Simviation Forums

just thought i'd mention a couple sci-fi movies that really impressed me in the past....my favorite was ''forbidden planet''.....very intelligent, great effects, a mystery which kept one riveted...ahead of it's time.......
another was a tv movie which maybe no one here saw, which was called the martian chronicles with rock hudson.....a great concept.....i have a friend who often gets so impressed by the vibes and personalities of others, that she constantly has to gather herself back together
movies these days, are just a pile of shootem up video games on the big screen.....the awe, wonder, and mystery, take a back seat....or is totally absent......the first star war movies were quite good though....after that, forget it.....oh...of course, avatar was impressive.......was just curious about other's opinions....

There's a lot of great sci-fi out there, both new and classic, like "2001: A Space Odyssey" (50 years ago, and still stands out!). Another favorite is "Fantastic Voyage", and not just because Raquel Welch was in it. Liked the design of the Proteuse sub.

In one sense, it's a shame that newer moves go for the "shoot-em-up" route, on the other hand, the "reboot syndrome" is a mixed bag. Robocop should have been left alone, but I'm curious to see Cameron's reboot of "Forbidden Planet" (It's in the works, IIRC, a three-part, pre-prequel, prequel, and remake of the original. I think a sequel to the original could be done, since the Krell had explored the galaxy, there might be a host of old Krell outposts scattered around... But I digress..

One of my favourites was The Day the Earth Caught Fire, very well acted and interesting because Arthur Christiansen (former editor of the Daily Express) played Jeff Jefferson, as the editor of the Daily Express and the documentary style of the film. Others include This Island Earth, Barbarella, War Games, most of the new Marvel films, Close Encounters of the Third Kind (loved the scene with the pipe tones where the windows blew out), 2010: The Year We Make Contact, Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow (The start of green screen and Gwyneth Paltrow) and Capricorn One (Great plane chase with Telly Savalas "Remember I Get Half")

Cheers
Rich

I enjoy watching the old sci fi. I appreciate how good they did the effects with what they had at the time. "Them" was a good radiation big bug movie. Magnetic Monster was a good one as well. Forbidden planet is one of my favorites. I remember watching warren stevens "doc" as rojan in star trek TOS by any other name not sure how I would feel about a reboot but it would be interesting to watch the saga unfold. beginning with the bellerephon leaving earth for Altair 4 a sequel would be cool if the krell managed to have a colony somewhere. It seems that "exploration and adventure has taken a back seat to shoot em up and blew them to bits

I think I am going to be FIRST on this one: 'Third Man' (1949). Now THAT was a movie. To this day I still remember the 'Third Man Theme' music. They don't make them like that anymore. Movies now have computer generated 'effects' (ie: 'video game') which you couldn't pay me to watch. What did I win?
Chuck B
Napamule

yea...i was going to mention 'this island earth' too....yea.....so great to see those tidbits of nostalgia....

The thing is, with me.....

The older I get the more pessimistic I become. so anything which doesn't make sense to me quickly loses my interest!

The first Star Wars film, using paper spaceships dangling on the end of bits of string, was acceptable....

...but for me, nowadays, we are being fooled with fancy computer graphics for everything, where it's difficult to tell fact from fiction.

(Typical example: Science documentaries regarding; "Space").

I spend a lot of time nowadays arguing with my TV Screen, telling it that what I see before me is a load of old codswallop!

For Sci-fi stuff, the first "TRON" film was, and still is, one of my favourite films...Very cleverly done considering the appearance of the first 8-Bit Computers and computer games in the early 1980's. (Typical Family Entertainment for its time!).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tron

Most of the rest I see nowadays is a right pain in the eyeballs!

Paul.... ... ... ...!

Forbidden Planet without a doubt!
Large Robot . Sexy female lead (Anne Francis), a young Leslie Nielsen and a plot compered Shakespeare's Tempest.

No contest.

Zaphod.

yea!!!!!!.............

Forbidden Planet was very much the template Gene Roddenberry used as a primary inspiration for Star Trek, though the C-57 Star Cruiser personnel looked a lot like a B-36 bomber crew more than the Enterprise crew.

One of my favorite classics is Robinson Crusoe on Mars, well done and still watchable, even though the Mars science is outdated. The first half of the film depicts a marooned American astronaut's survival efforts on the Red Planet, the second half a first contact with intelligent alien life. Criterion restored the film some years ago, glad to say, and the soundtrack music by composer Van Cleave released on CD, too. Note that if you've ever watched it on broadcast TV, you've probably not seen the entire movie. It was edited, shortened for broadcast. The late actor Paul Mantee who portrayed astronaut Christopher Draper had some resemblance to real astronaut Scott Carpenter, and it's surely his finest performance on film. It was originally to be titled "Marooned" but another studio already had the rights to that name for another movie, that wasn't near as good. RCOM lore has it that if it had been financially successful, there would have been a sequel, "Christopher Columbus in Space", but that didn't happen. Memorable line: "Mr. Echo, go to hell!"

Mars Gravity Probe 1 fires thrusters


And, can't overlook Disney's 1954 version of Twenty Thousand Leagues Under The Sea: a great cast and memorable performances by James Mason and Kirk Douglas, Nemo - my first anti-hero - travelled in a nuclear-powered Nautilus, and those brief glimpses of the Nautilus' base at Vulcania (an electronic telescope dish!!!), what a great film!

New good sf films are, indeed, rare. I think Christopher Nolan's Interstellar is the only one that comes to mind in past years.

For me.Stargate and Avatar.

Anthin.

B0ikat wrote:There's a lot of great sci-fi out there, both new and classic, like "2001: A Space Odyssey" (50 years ago, and still stands out!). Another favorite is "Fantastic Voyage", and not just because Raquel Welch was in it. Liked the design of the Proteuse sub.

In one sense, it's a shame that newer moves go for the "shoot-em-up" route, on the other hand, the "reboot syndrome" is a mixed bag. Robocop should have been left alone, but I'm curious to see Cameron's reboot of "Forbidden Planet" (It's in the works, IIRC, a three-part, pre-prequel, prequel, and remake of the original. I think a sequel to the original could be done, since the Krell had explored the galaxy, there might be a host of old Krell outposts scattered around... But I digress..

Stanley Kubrick is the undisputed God of modern film-making. Well, some say Hitchcock but he was obsessed with just suspense and mystery.

Speaking of 2001: A Space Odyssey, I just got out of the theater from a special 50th anniversary showing in IMax. This was the first time I saw in on The Big Screen. I must admit to mixed feelings. At times it's painfully tedious, yet still interesting enough to hold your attention, which, if it was a new release today, would probably be considered a huge flop, since we're used to the flashy rapid fire action and dialogue of modern sci-fi movies, but it's visual effects are still mostly outstanding. On that, I only noticed a few visual continuity "oopsies", most notably when the Aries lunar shuttle was about to land. I think the main reason the movie as a whole still ranks at the top of any list of top sci-fi movies is the "WTF?" factor. Whole college courses have been held and dissertations have been written about the meaning of various aspects of the movie. Even though I've seen the movie before on TV and DVD, the Star Child ending still left me with a feeling of "wow!"

The other thing that made this a special IMax event is that I went to the 10:30AM showing. I was the ONLY person in the theater. Just me. Nobody else. That's special. In a way sad, but still special. But the again, it's early morning on a Saturday in Shreveport, and it's Summer time. Not exactly "movie time" in these parts.

The two Dune movies. Made for TV, but...
The first one was kinda sad, if you read the book. Nothing like what the book described, although I guess the general plot was there somewhere.
The SECOND Dune movie, though, was outstanding. MUCH closer to what the book described. Nice to see. I thoroughly enjoyed it.

I have a lot of books, being a big sci-fi/fantasy fan, and there's a ton I'd love to see converted to a movie. Unfortunately, much like Dune, it's difficult to convert even a moderate sized book into a movie. There just isn't time in a 2.5 hour movie to tell some of the stories properly.
Things like Nova, or any of Roger Zelazny's Amber series would be awesome, but I doubt we'll ever see them or many others on the Big Screen. Many, many others, too numerous for me to list, sadly.

Have fun, all!
Pat☺