Today the film industry was rocked by the passing of legendary actor Sydney Poitier and I’ll take this moment to offer my condolences.
This is a post I wanted to do on my fab movies. Some of these are well known and others are considered complete trash by the majority, however I never allow peoples’ opinions to influence my tastes.
These diverse bunch of Sci-Fi movies, I’ve placed in an order of the year they came out. There are popular movies out there that the majority of critics and filmgoers deem as acceptable and worthy that just don’t appeal to me and I wouldn’t watch again even if I got paid to.
I’m not going to name my dislikes here only my likes and the fact that some are underrated or slatted and overlooked I find incredulous. However it’d be a boring world if everyone had the same tastes and opinions so allow me detail my choice movies and why they’re an interest to me:
The Thing (1982)
This is based on a novella titled Who Goes There, and written by John W. Campbell Jr, and the original movie, The Thing From Another World (1951).
The 1982 version was directed by John Carpenter, whose movies I appreciate, and stars Kurt Russell and Keith David.
The Thing is a horrifying tale of a dangerous alien capable of shapeshifting into any living thing – so that would include humans and animals, but I don’t think plants. The creature does this by first consuming or assimilating the host, and I don’t believe the shapeshifting being had an original form to begin with, nor was it the pilot of the crashed spaceship, which is discovered later on in the movie. This to me is what made the film an acclaimed horror movie with a bunch of men, in Antarctica, trying to survive and unmask this unknown predator.
The paranoia and tension had me on the edge of my seat, literally. It’s comparable to Alien which is more popular however I prefer this movie. Sure it’s rather disturbing to watch at times, funny too with the guys distrusting each other and trying methods to oust the malevolent monster in their mist but this’s definitely one I could watch again and again.
Event Horizon (1997)
When I first saw the trailer I wasn’t that impressed but went to see it with a a bunch of friends and was happy I made the right choice. Event Horizon is another Sci-Fi horror set in space and on spaceships. Staring Laurence Fishburne who is the captain of the rescue vessel, Lewis and Clark, and forced out of leave, with his crew, to Neptune to investigate the reappearance of another ship called the Event Horizon, that mysteriously vanished years previously. Sam Neill also stars as a shady scientist with a troubled backstory.
Directed by Paul W.S Anderson and written by Philip Elsner, the movie’s set in the year 2047 and is described as a ghost story or haunted house in space. I’d say that description is good and original too as I’m sure viewers were expecting to see killer aliens onboard. The tension, for me, was definitely there so was some of the dark humour, delivered mostly by actors Sean Pertwee and Richard T.Jones, which is an important element in horror.
Equilibrium (2002)
I remember this movie from my university days in 2003 and was invited by a group of friends to come along. I didn’t expect much from this in spite of Christian Bale staring in this along with Taye Diggs.
Equilibrium is set in a future in the aftermath of a Third World War where the society, of that era, has drastically made the decision to inhibit emotions by taking a drug daily. You have a special police force, called clerics, whose job is to maintain and protect the tyrannical system. Christian Bale plays a cleric with a special skill called Gun Kata, a type of martial arts with guns.
The film, directed by Kurt Wimmer, was compared to Metropolis and 1984. In fact the influences are obvious and I even remember it being compared to The Matrix, which only came out a few years prior, even Star Wars. Personally I don’t see much correlation despite the heavy use of guns in the movie. I described it as a futuristic western once.
Yeah it’s violent and underrated and I believe it should’ve received more attention despite it being on a lower budget. I would even say it’s one of the best films Kurt Wimmer made when compared to his later movie Ultraviolent, which was disappointing.
Children of Men (2006)
Based on a novel of the same name and written by English writer P. D. James which was published in 1992 and actually set in 2021. The movie, Children of Men, came out in 2006 and Clive Owen starred in it along with Julianne Moore, Michael Caine, and Chiwetel Ejiofor. I recall seeing the trailer before The Man of Steel viewing, and deciding, to myself, I wanted to go and see this.
Now the movie is another dystopian set in the year 2027. We’re now in 2022 so that’s only 5 years away and one could say we’re in a dystopian with a pandemic and the threat of major war breaking out. The difference being that Children of Men is a future where humanity is plagued by infertility, hence this is a world with no children, meaning humanity will go extinct in several years.
You as a viewer then sense the far reaching consequences of a world without children. This isn’t the only disturbing concept in the movie. You hear and see the glimmer of wars, pandemics, and terrorism. It’s set in the UK, which by the look of things, is one of the very few surviving nations in the world, which is continually being swamped by refugees and also on the brink of collapse itself. There is another chilling scene where Theo, played by Clive Owen, is on the train and an intro is displaying current events of ‘the world has collapsed’. One is left to assume that most or all of Europe along with many other nations have descended into anarchy or war.
Having it set in the UK was also refreshing as most apocalyptic movies are set in The US. This was even compared to Blade Runner and again I don’t see much correlation and being set in a near future there’s plenty of familiarity. I’d describe Children of Men as very surreal and the most believable in depicting a dystopic future.
District 9 (2009)
Aliens arrive on Earth, more precisely South Africa, and are gradually subjected, exploited and placed into slums. Directed by Neil Blomkamp, District 9 is a gritty Sci-Fi tale that takes a different route from the tired location of the US to Africa instead.
Government agent Sharlto Copley is accidently exposed to an alien substance, which begins to alter his body chemistry and is then compelled to team up with one of the aliens to fight against those he was initially working with.
The movie scores with me on originality where so many movies of its genre are set in the same country. The aliens have an entirely different look to humans. Their technology and their ship, weaponry isn’t too alien, rather authentic, defunct and dirty, that creates a bloody mess when used. Technology that’s more like something we can build eliminating the mega-powerfully shinny Star Treky feel that so many Sci-fi movies are saturated with.
Avatar (2009)
I thoroughly enjoyed this movie directed by James Cameron and look forward to the sequels. The planet Pandora is an exotic world populated by gigantic beings that’s in the process of being exploited by humans of a dying Earth. It was even compared to Dances With Wolves, and rightly so, but I can’t understand why it received so much hate.
It’s a fantastical movie, a fable that is a commentary on world history and atrocities committed on indigenous people by advanced outsiders from foreign lands. I would think this is why it received so much hate, mainly by the White Fanboy Crowd as:
- 1. It depicts humans as the evil alien invaders this time.
- 2. It holds a mirror up at White Supremacy and the atrocities of the past. Even in spite of having a White saviour — Jake Scully — positioned by default as the hero.
Out of all the sci-fi movies, I’ve listed here, this is a closer comparison to my first novel. I didn’t however get the concept for my story from Avartar as I was still in the draft stages of my book, when it came out. Both The Tribulations of Kharman and Avartar are set on alien worlds in humanity’s dark future with male protagonists, and complicated romance issues, and that is where the similarities end.
Daybreakers (2010)
Daybreakers, directed by Michael Spierig and Peter Spierig, is another Sci-Fi horror that imagines a world run by vampires, where humans are the hunted. It was made in 2010 and since the creators decided to give it a future date and set in the familiar year of 2019, you can forgive that.
This movie appealed to me in the simple sense that it was a virus that turned the majority of people into vampires and that there are even some vampires who had a conscious when it came to farming the unaffected as food.
A decent concept was that the cure involved using an unthinkable, simple yet painful method. Ethan Hawke, performs good as a vampire hematologist, with a conscious also other well known names like Sam Neill, again, and William Dafoe carry the movie well.
Elysium (2013)
Directed again by Neil Blomkamp, the movie is a tale of the haves and the have nots, which is my kind of plot device and very relatable. The poor and needy are the majority who live on a regressive Earth while a privileged wealthy minority live on the advanced space station Elysium. Everyone wants to get to Elysium to taste the good life and would risk their own lives to do it, by entering illegally. This draws parallels to the reality of people dying trying to enter either the UK or US.
Matt Damon’s mission is to get onto the station and cure himself after an accident at work gives him only a few hours to live. Sharlto Copley is this time playing a violent antagonist also with veteran actress Jodie Foster as the main antagonist and unsympathetic Sectary of Defence of the station.
Life (2017)
Another alien horror movie that I believe was grossly overlooked and even accused, by some critics, of ripping off Alien. While the film was not on most radars and the similarities are there, Life is set onboard the International Space Station where scientists have gathered some soil samples from Mars. They soon discover a microscopic organism that grows and eventually turns into a dangerous predator hunting the crew.
The film definitely has some unique qualities to it in the sense that there’s no gravity on the small station with no firearms, and that it’s too close to Earth, making the challenge of fighting and even ejecting the deadly creature more overwhelming.
The twist at the end is gut-wrenching and had me screaming at the screen for a sequel. Directed by Daniel Espinosa and starring Jake Gyllenhaal, Rebecca Ferguson and Ryan Reynolds.
The Tomorrow War (2021)
It’s another bizarre story of time-travelling soldiers from the near future who arrive to warn governments and enlist people in a war of survival against a frighteningly dangerous alien species.
The humour’s well done and the alien predators are worryingly big and realistic. I did an in-depth review on this movie last year and completely loved it. I took it for what it is, an action-packed sci-fi flick and with the amount of drivel that Amazon Prime parades I felt I struck the jackpot with this one.
Stars Chris Pratt as the family guy and anti-hero conscripted to fight the ruthless animalistic enemy in the future. Directed by Chris McKay.
Conclusion
So these are my top 10. My list could be longer but I wanted to limit it to 10 only. I look forward to what movies arrive in 2022.