Science fiction film

Science fiction film is a film genre that uses science fiction: speculative, science-based depictions of phenomena that are not necessarily accepted by mainstream science, such as extraterrestrial life forms, alien worlds, extrasensory perception, and time travel, often along with futuristic elements such as spacecraft, robots, or other technologies. Science fiction films have often been used to focus on political or social issues, and to explore philosophical issues like the human condition. In many cases, tropes derived from written science fiction may be used by filmmakers ignorant of or at best indifferent to the standards of scientific plausibility and plot logic to which written science fiction is traditionally held.^[1]

The genre has existed since the early years of silent cinema, when Georges Melies' A Trip to the Moon (1902) amazed audiences with its trick photography effects. The next major example in the genre was the 1927 film Metropolis. From the 1930s to the 1950s, the genre consisted mainly of low-budget B-movies. After Stanley Kubrick's 1968 landmark 2001: A Space Odyssey, the science fiction film genre was taken more seriously. In the late 1970s, big-budget science fiction films filled with special effects became popular with audiences after the success of Star Wars and paved the way for the blockbuster hits of subsequent decades.

Definition

Defining precisely which films belong to the science fiction genre is often difficult, as there is no universally accepted definition of the genre, or in fact its underlying genre in literature. According to one definition:

Science fiction film is a film genre which emphasizes actual, extrapolative, or speculative science and the empirical method, interacting in a social context with the lesser emphasized, but still present, transcendentalism of magic and religion, in an attempt to reconcile man with the unknown (Sobchack 63).

This definition assumes that a continuum exists between (real-world) empiricism and (supernatural) transcendentalism, with science fiction film on the side of empiricism, and horror film and fantasy film on the side of transcendentalism. However, there are numerous well-known examples of science fiction horror films, epitomized by such pictures as Frankenstein and Alien.

The visual style of science fiction film can be characterized by a clash between alien and familiar images. This clash is implemented when alien images become familiar, as in A Clockwork Orange, when the repetitions of the Korova Milkbar make the alien decor seem more familiar.^[2] As well, familiar images become alien, as in the films Repo Man and Liquid Sky.^[3] For example, in Dr. Strangelove, the distortion of the humans make the familiar images seem more alien.^[4] Finally, alien and familiar images are juxtaposed, as in The Deadly Mantis, when a giant praying mantis is shown climbing the Washington Monument.

Cultural theorist Scott Bukatman has proposed that science fiction film allows contemporary culture to witness an expression of the sublime, be it through exaggerated scale, apocalypse or transcendence.

History

Main article: History of science fiction films

1900–1920s

See also: List of science fiction films: Pre 1920 and List of science fiction films: 1920s

Science fiction films appeared early in the silent film era, typically as short films shot in black and white, sometimes with colour tinting. They usually had a technological theme and were often intended to be humorous. In 1902, Georges Méliès released Le Voyage dans la Lune, generally considered the first science fiction film,^[5] and a film that used early trick photography to depict a spacecraft's journey to the moon. Several early films merged the science fiction and horror genres. Examples of this are Frankenstein (1910), a film adaptation of Mary Shelley's novel, and Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (1920), based on the psychological tale by Robert Lewis Stevenson. Taking a more adventurous tack, 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea (1916) is a film based on Jules Verne’s famous novel of a wondrous submarine and its vengeful captain. In the 1920s, European filmmakers tended to use science fiction for prediction and social commentary, as can be seen in German films such as Metropolis (1927) and Frau im Mond (1929). Other notable science fiction films of the silent era include The Impossible Voyage (1904), The Motorist (1906), Conquest of the Pole (1912), Himmelskibet (1918), The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari (1919), L'Huomo Meccanico (1921), Paris Qui Dort (1923), Aelita (1924), Luch Smerti (1925) The Lost World (1925).

1930s–1950s

See also: List of science fiction films: 1930s, List of science fiction films: 1940s, and List of science fiction films: 1950s

In the 1930s there were several big budget science fiction films, notably Just Imagine (1930), the first science fiction musical, King Kong (1933), Things to Come (1936) and Lost Horizon (1937). Starting in 1936, a number of science fiction comic strips were adapted as serials, notably Flash Gordon and Buck Rogers, both starring Buster Crabbe. These serials, and the comic strips they were based on, were very popular with the general public. Other notable science fiction films of the 1930s include Frankenstein (1931), The Bride of Frankenstein (1935), Doctor X (1932), Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (1931), F.P.1 (1932), Island of Lost Souls (1932), Deluge (1933), The Invisible Man (1933), Mad Love (1935), Trans-Atlantic Tunnel (1935), The Devil-Doll (1936), The Invisible Ray (1936), The Man Who Changed His Mind (1936), The Walking Dead (1936), Non-Stop New York (1937), and The Return of Doctor X (1939). The 1940s brought us Before I Hang (1940), Black Friday (1940), Dr. Cyclops (1940), The Devil Commands (1941), Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (1941), Man Made Monster (1941),It Happened Tomorrow (1944), It Happens Every Spring (1949), and The Perfect Woman (1949). The release of Destination Moon (1950) and Rocketship X-M (1950) brought us to what many people consider "the golden age of the science fiction film."

In the 1950s public interest in space travel and new technologies was great. While many 1950s science fiction films were low-budget B movies, there were several successful films with larger budgets and impressive special effects. These include The Day the Earth Stood Still (1951), The Thing from Another World (1951), When Worlds Collide (1951), The War of the Worlds (1952), 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea (1954), This Island Earth (1955), Forbidden Planet (1956), Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956), The Curse of Frankenstein (1957), Journey to the Center of the Earth (1959) and On the Beach (1959). There is often a close connection between films in the science fiction genre and the so called "monster movie." Examples of this are Them! (1954), The Beast From 20,000 Fathoms (1953), and The Blob (1958). During the 1950s, Ray Harryhausen, protege of master King Kong animator Willis O'Brien, used stop-motion animation to create special effects for the following notable science fiction films: It Came from Beneath the Sea (1955), Earth vs. the Flying Saucers (1956) and 20 Million Miles to Earth (1957).

1960s

See also: List of science fiction films: 1960s

There were relatively few science fiction films in the 1960s, but some of the films transformed science fiction cinema. Stanley Kubrick’s 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968) brought new realism to the genre, with its groundbreaking visual effects and realistic portrayal of space travel and influenced the genre with its epic story and transcendent philosophical scope. Other 1960s films included Planet of the Apes (1968) and Fahrenheit 451 (1966), which provided social commentary, and the campy Barbarella (1968), which explored the sillier side of earlier science fiction. Jean-Luc Godard's French "new wave" film Alphaville (1965) posited a futuristic Paris commanded by an artificial intelligence which has outlawed all emotion.

Another influential science fiction film of the 1960s, though it was never produced, was Satyajit Ray's The Alien, a story about a boy in Bengal befriending an alien. After production of the film was cancelled, the script became available throughout America in mimeographed copies.^[6]

1970s–1980s

See also: List of science fiction films: 1970s and List of science fiction films: 1980s

The era of manned trips to the moon in 1969 and the 1970s saw a resurgence of interest in the science fiction film. Andrei Tarkovsky’s slow-paced Solaris (1972) had visuals and a philosophic scope reminiscent of 2001: A Space Odyssey. Science fiction films from the early 1970s explored the theme of paranoia, in which humanity is depicted as under threat from ecological or technological adversaries of its own creation, such as Silent Running (ecology), Westworld (man vs. robot), THX 1138 (man vs. the state), and Stanley Kubrick's A Clockwork Orange (threat of brainwashing). Conspiracy thriller films of the 1970s included Soylent Green and Futureworld. The science fiction comedies of the 1970s included Woody Allen's Sleeper and John Carpenter's Dark Star.

Star Wars (1977) and Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1978), were box-office hits that brought about a huge increase in science fiction films. In 1979, Star Trek: The Motion Picture brought the television series to the big screen for the first time. It was also in this period that The Walt Disney Company released many science fiction films for family audiences such as The Island at the Top of the World, Escape to Witch Mountain, The Black Hole, Flight of the Navigator, and Honey, I Shrunk The Kids. Ridley Scott's films, such as Alien and Blade Runner, along with James Cameron's The Terminator, presented the future as dark, dirty and chaotic, and depicted aliens and androids as hostile and dangerous. In contrast, Steven Spielberg's E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial, one of the most successful films of the 1980s, presented aliens as benign and friendly.

The big budget adaptations of Frank Herbert's Dune, Alex Raymond's Flash Gordon and Arthur C. Clarke's sequel to 2001, 2010, were box office duds that dissuaded producers from investing in science fiction literary properties. Disney's Tron turned out to be a moderate success. The strongest contributors to the genre during the second half of the 1980s were James Cameron and Paul Verhoeven with The Terminator and RoboCop entries. Robert Zemeckis' 1985 film Back to the Future and its sequels were critically praised and became box office successes, not to mention international phenomena. James Cameron's 1986 sequel to Alien, Aliens, was very different from the original film, falling more into the action/science fiction genre, it was both a critical and commercial success and Sigourney Weaver was nominated for Best Actress in a Leading Role at the Academy Awards. The Japanese anime film Akira (1988) also had a big influence outside Japan when released.

1990s–2000s

See also: List of science fiction films: 1990s and List of science fiction films: 2000s

In the 1990s, the emergence of the world wide web and the cyberpunk genre spawned several movies on the theme of the computer-human interface, such as Total Recall (1990), The Lawnmower Man (1992), and The Matrix (1999). Other themes included disaster films (e.g., Armageddon and Deep Impact both from 1998), alien invasion (e.g., Independence Day from 1996) and genetic experimentation (e.g., Jurassic Park from 1993 and Gattaca from 1997).

As the decade progressed, computers played an increasingly important role in both the addition of special effects (thanks to Terminator 2:Judgment Day, and Jurassic Park) and the production of films. As software developed in sophistication it was used to produce more complicated effects. It also enabled filmmakers to enhance the visual quality of animation, resulting in films such as Ghost in the Shell (1995) from Japan, and The Iron Giant (1999) from the US.

During the first decade of the 2000s, superhero films abounded, as did earthbound science fiction such as the Matrix trilogy. In 2005, the Star Wars saga was completed with the darkly themed Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith. Science-fiction also returned as a tool for political commentary in films such as A.I. Artificial Intelligence, Minority Report, Sunshine, District 9, Children of Men, Serenity and Pandorum.

Themes, imagery, and visual elements

Science fiction films are often speculative in nature, and often include key supporting elements of science and technology. However, as often as not the "science" in a Hollywood science fiction movie can be considered pseudo-science, relying primarily on atmosphere and quasi-scientific artistic fancy than facts and conventional scientific theory. The definition can also vary depending on the viewpoint of the observer.^{[citation needed]}

Many science fiction films include elements of mysticism, occult, magic, or the supernatural, considered by some to be more properly elements of fantasy or the occult (or religious) film.^{[citation needed]} This transforms the movie genre into a science fantasy with a religious or quasi-religious philosophy serving as the driving motivation. The movie Forbidden Planet employs many common science fiction elements, but the film carries a profound message - that the evolution of a species toward technological perfection (in this case exemplified by the disappeared alien civilization called the "Krell") does not ensure the loss of primitive and dangerous urges.^{[citation needed]} In the film this part of the primitive mind manifests itself as monstrous destructive force emanating from the freudian subconscious, or "Id".

Some films blur the line between the genres, such as films where the protagonist gains the extraordinary powers of the superhero. These films usually employ a quasi-plausible reason for the hero gaining these powers.^{[citation needed]}

Not all science fiction themes are equally suitable for movies. In addition to science fiction horror, space opera is most common.^{[citation needed]} Often enough, these films could just as well pass as westerns or World War II films if the science fiction props were removed.^{[citation needed]} Common motifs also include voyages and expeditions to other planets, and dystopias, while utopias are rare.^{[citation needed]}

Imagery

Film theorist Vivian Sobchack argues that science fiction films differ from fantasy films in that while science fiction film seeks to achieve our belief in the images we are viewing, fantasy film instead attempts to suspend our disbelief. The science fiction film displays the unfamiliar and alien in the context of the familiar. Despite the alien nature of the scenes and science fictional elements of the setting, the imagery of the film is related back to mankind and how we relate to our surroundings. While the sf film strives to push the boundaries of the human experience, they remain bound to the conditions and understanding of the audience and thereby contain prosaic aspects, rather than being completely alien or abstract.^{[citation needed]}

Genre films such as westerns or war movies are bound to a particular area or time period. This is not true of the science fiction film. However there are several common visual elements that are evocative of the genre. These include the spacecraft or space station, alien worlds or creatures, robots, and futuristic gadgets. More subtle visual clues can appear with changes of the human form through modifications in appearance, size, or behavior, or by means a known environment turned eerily alien, such as an empty city.^{[citation needed]}

Scientific elements

Peter Sellers as the title character from Dr. Strangelove

While science is a major element of this genre, many movie studios take significant liberties with scientific knowledge. Such liberties can be most readily observed in films that show spacecraft maneuvering in outer space. The vacuum should preclude the transmission of sound or maneuvers employing wings, yet the sound track is filled with inappropriate flying noises and changes in flight path resembling an aircraft banking. The film makers, unfamiliar with the specifics of space travel, focus instead on providing acoustical atmosphere and the more familiar maneuvers of the aircraft.

Similar instances of ignoring science in favor of art can be seen when movies present environmental effects. Entire planets are destroyed in titanic explosions requiring mere seconds, whereas an actual event of this nature would likely take many hours.

The role of the scientist has varied considerably in the science fiction film genre, depending on the public perception of science and advanced technology.^{[citation needed]} Starting with Dr. Frankenstein, the mad scientist became a stock character who posed a dire threat to society and perhaps even civilization. Certain portrayals of the "mad scientist", such as Peter Sellers's performance in Dr. Strangelove, have become iconic to the genre.^{[citation needed]} In the monster films of the 1950s, the scientist often played a heroic role as the only person who could provide a technological fix for some impending doom. Reflecting the distrust of government that began in the 1960s in the U.S., the brilliant but rebellious scientist became a common theme, often serving a Cassandra-like role during an impending disaster.

Alien life forms

Main article: Extraterrestrial life in popular culture

The concept of life, particularly intelligent life, having an extraterrestrial origin is a popular staple of science fiction films. Early films often used alien life forms as a threat or peril to the human race, where the invaders were frequently fictional representations of actual military or political threats on Earth. Later some aliens were represented as benign and even beneficial in nature in such films as Escape to Witch Mountain, E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial, and Close Encounters.

In order to provide subject matter to which audiences can relate, the large majority of intelligent alien races presented in films have an anthropomorphic nature, possessing human emotions and motivations. In films like Contact, The Box and The Day the Earth Stood Still, the aliens were nearly human in physical appearance, and communicated in a common earth tongue. A few films have tried to represent intelligent aliens as something utterly different from the usual humanoid shape (e.g. An intelligent life form surrounding an entire planet in Solaris, the ball shaped creature in Dark Star).

Disaster films

Main article: Disaster film

A frequent theme among science fiction films is that of impending or actual disaster on an epic scale. These often address a particular concern of the writer by serving as a vehicle of warning against a type of activity, including technological research. In the case of alien invasion films, the creatures can provide as a stand-in for a feared foreign power.

Disaster films typically fall into the following general categories:^{[citation needed]}

• Alien invasion — hostile extraterrestrials arrive and seek to supplant humanity. They are either overwhelmingly powerful or very insidious. Typical examples include The War of the Worlds (1953 film) and Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956 film).
• Environmental disaster — such as major climate change, or an asteroid or comet strike. Movies that have employed this theme include Soylent Green (1973) and Waterworld (1995).
• Man supplanted by technology — typically in the form of an all-powerful computer, advanced robots or cyborgs, or else genetically-modified humans or animals. Among the films in this category are The Terminator (1984) and The Matrix (1999).
• Nuclear war — usually in the form of a dystopic, post-holocaust tale of grim survival. Examples of such a storyline can be found in the movies Dr. Strangelove (1964), Planet of the Apes (1968), A Boy and His Dog (1975) and Mad Max (1979).
• Pandemic — a highly lethal disease, often one created by man, threatens or wipes out most of humanity in a massive plague. This topic has been treated in such films as The Andromeda Strain (1971), The Omega Man (1971), and 12 Monkeys (1995).

Monster films

Main article: Monster movie

While monster films do not usually depict danger on a global or epic scale, science fiction film also has a long tradition of movies featuring monster attacks. These differ from similar films in the horror or fantasy genres because science fiction films typically rely on a scientific (or at least pseudo-scientific) rationale for the monster's existence, rather than a supernatural or magical reason. Often, the science fiction film monster is created, awakened, or "evolves" because of the machinations of a mad scientist, a nuclear accident, or a scientific experiment gone awry. Typical examples include The Beast from 20,000 Fathoms (1953), Cloverfield and the Godzilla series of films.

Mind and identity

The core mental aspects of what makes us human has been a staple of science fiction films, particularly since the 1980s. Blade Runner examined what made an organic-creation a human, while the RoboCop series saw an android mechanism fitted with the brain and reprogrammed mind of a human to create a cyborg. The idea of brain transfer was not entirely new to science fiction film, as the concept of the "mad scientist" transferring the human mind to another body is as old as Frankenstein.

Films such as Total Recall have popularized a thread of films that explore the concept of reprogramming the human mind. The theme of brainwashing in several films of the sixties and seventies including A Clockwork Orange and The Manchurian Candidate coincided with secret real-life government experimentation during Project MKULTRA. Voluntary erasure of memory is further explored as themes of the films Paycheck and Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. The anime series Serial Experiments Lain also explores the idea of reprogrammable reality and memory.

The idea that a human could be entirely represented as a program in a computer was a core element of the film Tron. This would be further explored in the film version of The Lawnmower Man, and the idea reversed in Virtuosity as computer programs sought to become real persons. In the Matrix series, the virtual reality world became a real world prison for humanity, managed by intelligent machines. In eXistenZ, the nature of reality and virtual reality become intermixed with no clear distinguishing boundary.

Robots

Robots have been a part of science fiction since the Czech playwright Karel Čapek coined the word in 1921. In early films, robots were usually played by a human actor in a boxy metal suit, as in The Phantom Empire, although the female robot in Metropolis is an exception. The first depiction of a sophisticated robot in a United States film was in The Day the Earth Stood Still.

Robots in films are often sentient and sometimes sentimental, and they have filled a range of roles in science fiction films. Robots have been supporting characters, such as Robby the Robot in Forbidden Planet, sidekicks (e.g., C-3PO and R2-D2 from Star Wars), and extras, visible in the background to create a futuristic setting. As well, robots have been formidable movie villains or monsters (e.g., the robot Box in the 1976 film Logan's Run. In some cases, robots have even been the leading characters in science fiction films; in the 1982 film Blade Runner, many of the characters are bioengineered android "replicants".

Films like Bicentennial Man and A.I. Artificial Intelligence depicted the emotional fallouts of robots that are self aware.

One popular theme in science fiction film is whether robots will someday replace humans, a question raised in the film adaptation of Isaac Asimov's I, Robot, or whether intelligent robots could develop a conscience and a motivation to take over or destroy the human race (as depicted in The Terminator).

Time travel

Main article: Time travel in fiction

The concept of time travel—travelling backwards and forwards through time—has always been a popular staple of science fiction film and science fiction television series. Time travel usually involves the use of some type of advanced technology, such as H. G. Wells' classic The Time Machine, or the commercially successful 1980s-era Back to the Future trilogy. Other movies, such as the Planet of the Apes series, explained their depictions of time travel by drawing on physics concepts such as the Special relativity phenomenon of time dilation (which could occur if a spaceship was travelling near the speed of light). Some films show time travel not being attained from advanced technology, but rather from an inner source or personal power, such as the 2000s-era films Donnie Darko and The Butterfly Effect.

More conventional time travel movies use technology to bring the past to life in the present, or in a present that lies in our future. The film Iceman (1984) told the story of the reanimation of a frozen Neanderthal. The film Freejack (1992) shows time travel used to pull victims of horrible deaths forward in time a split-second before their demise, and then use their bodies for spare parts.

A common theme in time travel film is the paradoxical nature of travelling through time. In the French New Wave film La jetée (1962), director Chris Marker depicts the self-fulfilling aspect of a person being able to see their future by showing a child who witnesses the death of his future self. La Jetée was the inspiration for 12 Monkeys, (1995) director Terry Gilliam's film about time travel, memory, and madness. The Back to the Future series goes one step further and explores the result of altering the past, while in Star Trek: First Contact (1996) the crew must rescue the Earth from having its past altered by time-travelling cyborgs.

Genre as commentary on social issues

The science fiction film genre has long served as a useful vehicle for "safely" discussing controversial topical issues and often providing thoughtful social commentary on potential unforeseen future issues. Presentation of issues that are difficult or disturbing for an audience, can be made more acceptable when they are explored in a future setting or on a different, earth-like world. The altered context can allow for deeper examination and reflection of the ideas presented, with the perspective of a viewer watching remote events. Most controversial issues in science fiction films tend to fall into two general story lines, Utopian or dystopian. Either a society will become better or worse in the future. Because of controversy, most science fiction films will fall into the dystopian film category rather than the Utopian category.

The types of commentary and controversy presented in science fiction films often illustrate the particular concerns of the periods in which they were produced. Early science fiction films expressed fears about automation replacing workers and the dehumanization of society through science and technology. For example, 1951's The Man in the White Suit used a science fiction concept as a means to satirize postwar British "establishment" conservatism, industrial capitalists, and trade unions. Later films explored the fears of environmental catastrophe or technology-created disasters, and how they would impact society and individuals (i.e. Soylent Green).

The monster movies of the 1950s—like Godzilla (1954)—served as stand-ins for fears of nuclear war, communism and views on the cold war.^{[citation needed]} In the 1970s, science fiction films also became an effective way of satirizing contemporary social mores with Silent Running and Dark Star presenting hippies in space as a riposte to the militaristic types that had dominated earlier films.^{[citation needed]} Stanley Kubrick's A Clockwork Orange presented a horrific vision of youth culture, portraying a youth gang engaged in rape and murder, along with disturbing scenes of forced psychological conditioning serving to comment on societal responses to crime.

Logan's Run depicted a futuristic swingers utopia that practiced euthanasia as a form of population control and The Stepford Wives anticipated a reaction to the women's liberation movement. Enemy Mine demonstrated that the foes we have come to hate are often just like us, even if they appear alien.

Contemporary science fiction films continue to explore social and political issues. One recent example would be 2002's Minority Report, debuting in the months after the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001 and focused on the issues of police powers, privacy and civil liberties in the near-future United States. Some like Never Let Me Go explore the issues surrounding cloning.

More recently, the headlines surrounding events such as the Iraq War, international terrorism, the avian influenza scare, and U.S. anti-immigration laws have found their way into the consciousness of contemporary filmmakers. The 2006 film V for Vendetta drew inspiration from controversial issues such as The Patriot Act and the War on Terror, while science fiction thrillers such as Children of Men (also 2006) and District 9 (2009) commented on diverse social issues such as xenophobia, propaganda, and cognitive dissonance. Avatar (2009) had remarkable resemblance to colonialism of native land, mining by multinational-corporations and the Iraq War.

Future Noir

Lancaster University professor Jamaluddin Bin Aziz argues that as science fiction has evolved and expanded, it has fused with other film genres such as gothic thrillers and film noir. When science fiction integrates film noir elements, Bin Aziz calls the resulting hybrid form "future noir," a form which "... encapsulates a postmodern encounter with generic persistence, creating a mixture of irony, pessimism, prediction, extrapolation, bleakness and nostalgia." Future noir films such as Blade Runner, Twelve Monkeys, Dark City, and Children of Men use a protagonist who is "...increasingly dubious, alienated and fragmented", at once "dark and playful like the characters in Gibson’s Neuromancer", yet still with the "...shadow of Philip Marlowe..."

Future noir films that are set in a post-apocalyptic world "...restructure and re-represent society in a parody of the atmospheric world usually found in noir’s construction of a city — dark, bleak and beguiled." Future noir films often intermingle elements of the gothic thriller genre, such as Minority Report, which makes references to occult practices, and Alien, with its tagline ‘In space, no one can hear you scream’, and a space vessel, Nostromo, “that hark[s] back to images of the haunted house in the gothic horror tradition.” Bin Aziz states that films such as James Cameron’s The Terminator are a sub-genre of ‘techno noir’ that create "...an atmospheric feast of noir darkness and a double-edged world that is not what it seems."^[7]

Film versus literature

When compared to science fiction literature, science fiction films often rely less on the human imagination and more upon action scenes and special effect-created alien creatures and exotic backgrounds. Since the 1970s, film audiences have come to expect a high standard for special effects in science fiction films. In some cases, science fiction-themed films superimpose an exotic, futuristic setting onto what would not otherwise be a science-fiction tale. Nevertheless, some critically acclaimed science fiction movies have followed in the path of science fiction literature, using story development to explore abstract concepts.

Influence of science fiction authors

Jules Verne was the first major science fiction author to be adapted for the screen with Melies Le Voyage dans la Lune (1902) and 20,000 lieues sous les mers (1907), which used Verne's scenarios as a framework for fantastic visuals. By the time Verne's work fell out of copyright in 1950 the adaptations were treated as period pieces. His works have been adapted a number of times since then, including 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea in 1954, From the Earth to the Moon in 1958, and Journey to the Center of the Earth in 1959.

2001: A Space Odyssey, the landmark 1968 collaboration between filmmaker Stanley Kubrick and classic science fiction author Arthur C. Clarke featured groundbreaking special effects, such as the realization of the space ship Discovery One (pictured here)

H. G. Wells novels The Invisible Man, Things to Come and The Island of Doctor Moreau were all adapted into films during his lifetime while The War of the Worlds was updated in 1953 and again in 2005, adapted to film at least four times altogether. The Time Machine has had two film versions (1961 and 2002) while Sleeper in part is a pastiche of Wells' 1910 novel The Sleeper Awakes.

With the drop-off in interest in science fiction films during the 1940s, few of the 'golden age' science fiction authors made it to the screen. A novella by John W. Campbell provided the basis for The Thing from Another World (1951). Robert A. Heinlein contributed to the screenplay for Destination Moon in 1950, but none of his major works were adapted for the screen until the 1990s: The Puppet Masters in 1994 and Starship Troopers in 1997. Isaac Asimov's fiction influenced the Star Wars and Star Trek films, but it was not until 1988 that a film version of one of his short stories (Nightfall) was produced. The first major motion picture adaptation of a full-length Asimov work was Bicentennial Man (1999) (based on the short stories "Bicentennial Man" and "The Positronic Man", the latter co-written with Robert Silverberg), although 2004's I, Robot, a film loosely based on Asimov's book of short stories by the same name, drew more attention.

The adaptation of science fiction author Arthur C. Clarke's novel as 2001: A Space Odyssey won the Academy Award for Visual Effects and offered thematic complexity not typically associated with the science fiction genre at the time. Its sequel, 2010, was commercially successful but less highly regarded by critics. Reflecting the times, two earlier science fiction works by Ray Bradbury were adapted for cinema in the 1960s with Fahrenheit 451 and The Illustrated Man. Kurt Vonnegut's Slaughterhouse-Five was filmed in 1971 and Breakfast of Champions in 1998.

Philip K. Dick's fiction has been used in a number of science fiction films, in part because it evokes the paranoia that has been a central feature of the genre. Films based on Dick's works include Blade Runner (1982), Total Recall (1990), Impostor (2001), Minority Report (2002), Paycheck (2003), and A Scanner Darkly (2006). These films are loose adaptations of the original story, with the exception of A Scanner Darkly, which is close to Dick's book.

See also

Science fiction (novels and short stories) List of science fiction films List of dystopian films List of films set in the future Science fiction on television Genres, subcategories and related topics to science fiction

Hugo Award for Best Dramatic Presentation, Long Form Saturn Award for Best Science Fiction Film

References

1. ^ http://www.filmsite.org/sci-fifilms.html
2. ^ Sobchack, Vivian Carol (1997). Screening space: the American science fiction film. Rutgers University Press. p. 106. ISBN 081352492X. 
3. ^ Perrine, Toni A. (1998). Film and the nuclear age: representing cultural anxiety. Taylor & Francis. pp. 31–32. ISBN 0815329326. 
4. ^ Sobchack (1997:170–174).
5. ^ Creed, Barbara (2009). Darwin's Screens: Evolutionary Aesthetics, Time and Sexual Display in the Cinema. Carlton, Victoria: Melbourne University Publishing. p. 58. ISBN 978-0-52285-258-5. 
6. ^ Newman J (17 September 2001). "Satyajit Ray Collection receives Packard grant and lecture endowment". UC Santa Cruz Currents online. http://www.ucsc.edu/currents/01-02/09-17/ray.html. Retrieved 29 April 2006. 
7. ^ Bin Aziz, Jamaluddin (Summer 2005). "Future Noir". Summer Special: Postmodern and Future Noir. Crimeculture.com. http://www.crimeculture.com/Contents/Articles-Summer05/JemAziz1.html. Retrieved 17 November 2008. 

Further reading

• Welch Everman, Cult Science Fiction Films, Citadel Press, 1995, ISBN 0-8065-1602-X.
• Peter Guttmacher, Legendary Sci-Fi Movies, 1997, ISBN 1-56799-490-3.
• Phil Hardy, The Overlook Film Encyclopedia, Science Fiction. William Morrow and Company, New York, 1995, ISBN 0-87951-626-7.
• Richard S. Myers, S-F 2: A pictorial history of science fiction from 1975 to the present, 1984, Citadel Press, ISBN 0-8065-0875-2.
• Gregg Rickman, The Science Fiction Film Reader, 2004, ISBN 0-87910-994-7.
• Dave Saunders, Arnold: Schwarzenegger and the Movies, 2009, London, I. B. Tauris
• Errol Vieth, Screening Science: Context, Text and Science in Fifties Science Fiction Film, Lanham, MD and London: Scarecrow Press, 2001. ISBN 0-8108-4023-5

External links

• The Encyclopedia of Fantastic Film and Television — horror, science fiction, fantasy and animation
• The Greatest Films: Science Fiction Films