What is your favourite sci-fi film that is on/has been on the big screen ?


There is one more thing i would like to talk about, Harry Potter3, because i think they spoiled it by putting to much together in one film. But what do you think about both things?

WTF? This isn't a poll!?

*universe implodes*

I'm sure there are many, many other threads in which favourite films are being discussed. How about trying to search for a few? I just did, and it look me literally 6.24 seconds to find this thread. I also, bizarrely, stumbled across one of the threads that contributed to DHG getting banned. *tear*

I've edited the topic title to reflect more closely the choices made by LT and to put a new spin on the old 'what's the best film' thread. As LB says, 'best films' have been covered quite often and relatively recently, so I thought maybe a genre topic would be interesting.

If we're going for sci-fi, I'd probably rate Blade Runner: the director's cut as easily among the best, partly because I think it's a great film that is daring enough to give the audience enough credit to work out the meaning of things, but also because it was part of a the cyberpunk movement that changed all science-fiction since its time. That said, I can also see how people find it incredibly tedious, I just happen to not agree with them!

On a similar line, Metropolis by Fritz Lang is still an enjoyable movie seventy years later and remains an important film to see if you want to appreciate modern society's concerns about the development of new technology. It really plays on the classic fears of science that were probably best expressed initially in Mary Shelley's book Frankenstein. If there was a good version of that in film then that would also probably be on the list, but in the retelling they've all lost their spark

Well i have to say Serenity ...(Snuggs would beat me up if i didnt).

Seriously though:-

Blade Runner
Babylon 5, any movie ....mad about B5.
When the Earth stood still.

Well, is it sci-fi if it's set a long time ago in a galaxy far far away?

Er, Twelve Monkeys... Monkey, Mon-KEY! Hehe!
(Ah, Brucie, gives hope to all us baldies that we can still be action heroes!)

Oo, that is a good one. Mon... Key...

I guess the Alien films should be in the list. Alien was among the first (if not the very first) film to show space travellers as being dirty and bored. It really laid the ground for a lot of sci-fi to come.

Think Silent Running set the first bored in space scene, only it's the human that goes on a killing spree and not an alien.

Bored and Dirty space travellers? You'd be looking for John Carpenter's Dark Star. I think its been mentioned on here before. Someone said it was one of the worst films they'd ever seen, or something silly like that. Its not. Its the best.

Being that no one's mentioned any Star Trek movies...I'm gonna have to say First Contact is possibly amoung my favourites, set in the next generation timeline at least. From the Orginal Series cast, I think possibly the Voyage Home or the Wrath of Kahn...the Motion Picture was pretty good too.

Other than that.......does Space Balls count?

No and we should kick you in yours for mentioning it!!!

Ohh and leave my naughty bits out of movies ...*smut for the adults*

Serenity, of course. See it on DVD or video if you missed it in theaters. It's the closest I've ever come to either crying or standing on my seat cheering. Given that I'm normally fairly deadpan when I'm watching movies, that's an event.
I'm sorry, but Star Trek: The Motion Picture was so dumb that I almost cried. I like a lot of the Trek universe, but I didn't like that. I do agree that the others you mentioned were good, though.
Independence Day was fairly campy, but I had fun with it anyway. Lots of explosions and lasers automatically made it better than every romantic comedy I have ever been forced to watch.
Spaceballs was indeed funny, but not for young children. I think my parents were a bit shocked when I saw it at fourteen and understood (and laughed at) the dirty jokes.
I can't believe that no one's (directly) mentioned Star Wars yet. (Yes, I saw the allusion.) I admit that the first two in the newer trilogy sucked so much that it was pathetic, but the original trilogy and the newest movie were quite good. (Barring some of the more annoying mushy/touching dialogue, of course.)
My loose definition of sci-fi- anything with aliens, spaceships, or both that is not based on a true story. So Apollo 13 never really counted for me.

Thing is with a sci fi thread is you can get bogged down in generic crap like Star Wars and Star Trek movies.

Yes Star Wars the first 3 are great, but the new releases makes me want to stuff a six pack and the bonus DVD's up Mr Lucas's fat arse (F**k sake what was the man thinking other than $$$. Don't give me that bullshit of *ohh story line*, his idea of the world.... His idea of the world was $$$ *hear the cash register sound right now*

Star Trek ...know what i loved Star Trek ...know what pisses me off though ...almost no space battles, cheap bastards. Ohhh sure they fight alot, and you see the bridge staff give orders ...but damnit i want to see shit blow up. *been a massive hernia for years that vent*..(if you pm i'm go for the full out vent. *swearing will be included in every other word ...you have been warned*).

So we have to go by good sci fi movies, like The forbidden planet, (both verisons). Also alot of the 50's movies have not been mentioned, they are outstanding in there field as with out them we would not have the good sci fi we do now.

Anyway, if you want class sci fi, go for Babylon 5. That series is amazing (yes ended, and yes my ex did steal my limited edition B5 tee-shirt *only 100 ever made, and only like 10 in the UK*...cow). But that is a space opera. Anyway time for me to stop here as Mata will be telling me to stop swearing ...ect

The thought had barely crossed my mind...

I do love B movies from the 1950s, they give a real taste of paranoia, but I think the king of them really has to be Invasion of the Body Snatchers. Every version of that is just brilliant in its own way, from the fifties denial of the apocalypse to the 80s embrace of the end of humanity. Truly classic stuff. I bet that's one of those stories that continues to be remade time and again. In essence it's just a sci-fi spin on fairies abducting children and leaving doppelganers in their place, but maybe it's that cultural resonance that makes it so involving. I think we always fear the familiar-but-strange the most.

Dark City It's just fab, made me think about 'reality'. I like the way it's all set at night. The colours, and the retro feel. I like retro feels, like in Batman films.

But the sci fi I can watch again and again is Sci-Fi Channels three parter of Dune. I can't really put my finger on what it is about Dune that makes it so watchable for me. It just kinda is.

Edit: I don't think Dune was released at the cinema actualy.

Fifth Element- My favorite movie of all time.

Cube- Cult classic, and very interesting.

Pi- Low budget, and it messes with your mind something fierce.

The Matrix- Only the original though.

Donnie Darko- This movie will have you confused and arguing with your friends about what really happened. It's great.

The Abyss- Classic. I must have seen this movie a thousand times, and it never gets old.

Flash AHHH AHHHHH
he saved every one of us!

E.T.

Event Horizon one of the first films to truly scare me since the original nightmare on elm street

Tron

Brazil

would have said star wars, twelve monkeys and the first 2 alien films but they already got said... Mon...Key

I think the original was though. Personally I like the remake better. And I know what you mean, I don't know why I like it... I just do.

I really love all the Alien movies (but i do think the first one was a bit...*searches for answere* you know rubbish)

So then you don't love all the Alien movies. I liked the first three, and AVP was helluva good, in my book. Also, the first Predator movie was pretty rad. My ex-governor was in it, how awesomely sad is that? "I don't got time to bleed" heheh.

Yeah, Travis, Lynche's version of Dune was released at the cinema.

I also like Soylent Green. People!

The idea of people not being able to trace thier food back to source and or not even caring because they are so desperate just to eat. And the government in on it all. I like the 'actualy you are not paranoid, shizzle like that is going on' stories.

I really like the David Lynch version of Dune, It really relays the precision of language used by James Herbert in the books, and the precision of living as well there is something really alien in the way that the people in the book live and that came across in the film. Having said that i also like the sci-fi cahnnel version but for other reasons I.E. fitting a lot more of the books content in.


LT that is a sin! dare I ask if you liked 3 and 4? I tend to ignore their existance i dislike them that much, what is it about Alien that you dislike?
ALIEN is a perfect example of a claustrophobic thriller
ALIENS is a perfect example of a space action horror,
ALIEN3 is a perfect example of why you should stick to 1 director and not let actors have too much say,
ALIEN RESURECTION tried to recapture number 2 and despite an amazing cast failed miserably.
ALIEN VERSUS PREDATOR was a vaguely enjoyable romp if you had your brain switched to enjoy the fight scenes mode.

I saw Alien and Aliens but then heard that the rest were rubbish and never bothered watching them. They were interesting enough, but I never really connected with the characters. I must agree that Soylent Green was good, but it felt more like a paranoid thriller than sci-fi to me. There's a good bit of vagueness about the lines between science fiction, futuristic thrillers, and space opera. I like a lot of the B-rated movies that I've seen, but nothing will ever top Serenity for me.

There's also a very strong horror aspect in science-fiction too, as well as fantasy. Dune is interesting because it is very much a fantasy novel (an entirely non-earth based narrative with unfamiliar cultural references, all you need is for half of them to be elves and you're away) but it is set in a science-fiction universe. Fantasy novels usually tend to be very involved with the politics and relationships between cultures, which is something that sci-fi isn't usually so concerned with. Sci-fi is normally recognisable by the technology used. Star Wars is just a western/samurai movie but becomes sci-fi due to its setting. Dune is a fantasy story that is disguised as sci-fi.

Alien embodies a lot of the most pure sci-fi ideas, which are mainly related to the fear of the new, where the new is represented by technology. Sci-fi often bases its plot on the premise: the piece of technology called X allows humans to encounter/do/be something/somewhere new, but this turns out to be surprisingly dangerous. From this you get things like David Cronenburg's body horror films like Scanner, Videodrome, The Fly and the fairly recent Existenz. Often these aren't clearly sci-fi, but in terms of the narrative mode they are.

From this perspective, Alien really is the only one of the series that really sticks to the sci-fi formula. LT, it could be that you're actually just not that keen on pure sci-fi, you like other things mixed in with it. Then again, the whole thing is based on tension and rated 18, so it might just be that you're not really in the right frame of mind yet to appreciate the way it builds itself.

Back onto Cronenburg, I think The Fly is a real all-time classic movie of pretty much any genre. The plot is very simple but is executed and explored brilliantly. The effects were at just the right level of sophisication that they could achieve some pretty stomach churning moments without you feeling the need to wonder about the computing power it took: it's all done with real objects and I think that really helps the feel of it. Is it just me, or is it a lot harder to be scared of a computer generated monster than a live-action one?

I could go on for a whole thesis about this, but I think I'll stop here for the moment!

I'm all up for the model school of thought, I think that one of the only times I have seen CGI done convincingly is Golum, and by convincingly i mean that i wasn't thinking about the fact that he was computer generated most of the time, a few moments let it down, off the top of my head that would be the sequence in mount doom.
When Lucas decided to go back and tamper with the original star wars films (eps 4-6) and add computer generated stuff to it he took it even farther toward clinical sterility than it already was, I loved the space fights in those films and don't think that they have been matched, especially jedi, the new cgi scenes detract horifically and don't even get me started on Jabba!

I also like Judge Dredd, Robo-Cop and The Running Man-parts of that film were really funny

Recently Serenity has stormed up and is blinking marvelously in the stratosphere being all out sci fi.

Dark City is amazing and would fit, but who would dare question the awsome Short Circuit or Batteries Not Included huh? HUH?

I saw BNI when I was young in the cinema and I didn't really appreciate it, after all, it's basically a soppy romance sort of film and I wanted space fights! I watched it last year and cried lots because these days I'm a bit soppy wotsit.

The first scifi movie I ever saw in theatre was Disney's the Black Hole. I'll always have a bit of a soft spot for it.

Amazing Voyage based on the book by the late Isaac Asimov is also one of the movies that warped me into the scifi loving individual I am today. I'd be keen to see it again now that I've a better grasp on basic biology and see how it stands up.

Pitch Black starring Vin Diesel. Wonderful trapped on an alien planet and can't even necessarily trust your own species film. The eclipse scene with the planet slowly blocking the last sun is wonderful. The whole "oh oh, we are now up the cack" feeling that slowly dawns with the sunset. Not sure I was too keen on the Vin-o-vision and Alien-o-vision shots but meh. The second in the series was more campy fun in my opinion but still a neat way to spend a few hours.

Others already mentioned before on this thread.

OK fave sci fi films.
Starting with Event Horizon. I have only watched it once all the way through. WHy? Because it is so Sh!t scary that I have to hide
Followed by such pieces of excellence as The last starfighter- cheesy but pretty cool,Serenity- just cos it's soooo cool, The Matrix- effects made my eyes pop out, The sci fi channel showed the princess bride the other day so I suppose that could count! God thinking about it I haven't really seen many GOOD sci fi films, most have been fantasy related

Most sci-fi generally is rubbish-but-enjoyable, so I'm not sure if 'good' is a term that can be easily applied to the genre.

Possibly true, but the same can be said for most of the stupid action movies coming out these days. Serenity owns because it has sapce battles and character development.
Batteries not Included was all right and good fun for when you're in a non-violent mood, but all the mushy stuff did get a bit wearing after a while. I liked it (loved the baby spaceships), but I didn't cry because I'm an emotion-concealing introvert until I'm angry. Yep.

The X-Men series is pretty well done, and I have hopes for the next as well... Kelsey Grammar and all.

And Back to The Future I & II. God those are good movies! I love Michael J. Fox!

The X-men was really good. And Hugh Jackmon (?the guy who played wolverine) had really nice jeans in both films.

I really liked a movie called Equilibrium. You had to suspend belief in some places, but overall it was really good.

A movie called The Returner. Its a japanese film about a girl who goes back in time (to our time to be specific) to try and stop the invasion of aliens. The action moves are wicked cool.

Serenity. A sci-fi universe that actually makes sense. Cute chief engineer too.

Dark City and Blade Runner: Directors Cut. Both surprisingly deep films that keep you on the edge of your seat throughout. Both so perfect that to even think of doing sequels is baffling.

Dune. A bunch of boy scouts running around in a sand pit beating people over each others heads. Yay! Great story and characters, and a whole universe of information that really pulls you in. What if Empires DIDN'T fall?
Oh yes, it also has Patrick Stewart charging Harkkonen while holding a puppy. Priceless.

Sci-Fi channel remake was even better.

Event Horizon. I've only watched it twice through, it still scares me somethng chronic. Reminds me a lot of System Shock 2 and DooM for some reason.

Ghostbusters. DON'T CROSS THE STREAMS!

Flash Gordon. HAWKMEN, DIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIVE!

Star Wars episode 4,5, and 6. Maybe because I was younger when I first saw them I rate them far higher than the more recent ones. And besides, "Jar Jar makes the Ewoks look like f'kin Shaft!"

And, of course, Aliens. 1+2 mostly... mostly... The first one had far more suspense and if you havn't watched the later ones you just do not know what the xenomorph is capable of. The thing is just unstoppable and seems capable of outwitting everyone too.
Aliens because the film starts off and you think the humans are tooled up and ready to rock. Yeah, Colonial Marines kicking arse with their carbines. Roxxorz. But no, half an hour in and its game over man.

Ripley is deffinitely one of the best 'heroes' of all time. You know you want her watching your back, even if all she wants is to get the hell out of there. And like Dune there is a lot of backstorey to flesh out the universe.

And of course, Equilibrium. Poetry in motion.

That's all I can think of for now. I'll leave you with this.

KHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAN!

I like the movies. I would love them if not for one fact: THEY ARE SANS GAMBIT! How do they put Beast in without putting in Gambit. Gambit is the man. We need to rally up the troops and force them to put him in the next one.

He IS gonna be in some of the later films, they're just warming up to him. He's the best character afterall. Well, next to Wolverine naturally.

He better be. *Shakes fist*. He was one of the first X-men, if I remember right. Not the very original ones, but soon after. Is that right or am I making things up?

Nah. I think Gambit's cooler. I'd like to see some Psylocke action, though. She was always one of my favorites.

I have to agree that the X-Men movies have been excellent and great fun to watch, as was Batman. However, when I consider bad action movies like Hulk, Elektra, and (more cheesy and annoying than actually bad) Fantastic 4, I really can't agree that sci-fi films are more rubbishy than any other movie genre.

Serenity, now and forever.

The Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi. Particularly the last one, though it was marred by those bloody Ewoks.

Starship Troopers, which also wins the award for Most Gratuitous Shower Scene. I mean, really.

Actually, I would prefer it if they didn't include him at all. I mean, what actor could do justice to the character? The only person I can think of is Josh Holloway (of Lost fame) who has the roguish charm and the accent.

ahem



Taken from here (page 5).

If he's not going to be in this third one, doesn't look like we'll see him at all. I'm glad they've got Angel (wasn't his name different in the comics?) though, his mutation is awesome *wants wings*.

He was Angel in the comics at first. Apocalypse kidnapped him and altered his mutation, making his wings metal and various other stuff. When he eventually rejoined X-Factor, he changed his name to Archangel.

Angel was fairly interesting. Didn't he have a crush on Storm for a while? Stinks that they're not making a fourth movie, but a Wolverine spin-off sounds fun. I sense lots of fights with excessive testosterone and roaring.
Good job knowing the comic book trivia, Commie. I can't be bothered to keep track of anything except a little rough background.