Favorite Science Fiction Movies

inspired by sleeper-has-awakened | Sunday, August 14, 2005 | all interested FReepers

[Phsstpok]

They need to hire you for "fixer-of-plot-holes". Could be a whole new career for you.

My nephew just sold his first two novels to a mainstream publishing house (the first should come out in Q1 '06) and they've already been optioned by a major Hollywood producer.

I keep volunteering to act as his gopher. He says to wait till he actually has something in production and he'll see if they even let him on the set, let alone relatives.

I'd actually probably be good at this job, which I understand is called "continuity," but I'd also probably piss everyone off by being a nit picker.

[softwarecreator]

I am not sure if this constitutes "continuity" as much as it would fall under "script repair" or whatever.

Continuity is where, if in a frame, the actor has on a blue tie with a brown stain, in all subsequent frames he should have on the same blue tie with the same brown stain.  It's basically making sure things match from frame to frame or scene to scene.  I bet that would be a fun job and if you like it you should really pursue it.

Congrats to your nephew's novels!!  That is fantastic!!

[The Foolkiller]

That was what was great about Harryhausen. He gave each and every one of his creations distinct and individual personalities-just like his mentor Willis O'Brien (Kong) did. I have no idea how they were able to accomplish that with small bendable models-but it was a tribute to their genius. It's something this CGI crap can't ever do. God, I miss stop-motion photography(curse you, Lucas & Spielberg)! And, yeah, I always saw the similarities between the Ymir & Kong myself. Maybe he did it as a homage to his mentor-who knows? Wonder where they came up with that name(Ymir)? It never had a name in the movie-just "the creature." By the way, he sure grew fast for hardly eating anything. :D

[The Foolkiller]

Maybe Forry Ackerman came up with it (Ymir).

[RightWingAtheist]

Spot on! Also, The Thing is still very relevant in its message today. The people who made it included some of Hollywood's biggest conservatives (Howard Hawks of course, but also Christian Nyby, Charles Lederer, and the uncredited Ben Hecht), and the allegorical Cold War subtext has of course been noted ad nauseum. But whenever I watch Carrington try to reason with Arness's Killer Carrot, I can't help but think about today's Not In Our Names types, who aren't necessarily evil themselves, but keep insisting that we shouldn't try to defeat those genuinely evil people who to kill us, and that we should try to understand them even when it's obvious that negotiation is futile.

[RightWingAtheist]

Incidentally, Harryhausen is a staunch conservative Republican. His producer, Charles Schneer, was an equally staunch liberal Democrat, and actually helped to break the Hollywood blacklist. I guess you can think of Harryhausen and Schneer as the Stewart and Fonda of special effects.

[The Foolkiller]

By the way-I read somewhere that Hawks originally intended to do his version faithful to the story "Who Goes There?" by Cambell-have the Thing be a shapeshifter, as Carpenter did-but when he found out the price, said: "Jesus! The guy wants (exact amount not remembered by me) a TENTACLE, for Christ's sake! Get me a big guy, put him in a suit, and turn out the lights!" LOL

[TheLion]

Yep, Patricia Neal had the right stuff! Had never thought about Washington in the 50's.

[EveningStar]

ping

[TheLion]

I was probably about the same age as the film's young boy when, Day the Earth Stood Still came out....boy was I in awe of that film then!

[EveningStar]

The John Carpenter remake of The Thing may be more faithful to the original story, but is an inferior film in nearly every level except a technical one.

Agreed

I consider it to be the single most overpraised science fiction film of all time.

It's definitely up there. It does have company, though. ;)

[KevinDavis]

[BenLurkin]

Excellent choice.

[BenLurkin]

[BenLurkin]

[BenLurkin]

[Knitting A Conundrum]

As silly sf themed comedies go, I have to admit a sick weakness for Earth Girls are Easy....

[BenLurkin]

I thought no one else had ever seen this movie . . . I recommend it highly!

Also recommended.....

And kudos to these choices ...

[KevinDavis]

DS9 was a ripoff of B5.

[KevinDavis]

Well here is my list....

Terminator 2 -> The best of the Terminator series
Independence Day -> Good movie
Men in Black -> Should have done one Men in Black. The second sucked
Total Recall -> I enjoyed the scenes on Mars
Back to the Future -> I enjoyed all 3 Back to the Futures
The Running Man -> Enjoyable...
Demolition Man -> Be Well
2001 -> I enjoyed it, but what the heck happened?
5th Element -> Could have done without Chris Tucker
Spaceballs -> May the Sharwtz be with you!
Starship Troopers -> Cool movie
Forbidden Planet -> Ahead of its time
Logan's Run -> Good movie...
Enemy Mine -> Now a basis for every sci-fi story... Alien and human crash land on the planet.
Tron -> Awesome special effects
Clash of the Titans -> COuld have done without Bobo the owl
Flash Gordon -> I know it was campy, but I enjoyed it
Stargate -> Withouth the movie no sg1
Planet of the Apes (Old Version) -> I liked the new one, but could gotten someone else to play the lead role..
Imposter -> Was he real or an Android from Alpha Centauri??
Star Trek -> Star Trek V sucked big time!!!
Star Wars -> The orginal trilogy was better. However episode 3 was awesome...

The movie I'm looking forward to is Serenity. I saw Blade Runner and I fell asleep.. I'll try to watch it again...