular set of species worked _very_ well! As for the system with multiple suns, I'm not sure that we know whether it would work in reality, so it's fair game for science fiction. My only problem was when the rings of the planet offered an obstruction to the sunlight, but that's purely nitpicking in an otherwise very good movie.

[Bronze-Dragonrider]

Well Jurassic Park isn't *that* far fetched. The movie is crap compared to the book though. Theoretically, ressurecting dinosaurs probably could be done, *if* they had super fast processing computers beyond what we have today. They're actually trying to bring back the mammoth, but thats easier because they have a full body, fur and all for DNA samples. The DNA from mosquitos might work if they found a DNA strand intact enough to fill in the gaps with bits from living creatures today. But it would still not be a true dinosaur, it would be a sort of mutant thing because its not a complete dinosaur DNA. And they could never tell what creature they'd get :roll:

[maiken]

A few of my favourites:

Pitch Black
A Clockwork Orange
Ghost in the Shell
The Andromeda Strain

Okay, I have to admit that movies always have to gloss over things a bit, but some movies do space travel (for instance) very badly, in ways that annoy anyone who knows science, while others do it well.


Ooooo Yay! Ghost in the Shell!

My favorites are:
Legends of EarthSea (2parter on Scifi channel)
Gundam Wing Last Waltz(yes anime..but it's still a scifi movie)
The Outlaw Star Movie(another anime)
and any other anime scifi movies..can't think of any at the moment...but i guarantee i've seen 'em all! I mean I have a whole Anime Collection of over 500 dvds....I know i'm spoiled but who cares? I like what I like....

mai :bouncy:

[Just Bob]

The Gundam Wing series and movie have very interesting storylines, but on a political and sociological level rather than scientific. I've always felt that the whole giant mecha sub-genre was a bit silly, although it can spawn some fascinating work from time to time. Gunbuster (a.k.a. Top o Nerae) is very interesting for the way it deals with the implications of relativity on space travel, and Voices of a Distant Star is beautiful on a number of levels, despite being far too short.

I think we need an anime thread. Would you care to do the honours, or shall I?

[maiken]

Already did! Yesterday in fact. See the 'Anybody other Anime nuts on here?' Thread. I think that's what I called it.

mai :blush:

[Just Bob]

:blush:
'Nuff said.

[Mausey]

I don't like a lot of cold hard facts in my movies. :D I enjoy suspending all sense of reality and just enjoying it. It doesn't matter to me if the rescue ship couldn't possible have gotten there in time or the rocket wouldn't explode in that fashion. As long as it's a fun movie, I don't really care how wacky the science is. :laugh:

[Sharon]

When I first saw The Andromedia Strain it freaked me out. It seemed so plausible. I consider it the finest adaptation of any of the Michael Crichton novels that have been turned into movies. (Warning: Do not get me started on the hack job Hollywood made of Congo, and Jurassic Park:irked: )
I saw the movie long before I read the novel, but it's amazing how close the movie is to the book.

[Just Bob]

I don't like a lot of cold hard facts in my movies. :D I enjoy suspending all sense of reality and just enjoying it. It doesn't matter to me if the rescue ship couldn't possible have gotten there in time or the rocket wouldn't explode in that fashion. As long as it's a fun movie, I don't really care how wacky the science is. :laugh:
I'm not like that at all. Admittedly, banal and average contemporary reality often bores me in films, but I love to see a plot that has been put together with care and skill. I tend to think that people who make a science fiction film with little regard for the science are displaying a lack of respect for both the material and the audience.
Sometimes, as with Signs (the M. Night Shyamalan movie starring Mel Gibson) I actually wonder why they put the film in a sci-fi setting. In this case, I think the main theme was a good one, and the message was worthy and well illustrated, but the science was a mess. The story could have been done just as easily in another genre that didn't include clear impossibilities that invalidated the whole plot for me.

[selket]

how about the thing(the first one) or war of the worlds?\or blade runner?

[Flinx]

Day after tomorrow, the changes happened far too fast. Glaciers don't hit that quickly.You might be interested in reading The Coming Global Superstorm by Art Bell & with Whitley Strieber. This is a non-fiction book that the movie was based on.

Flinx :crazy:

[Dai]

Dark Star

[Milo]

I didn't care for the Andromeda Strain movie. The BOOK on the other hand :ok: I guess it was alright, but I just loved the book.

[Earthmother]

Gattaca (i think thats how its spelt?)

Released at a time when the ethics of Genetic Science, research and manipulation was a hot subject ...

The film captured the ethical dilema facing society if it should go to far in the application of genetic screening, whilst also telling the story of 2 men as they come to terms with their own ambitions and lives ... even if they are living the others ....

its a very complicated plot to sum up, but a very good film to watch...

Brings to mind a book by Robert Heinlein that dealt with similar issues .... cannot for the life of me remember what it is at the moment ... but i shall post details at some point when i go home tommorow and dig it out of my book collection .. :D

I love Gattaca and own it on dvd. Excellent movie!

[-H-]

Gattaca (i think thats how its spelt?)

Released at a time when the ethics of Genetic Science, research and manipulation was a hot subject ...

The film captured the ethical dilema facing society if it should go to far in the application of genetic screening, whilst also telling the story of 2 men as they come to terms with their own ambitions and lives ... even if they are living the others ....

its a very complicated plot to sum up, but a very good film to watch...

Brings to mind a book by Robert Heinlein that dealt with similar issues .... cannot for the life of me remember what it is at the moment ... but i shall post details at some point when i go home tommorow and dig it out of my book collection .. :D


Remembered the book title !!!!

if anyones interested "Beyond this Horizon" deals with the ethics of Genetic manipulation many years before the popularity of the subject became ..... well popular i suppose ;)

[Shadow*]

Dark Star
Ditto that one, I especially enjoyed the conversation they had with the Bomb. :rofl:
Psychosis mixed with some dark humour, I suppose it isn't every ones cup of tea, but I thoroughly enjoy it.

[Silverspirit157]

Well Jurassic Park isn't *that* far fetched. The movie is crap compared to the book though. Theoretically, ressurecting dinosaurs probably could be done, *if* they had super fast processing computers beyond what we have today. They're actually trying to bring back the mammoth, but thats easier because they have a full body, fur and all for DNA samples. The DNA from mosquitos might work if they found a DNA strand intact enough to fill in the gaps with bits from living creatures today. But it would still not be a true dinosaur, it would be a sort of mutant thing because its not a complete dinosaur DNA. And they could never tell what creature they'd get :roll:

Actually not. You absolutely MUST have the complete DNA strand before you can clone. The filling of the genes with other animals is impossible. In the first place, we have no idea WHAT genes they had nor what the proteins they code for looked like, or what they were supposed to do. As an example, human insulin doesn't look like gene coding for it at all because it is cleaved 2 or 3 times before it folds and is actually a combination of genes because the peptides are fused together as needed. Not only that, we can't tell just looking at DNA what it should be coding for. The majority of human DNA doesn't code for ANYTHING as far as we can tell and is considered remnants of various viruses. So putting together something as complex as dino DNA from other animals would be impossible because you don't have anything to compare it to and no living creatures to test which genes they had that needed to be replaced.

[Silverspirit157]

I'm with Mausey here. As long as the story's good, I don't mind too much about the science...except the biological because I jolly well know there is no way around it...

[Bronze-Dragonrider]

Actually not. You absolutely MUST have the complete DNA strand before you can clone. The filling of the genes with other animals is impossible. In the first place, we have no idea WHAT genes they had nor what the proteins they code for looked like, or what they were supposed to do. As an example, human insulin doesn't look like gene coding for it at all because it is cleaved 2 or 3 times before it folds and is actually a combination of genes because the peptides are fused together as needed. Not only that, we can't tell just looking at DNA what it should be coding for. The majority of human DNA doesn't code for ANYTHING as far as we can tell and is considered remnants of various viruses. So putting together something as complex as dino DNA from other animals would be impossible because you don't have anything to compare it to and no living creatures to test which genes they had that needed to be replaced.

Yeah after I think about it, you're right. The genetic code is so incredibly vast that it would be impossible to peice together anything without it looking beyond recognition if they ever did manage to get something out of it. I was just going by a documentary I saw about it. "The Real Jurassic Park" narrarated by Jeff Goldblume.