The Proverbial Great SF Movie

[Australis]

I started this thread elsewhere, and a mod said it may be better done, say, here, so...

Question for fans of Big SF.

By now a lot of you will have seen '[Interstellar', and quite a few the short 'Wanderers' on YT. I was thinking about how they hark back to the "proverbial good SF moive" that Kubrick aimed to make in '2001'. SInce then (Sixties) we've had a couple of others, like 'Solaris'.

I was thinking about this, and how I'd like to write a script like that, then the idea popped into my head: what about the "proverbial good SF trilogy"? WTH? But with a big difference: each movie would embrace a particular SF trope, while still using mostly the same leads over the three stories, a little like 'Cloud Atlas' (which I have not seen but heard good thing about). So two of them would be space travel and time travel. But I'm a bit stumped as to what the third one would be. apocalypse? Alien invasion? The robots? Dystopia?

So, what are your thoughts? Two questions:
What would your choice nbe as the big SF trope outside the 2 I mentioned?
What films are, to you, the proverbial good SF films?

Count Zero also said:

For me, the third trope would be artificial intelligence. It could be combined with robots/androids, i.e. artificial life.

Some suggestions already:
District 9, Moon, Children of Men, Solaris (both versions are solid), Alien, Inception, Carpenter's The Thing, Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, Twelve Monkeys, Interstellar, Akira. Moon, Automata.

What else? And what should the third idea be?

 

[The Laughing Vulcan]

I started this thread elsewhere, and a mod said it may be better done, say, here, so...

Question for fans of Big SF.

By now a lot of you will have seen '[Interstellar', and quite a few the short 'Wanderers' on YT. I was thinking about how they hark back to the "proverbial good SF moive" that Kubrick aimed to make in '2001'. SInce then (Sixties) we've had a couple of others, like 'Solaris'.

I was thinking about this, and how I'd like to write a script like that, then the idea popped into my head: what about the "proverbial good SF trilogy"? WTH? But with a big difference: each movie would embrace a particular SF trope, while still using mostly the same leads over the three stories, a little like 'Cloud Atlas' (which I have not seen but heard good thing about). So two of them would be space travel and time travel. But I'm a bit stumped as to what the third one would be. apocalypse? Alien invasion? The robots? Dystopia?

So, what are your thoughts? Two questions:
What would your choice nbe as the big SF trope outside the 2 I mentioned?
What films are, to you, the proverbial good SF films?

Count Zero also said:

For me, the third trope would be artificial intelligence. It could be combined with robots/androids, i.e. artificial life.

Some suggestions already:
District 9, Moon, Children of Men, Solaris (both versions are solid), Alien, Inception, Carpenter's The Thing, Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, Twelve Monkeys, Interstellar, Akira. Moon, Automata.

What else? And what should the third idea be?

The BBC are currently having a sci-fi history season, and there's a four part documentary running looking at the various major tropes in movies. The first was space travel, the second invasion, the third artifical life (robots and cyborgs), and next week they do time travel.

From the Earth to the Moon, War of the Worlds, Frankenstein, The Time Machine, you have the four classic tropes of sci-fi, all classic novels written in the 19th Century, exploration, invasion, creation and speculation. Maybe a quadrilogy?

 

[Australis]

I think I have that series, or something very similar (The Real History of Science Fiction). Actually that is a good point, that the 4 themes are the big ones. But most series arre a trilogy. They usually screw it up with the 4th. But I will dwell on this.

In a similar vein to that doco series is another one, 'SFUK', worth checking out.

 

[Scout101]

Gotta vote Dystopia, I think. AI is a fine choice, just think Dystopia gives more interesting results

 

[Australis]

Thanks for that.

Come on, peeps! 123 views and 3 replies (1 of them mine)? Ya gotta have an opinion, let's hear some!

 

[Admiral2]

Space travel, time travel, dimension travel.

 

[BigJake]

Thanks for that.

Come on, peeps! 123 views and 3 replies (1 of them mine)? Ya gotta have an opinion, let's hear some!

I noticed my suggestion of inner space and exploring the human mind did not make the transition from the old thread, so I am punishing you with cold, cold silence.

 

[Professor Zoom]

Space travel, time travel, dimension travel.

I think as a trilogy using tropes, these would be the strongest as far as tying it all together. All involving exploration, which is a big component of SF.

But, if we are talking the big three tropes of science fiction in general, I would say evolution and the next step, i.e., artificial intelligence.

 

[Australis]

I noticed my suggestion of inner space and exploring the human mind did not make the transition from the old thread, so I am punishing you with cold, cold silence.

Oops, my bad. Apologies.

While both dimension travel and inner space have their attraxtions, not all SF is about travel, so a different one might be the go. That said, neither is out of the running.

Movies of inner space and dimension travel as examples?

 

[Professor Zoom]

Movies of inner space and dimension travel as examples?

Inner Space movies: Inner Space, Fantastic Voyage.

Dimensional... I can't think of a movie off the top of my head, but there's the TV show Charlie Jade, it's about alternative dimensions.

 

[BigJake]

The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai: Across the Eighth Dimension. Though it's not what I'd call a great SF movie per se.

"Dimensional Travel" and "Time Travel" are basically species of the same thing. The One involved parallel universes (also not a great SF movie really, though a pretty good chop-socky flick). Donnie Darko is a kind of hybrid, as is Minority Report and Butterfly Effect.

 

[Professor Zoom]

Jeez. I totally forgot about Sliders, as dimensional travel.

 

[Australis]

Ah, so mostly alt.universe/alt.history, got it, that was on my mind as well.

 

[Admiral2]

Movies of inner space and dimension travel as examples?

Event Horizon - spaceship engine accesses a hell dimension

The Black Hole - heroes escape by entering dimension beyond black hole

TRON and TRON Legacy - travel to a dimension based on computer networks.

 

[Australis]

Hmm. What about... alien invasion... but the alien is an artificial intelligence?

 

[eyeresist]

EASY: Parallel dimensions

HARD: Transhumanism

Or you could combine the two, either going to a dimension where transhumanism exists, or humans developing in this universe to the point where we are able to perceive or travel to other dimensions.

 

[RJDiogenes]

I suppose it would depend upon the intent of the trilogy. I would go with Space Travel, First Contact, and Deep Time (i.e. a modern First And Last Men kind of thing, which would encompass transhumanism and AI and so forth).

However, going in a completely different direction, a logical follow on to Space Travel and Time Travel would indeed be Dimension Travel. But time travel and dimension travel are far more speculative and border on fantasy, so any exploration of the human condition would of necessity be more metaphorical than the first paragraph. That's not a bad thing, just an entirely different kettle of fish.

As for the proverbial good SF, aside from 2001 and 2010 (and, hopefully, 3001), I think of stuff like Forbidden Planet and The Day The Earth Stood Still.

 

[Klaus]

Space travel, time travel, dimension travel.

ENT's "In A Mirror, Darkly" has all three! *ducks*

...one of my best sf trope movies would be Forbidden Planet.

 

[eyeresist]

Space travel, time travel, dimension travel.

ENT's "In A Mirror, Darkly" has all three! *ducks*

In A Mirror, Duckly?

 

[Deckerd]

The trouble with dimension travel, as it's almost always depicted, is it's just like the origin only a bit different. I don't see the point, since SG1 managed to do it with the minimum of fuss without having to resort to alternate universes.