Very good article Curt!
This is the sort of stuff I love reading and posting about. One thing that has always bugged me about a lot of Sci-Fi films (and supernatural types ala Stephen King) is the ending where the final confrontation ends with characters shooting sparks out of their eyes at one another and knocking each other around with electrocuting rays…uggg? And seriously some of the films I genuinely love suffer from this lack of imagination e.g Dark City, The Fifth Element, I am sure others can think of more.

I thought “Moon” was a perfect film for what it tried to be. I was really disappointed with “Sunshine” I was totally sold on that film all the way until the third act when it devolved into some what? low budget horror ending? what was really compelling in the film was the dynamic between the crew; who was important who was expendable, who was right and who was wrong ect. I still love the first two thirds though.

“Gattaca” is a greatly under appreciated film. I loved “Solaris” for its mood and ideas. “Impostor” was pretty good as well. How about “Rollerball” even “Frankenstein” could be considered sci-fi. lots of good ones.

Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, Primer, Code 46, Moon, Alien, Blade Runner, Gattaca, Robocop, Starship Troopers, Contact, Dark City, The Sticky Fingers of Time, eXistenZ, The Fountain, Paprika, The Thing, The Prestige, Children of Men, Sunshine, and Soderbergh’s Solaris remake are some of the post 1979 great science fiction films.

Hopefully Christopher Nolan’s INCEPTION delivers on this.

Great list and sound logic. I mean these basics apply for most genres (where not genre specific) but it is good to see them spelled out concisely like this. For me 1 and 3 are the biggest for Science Fiction whereas 2,3 are the biggest for say film noir and 2,4 are the best for the indie offbeat flick. Good stuff!

There is something about Blade Runner that for some reason I am never able to get into it. Anyone else have this problem?
Great article though, it’s always nice to refresh your memory of all those great films out there.

@ xego, I agree with the Gattaca remark, I caught this when it first came out before even knowing anything about it and loved the movie. It never got much attention though, which is weird considering it’s Uma and Ethan.

Voyage Dan La Lune, 1902. (108 years of Sci Fi films)

Can someone please CC every studio exec on this article and make them read it over and over and over again until they finally learn to stop making shitty sci-fi films??

Great article. Right on the money.

comics will always rule sci-fi. inception was based on numerous comics, even robocop was better as a comic. sci-fi movies cant even begin to be intelligent, it costs to much.

@Itchy-finger @Rian

For me Blade Runner is anything but boring. I have loved this movie since it first came out on vhs and it was quite a different film too..voice over…no added scenes ect. I thought Harrison ford and Sean Young were interesting together. Here you have Deckard seemingly void of emotion a machine in affect falling for a machine. In Blade Runner it is really the machines that value what it is to be human. That is really what grabbed me about the story. The film is a masterpiece. In visuals, photography, set design ect. Give it another chance.

I fail to understand how anyone finds Blade Runner Boring. THere is tons of stuff going on in each and every shot, and the film ticks along like any good police procedurial film should. It’s not even that long.

Back at you. I appreciate the comments.

@Xego Mea culpa on Sunshine. Absolutely right (RAM failure on my part).

@Kurt I’ve been through Alastair Reynold’s Revelation Space series twice including Chasm City. (I guess you can tell). I’ll study your film list to see what I’ve missed. And you’re right – Lynch’s Dunefor the settings. In the upcoming Film Junk SF Universe it takes pride of place in the Twisted Nebula.

@Rus You are correct to be confused – the internal logic slipped a little bit there. I am really not a rigid person when it comes to typologies like this. I go for the feeling.

@Justice No points for you. I arbitrarily start SF films in the Golden Fifties. I just didn’t tell anyone.

A collective thank you for some nicely articulated observations about Bladerunner for all those people who said “Hunh?” Worth some more thought though. (I didn’t know there were two people who didn’t think so much of Bladerunner).

@Daemon Get out of my head. I write ‘em like the editor tells me to write ‘em. (Between us, there is some truth to what you say – the writing I mean. A few dinks has never affected my writing. Maybe yours though).

Final question, which gold standard would you replace with your gold standard?

hmmm, my golden standard

take away 1) smart idea/great story
—replace with—
1) hot ass bitch

i’m a biology student, but i also don’t hold plausible science in high regard. i can certainly appreciate it but i would rather see some sort of moral message or social commentary involved

I guess you can put me in the club with the people who don’t really appreciate Blade Runner. I suppose all the negativity towards the film when it first came out has perhaps tainted my viewpoint. I did buy the 5 HD-DVD disk briefcase version, and have watched most of the extras and commentaries.

Applying Curt’s Gold Standards to Blade Runner, I’m not sure the movie would pass at least based on my application of the standards. I think the idea of chasing down replicants with a limited life span to be a somewhat smart idea. Ha ha. Blade Runner touches on interesting ideas, but it doesn’t explore the implications. I don’t think the characters are quite authentic. We never do understand what makes Deckard such a good Blade Runner. Why doesn’t Deckard get backup? You would think the Gaff character would lend a hand instead of just hanging about. I found the setting to be somewhat unbelievable. I don’t buy into the design ethic of putting new stuff over old stuff. For economic reasons, people will have the tendency to remove the older buildings. The use of the Bradbury building just seemed to be a cost saving measure. As for plausible science, there seems to be a technology that allows for hovercars, but we don’t see this technology applied elsewhere. You would think that guns would have improved beyond what was shown, and that there might be advanced weaponry. With the idea of replicants with implanted memories, one wonders if this technology would allow for immortality. Why was Rachel created without the knowledge that she was a replicant? Simply as an exercise in trying to fool the Voight-Kampff test? Some people think Blade Runner painted a believable future that subsequent films were quick to emulate. For a suburbanite like myself, the Blade Runner future leaves a lot to the imagination.

calm down KYriakos, Reed makes some valid points, misguided, but valid.

first, Bladerunner is over 25 years old and the design aesthetic it introduced became so powerful that the term “bladerunnerlike” is even used in Cameron’s Avatar supporting book to describe earth! The film has now become a design virus we can’t get past!

I think what frustrates a lot of people about Reed’s comments is they don’t take in to account the achievement of doing more with less. Which is odd when you think about the original Star Trek…

I really don’t understand the comment of “cost savings” because at the heart of a design aesthetic for a film the only choice should be if the location in question fits with the overall design aesthetic, judging the cost benefit isn’t necessary.

The whole argument of new things over old is very real as I work everyday designing new additions and installing new technology over the bones of 1900s Chicago. I actually think the current recession is going to make America reuse buildings even more, like they do in Europe, getting us one step closer to BLADERUNNER!!

still Armin Meiwes? huge Star-trek fan..

Really rus?

…Really?

@ REED

Well Mr. Farrington we meet again…I will answer your charges against Blade Runner…Rus in Chitown did cover some but not all.

“Blade Runner touches on interesting ideas, but it doesn’t explore the implications.”

…The film very much deals with the implications it is in fact I would say one of the central themes of the film. It is in Deckard’s change in attitude towards “Andies” and of course what he does to them, when he falls for Rachel. It first he is defensive against Rachel’s pointed questions about the morality of his work. You could almost substitute their conversation with that of a butcher and a vegan. But as he falls for her he becomes protective of her. Their is also the implication that Deckard may have quit because he had qualms about what he was doing? or considering what happened to his replacement he may have thought the game was getting to rough, the film doesn’t seem to say. To the best of my recollection none of this follows the original source material.

“I don’t think the characters are quite authentic.”

The humans are somewhat less than in Blade Runner, M. Emmet Walsh’s character is a real bastard. And Edward James Olmos just seems to be waiting to get the order to whack everybody. And Rachel, Batty, Pris, ect are all Replicants so no they are not by definition authentic. To me Deckard is authentic only after falling for Rachel.

“We never do understand what makes Deckard such a good Blade Runner?”

Come on Reed you have to allow for certain plot conventions. When M. Emmet Walsh says he is the best he’s the best, after all he is willing to go to extraordinarily sleazy tactics to force him out of retirement isn’t he? The first time you saw Star Wars were you incredulous as to whether Han Solo was in fact a great pilot because we hadn’t seen him fly anything yet? No, you just took it on faith. Did you ask to see scenes of Scotty or Bones cramming for their finals to believe that they were really qualified for their positions?

“Why doesn’t Deckard get backup?”
“You would think the Gaff character would lend a hand instead of just hanging about.”

This is just dumb, but I am going to answer it anyway because I believe you are sincere, sincerely what? I will not say.

Blade Runner at its heart is a Noir. The Protagonist is almost always a lone wolf. Did you ever see Steve McQueen with a partner? Or if you were Clint Eastwood’s partner that meant you were going to die. It is pretty obvious the attitude Deckard’s old boss has for the Blade Runners under his command. He clearly sees himself above them, he sees them as expendable. If Deckard is a Replicant as the movie insists (thanks to Ridleys tampering with it) then it makes perfect sense that he would send him out alone. It is pretty clear that Gaff is not a Replicant he is too eccentric. He is there to simply be a toady for M. Emmet Walsh, Toadies never get their hands dirty do they? What did you think they were going to partner up? They are totally antagonistic towards one another, not to mention Deckard knows full well that it will be Gaff that will be tracking he and Rachel down.

“I found the setting to be somewhat unbelievable. I don’t buy into the design ethic of putting new stuff over old stuff. For economic reasons, people will have the tendency to remove the older buildings. The use of the Bradbury building just seemed to be a cost saving measure.”

Rus answered the technical side of this better than I could but just to add, and I know we are talking about the film here and not the book but I think the differences are interesting. In the book the world had become so polluted that animals had died off (hence the need for synthetics, and also man had built upward, and the lower levels were left to those of the lower classes, to be affected by the pollution and become “Chicken heads” Most of those that could leave Earth for the off world territories had done so, those who haven’t are either making plans to, or are not able to pass the screening test. Again none of this is really dealt with in the movie.

“As for plausible science, there seems to be a technology that allows for hovercars, but we don’t see this technology applied elsewhere. You would think that guns would have improved beyond what was shown, and that there might be advanced weaponry.”

They could have built a hover city I suppose but the Earth is decayed and not really worth hanging around for that is why they are going off world as the film points out. I think Deckard’s weapon seemed advanced, I guess Scott could have given him a Phaser but I don’t think the aesthetic would have been right.

“With the idea of replicants with implanted memories, one wonders if this technology would allow for immortality.”

I don’t believe you have put enough logic behind this question, it is not answerable.

“Why was Rachel created without the knowledge that she was a replicant? Simply as an exercise in trying to fool the Voight-Kampff test?”

Well the obvious answer is that it makes for some of the best drama in the film. The film doesn’t expressly say why Rachel was created however Joe Turkel’s portrayal of Tyrell gives us insight. He is obviously genius, artist, pushing ever further into the frontier of science, and certainly quite proud of his creations. Because of Rutger’s great portrayal of Batty we have sympathy for his plight and subsequently we see Tyrell in his Corporate ivory tower as the villain. But is he really? Replicants are not people. This goes back to what Deckard said in the begining, “Replicants are like any other machine – they’re either a benefit or a hazard. If they’re a benefit, it’s not my problem.” Do we afford the same rights to a machine as a man if the machine is sentient? What of Clones? These were the kind of questions PKD was delving into. As for Rachel she may have been made as a companion for Tyrell implanted with his nieces memories. Was he interested to know if she could beat the Voight-Kampff test, clearly he was, and don’t forget her presence on Earth is a violation of law.

“Some people think Blade Runner painted a believable future that subsequent films were quick to emulate. For a suburbanite like myself, the Blade Runner future leaves a lot to the imagination”

Whether you believe in a dystopic future or not is really telling to ones own personality and outlook on life. I don’t see a future where the world becomes uninhabitable from pollution, I do see how the Green Revolution could lead to a despotism of it’s own however.

Good Job Reed.

Please forgive me for geeking out and turning this into the Blade Runner Forum.

I’ll give Reed that maybe the police procedural stuff may have been “watered down” in the service of drama.

I don’t understand, “It bothers me that people pick apart films like the Transformers series, yet admire films like Star Trek, District 9, or Avatar.” as all my personal problems with Bay’s films relate to any film – character development, script, pace, etc. Reed if you can’t see how Trans. lacks in quality to the films you mentioned, it is going to be hard to talk film with you.

I will give you a film like Star Trek has many of the same problems as Trans., but the magic of storytelling and film gives us that magical, unknowable quality that makes us value things differently. Like Lucas said, “film is binary, positive or negative, it just works or it doesn’t” (Avatar is radioactive) Ultimately, I think your frustration comes from your personal desire to understand why something like Bladerunner gets held up, I admire that curiosity, we need more of it on the filmjunk boards.

I don’t personally have any gold standards for good science fiction although it might not seem that way. I just often parrot what other people whom I respect have said about good science fiction.

rus, you’ve more than once quoted Lucas’s statement about film being binary, but I think it’s a surface level statement that simplifies the decision-making process that goes into a thumbs-up or thumbs-down verdict. I’m guessing both you and Lucas realize this.

I wouldn’t think that you would be the type of person to endorse a “magical, unknowable quality” since your comments reflect that you are a rational person (even though I don’t always agree with your rationalizations and vice versa). If you’re waxing poetic by alluding to the magic of movies to transport us, then that’s fine.

I hate it when people think other people’s preferences are wrong. When they say a certain movie should have been nominated for an Oscar and not such and such a movie. Let me make this clear. I don’t hate opinions. I hate opinions about other people’s opinions. Even though I often hate other people’s opinions. Ha ha.

I think why I parrot the Lucas quote is because it is fun, and nerdy, about a very artistic and unknowable thing. It speaks to that something that a film might have that can’t be quantified after breaking down ever aspect of the film. Even though I write like a very rational person I understand film is the most complex of artforms. No other artform combines so many mediums PLUS has to deal with constantly changing social psyche.

I learned this from working on film, Jay could explain it to you directly, when editing a scene you can change the total feel, direction of that scene by changing either the color, cut, sound, score, etc. by the smallest of factors. When you take that over an entire film, and then add the fact the film is appearing in a time and place were the general populations attitudes can change about you, your actor, your subject….this is were the Lucas quote comes in, there are just to many variables to completly take in to account that sometimes it comes down to something unknowable.

I’ve express this in my anaylsis of Avatar and belief that Cameron is working from a different mindset than any other director. “The master showman aspect” It helps me understand how one man has garnered the top two moneymaking films of all time. I understand the unknowable now – that his conception of an idea is wrapped up in “giving the world what it didn’t know it wanted”.

I recently watched The Hangover and was very unimpressed. I think that is a film that hit the market at the right time when the general public needed to laugh. Again, binary, on/off, who could have predicted it’s huge appeal. Would it have done that business if the economy was better, if Will Ferrell was in it, if another strong comedy was next door? Its unknowable, so we parrot Lucas to explain it away.

***Same with Moon.
Once you put crazy action scenes in those movies you miss the tons of little things that are going on in each and every shot and all you do then is focus on the ..EXPLOSION.

Get off our back j. yes we are perverts, we like Dull sci-fi movies.***

What’s that got to do with it? As soon as someone dislikes a movie like that, you bring out the whole ”expected” or ”appreciation” shit. I love Blade Runner myself (it’s actually my favourite Sci-Fi film), but I know many who don’t, and I can really understand why. Blade Runner is one of those movies I really can understand why people dislike. They find it boring, but not because it doesn’t have explosions or whatever you would like calling it. They find it boring simply because they are not interested. And the movies story is in some cases based on our subjective meanings. There is for example a seen near the wind, when Rutgers character holds a white pigeon in his hand, and he releases it with a slow motion, and it is one of the most superficial and stupid things ever (mostly because it’s a shame to see something like that in such a great movie).
The thing about Moon is different with me. I didn’t like that movie as much as you guys did. I think I gave it a 6 or 5/10. Except for GERTY and the first 15 min, the movie was really dull, unoriginal and so predictable. Like for eks. how many times haven’t we seen the corporal thing before? And what new did Moon bring to the table with it? The ending was the only unpredictable thing. I predicted an unoriginal ending like the rest of the movie was, but instead in ends in a much worse way. He goes home and…well…NOTHING REALLY HAPPENS.