# "WIRED" Magazine's 20 Greatest Science Fiction movies ever made **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [May 21, 2002, 7:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wired-magazines-20-greatest-science-fiction-movies-ever-made/110060 "2002-05-21T07:23:15Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Abe](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/f1d935/32.png) [@Abe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Abe)\ **Post date:** [May 22, 2002, 11:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wired-magazines-20-greatest-science-fiction-movies-ever-made/110060/41 "2002-05-22T11:18:34Z")
A note from a concerned poster to no one in particular: this forum seems to attract the unlimited airing of opinion. I can understand nominating works that have not been mentioned, but the interest value of whether you just “liked” a work or not is usually limited. I for one read these boards not to receive simplistic yes/no opinions, but because I’m interested in what readers of these boards have to add to the discussion on particular works. Can we actually **debate** the merits of the works instead of simply polling or airing? I liked it. I didn’t like it. It sucked. It blew. It was perfect. Beautiful. Trash. Boring. Snooze. Brilliant. Excellent. This is hardly salon discussion. Of course people are interested in knowing whether you liked the film or not, but that’s when you incorporate your opinion into an intelligent discussion. Otherwise anyone can elicit perfectly valid “opinion lists” from anyone at all, in which case every single such list will be equally without merit. Well, now that that’s over with… > [@](#): > > _Posted by Chronos_ > Akira is way too freaky for my tastes, but at least they didn’t include that piece of meaningless trash Dark City that some folks have nominated. And I suppose that they had to have a token anime on the list, so Akira can stay. **Chronos** , I notice you’re speaking evil of _Dark City_ again; do you have a reason this time for calling it “meaningless trash”? As far as _Akira_ goes, I agree, I see nothing in this work to suggest it is one of the top 20 sci-fi films of all time. If they had to pick an important Japanese animation something like the earlier (and somewhat clunkier but more charming) _Nausicaa_ springs to mind, although one is ultra-violent cyber-punk dorks and the other is post-apocalyptic insectia. Abandoning the “classics” they could easily have picked _Ghost in the Shell_ or something equally interesting and stylish. You later claim that _Contact_ is deserving of inclusion among the greatest sci-fi films of all time. Care to expand on this? I found _Contact_ of very little substance overall, with a presentation and development of themes that were practically pedestrian. Speaking of novels, you may be interested in the very interesting little book by Stanislaw Lem, _His Master’s Voice_, from which Sagan stole several main elements present in _Contact_ (including much of the plot). Sagan is not a science fiction writer of any stature, but Lem, now _there’s_ a writer… (When _Contact_ came out, I didn’t see a single reference to _His Master’s Voice_ in any review of the film. That doesn’t seem right, considering that this is the writer who gave us _Solaris_). _Jurassic Park_ I notice has been adequately defended by **RickJay** and **MattD**. I don’t feel great enthusiasm for that film (and I’m ignoring the rather jocular sequels) but I have no difficulties recognizing the important good treatment of the dinosaur theme as far as films go). > [@](#): > > _Posted by Tuckerfan_ > Let’s see, you’ve developed a spectacular technology and are able to do something which is insanely controversial (namely cloning) and instead of cloning a bunch of herbavores and making the place a giant petting zoo, thus making the folks opposed to cloning look like ravening loons, you clone T-Rexes and velociraptors along with the herbavores and plan on turning tourists loose among them??? Plenty of points for style, but minus several million for good thinking. **Tuckerfan** , I don’t understand why the decision to clone a selection of herbivorous AND carnivorous dinosaurs should make for a bad film. Is it a bad decision to raise large carnivores from the past? Possibly. But why does it make for a bad film? Don’t forget, the tragic flaw in Hammond is (predictably) hubris, in this case presuming he could play god with extinct animals of such power. Yes, he would have been better off cloning only the herbivores, but Hammond was driven by commercial interest to assume he could handle raising the T-Rex and velociraptors. Jurassic Park was meant to be the ultimate safari park, and a selection of dinosaurs was required for it. No doubt cloning only herbivores to begin with would have been smarter and safer, but that is a problem within the movie, not of the movie. _Star Wars_ fans, please calm down! Does the addition of a new section to the original _Star Wars_ title really make a huge difference? Yes, the work is called _Star Wars_ properly, or at least classically, but with the size of the Lucas franchise it is understandable that an extra few words have been tagged on to make reference simpler. After all, if you say “Star Wars” you could be talking about any of the 5 (so far) canonical films, a number of lesser films (_Holiday Special_, anyone?), a large number of books, video games, toys, etc. _Star Wars_ has become the name of the franchise, and _A New Hope_ makes it clear that you are talking about what has become Episode 4, and not about anything else or the entire franchise. Let’s face it, calling films by their episode numbers is not very appealing, nor does _Star Wars: The Movie_ sound terribly slick, so there is a rationale of sorts behind tacking on _A New Hope_. It’s fairly clear that _Empire Strikes Back_ is a better film than _Star Wars_, but ESB is not the one that started it all… > [@](#): > > _Posted by ftg_ > When I turned to read the article in Wired (on good old paper) I knew how the list would go based on which was #1. Aha, Blade Runner. So it’s going to be a Sci-Fi geek’s list. And then Gattaca. Gattaca??? What true blue, die hard Sci-Fi geek remotely likes Gattaca? Considered an embarrassment to the genre. Well **ftg** , Gattaca as a novel or short story would be nothing new, indeed it may even be boring since this material is not unusual in science fiction literature. The appeal of this film resides in its ideas, not in the action (otherwise you will find it quite boring). What we see in _Gattaca_ is theoretically possible, and it raises important questions about the integration of social and hard sciences, and about society and the state(what is good for a society? Is a good society one filled with genetically perfect unswerving automata? How do the “advancement” concepts of technology and justice result in something as twisted as ‘Genoism’?- is it a problem with imperfect human nature or are there limitations to technological manipulation of human nature? Can we hope to maintain privacy of genetic information?). I think this “idea factor” alone is a significant achievement, because films normally do not communicate ideas quite as well as books do. I think _Gattaca_ ultimately becomes too involved in melodrama though, so my opinion of it is tarnished in spite of its strong script and filming. By no means is this an embarrassment to the genre! _Close Encounters of the third Kind_ always struck me as a cop-out film, raising a big head of steam and then going nowhere with it. I have looked and looked again, and I can’t see why people rave about this film. I don’t see anything truly remarkable about it and even looking at the story there seems to be precious little there beyond journeying to a location and running into other confused people. I suppose the film has some interest when viewed allegorically, particularly the idea of chosen “disciples” converging on a bare mountain to partake in the pseudo-religious New Age ecstasy of contact with higher beings; but overall I’m afraid I just don’t get the appeal of this film. As a side note, I wonder if _The Abyss_ deliberately imitated the ending? > [@](#): > > _posted by Miller_ > 12. TRON: Uhh… yeah. How does this even remotely qualify? A good film if you’re either a) under the age of twelve or b) stoned out of your gourd. By all the spirits, **Miller** , I hope you’re kidding! The setting of _Tron_ alone is impressive, and how many gladiator films do you know that are as slick as this one? A purely artificial world with lightcycles and floating armoured tanks! There’s no question that the film descends into silliness every now and then, but many films do. Overall this film is certainly not without its merits, chief of which I consider the setting and the curiously effective and historically important special effects (especially in this day of careless CGI). But also consider–and you may have missed this when you were 12–that there is a story in Tron. A lot of people found that the jargon, the bewildering action, and the completely disorienting setting didn’t result in much of a story, but it’s there, and it’s more accessible today than it was 20 years ago. In 1982 people interested in computers and video games tended to be mostly kids, those who worked in computing, or hobbyists; today this film can speak to a much broader semi-computer-literate base without having to shift from the '80s. And it’s not at all Disney-like (but there is an emormous outline of a Mickey-Mouse head towards the end of the film when the camera pans across the dark and glittering computer landscape). Finally, _Tron_ is the grand-daddy of the computer film and is considered seminal in this respect. Even if it weren’t it _is_ a unique work and it would still be important simply for that reason. Like Harryhausen’s stop-motion work, Tron is not old and dated–it’s timeless. (one thing I found the last time I viewed _Tron_ is that the oppressive and claustrophobic graphics look infinitely better on the big screen than on a TV, and I have a fairly large-ish TV–it must be difficult to enjoy this film on very small screens). > [@](#): > > _Posted by Mephisto_ > 2001: A Space Odessy: A true classic. However, the part with the apes lasted waaay too long. It was as if they recorded ape history in its entirety and forced me to watch it in real time. Likewise, some of the space scenes made me feel as though I were suffering through a real time film that chronicled the entirety of the Space Age. Of course, movies were made differently back then. I’m sure this movie would have blown my mind the way it did everybody else’s had I actually been alive to watch it when it was first screened back in theaters. That said, I think this is still a great movie. Some people do find _2001_ or sections of it boring, but the extra time just gives you time to think! It was made at a deliberate pace on purpose. Kubrick and Clarke really wanted to communicate what it must be like to take a months-long journey to another planet, or how it really feels to go on an EVA. You are made aware of enormous distances rolling by, whether it’s en route to Jupiter or speeding above the Lunar surface. The precision and gracefulness of celestial motion is also reflected in the pace and in the music (consider the sequence from the famous jump-cut to the completion of docking at the orbital station–I don’t think any other film I have seen brings together visuals, motion, and music is such harmony). I’m not sure why you say the part with our ancestors lasted too long. Quite a lot of things happen in that sequence in spite of the poorly developed conversation skills involved, and I think compressing it would take away the neutral panoramic angle Kubrick was going for and replace it with a narrower expositional one. It would speed up the film, but this is not the kind of film you necessarily want to speed up, because you’ll almost certainly lose the hypnotic quality of the film and the “vastness” effect. Somebody mentioned _A.I._ as missing from the list, but that is about as much of a science fiction film as _Edward Scissorshands_. In other words it’s not, it’s a fable despite its vague sci-fi trappings. And its ideas are rather basic, that I saw. A long and condescending film, I thought, and an opportunity lost–and I saw nothing in it that reminded me of Kubrick, whose project this was originally. I must however say that the performances of the kid, the gigolo-bot, and one or two others were fantastic. ---
**Author:** ![plnnr](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/7ea924/32.png) [@plnnr](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/plnnr)\ **Post date:** [May 22, 2002, 12:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wired-magazines-20-greatest-science-fiction-movies-ever-made/110060/42 "2002-05-22T12:37:30Z")
I believe my comments re: Sleeper and Barbarella have just been vindicated. ---
**Author:** ![RickJay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/bb73d2/32.png) [@RickJay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RickJay)\ **Post date:** [May 22, 2002, 1:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wired-magazines-20-greatest-science-fiction-movies-ever-made/110060/43 "2002-05-22T13:05:10Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Tuckerfan \* > \*\*I gotta take issue with you, **RickJay** on _Jurassic Park_. I saw it in the theater and positively _hated_ the movie. It was, at best, eye candy. The plot was blatently cribbed from _Jaws_ and _WestWorld_, and wholly unoriginal. Then there was the fact that things happened in that movie were _insanely_ illogical. Tucker, if you hated the movie I think that’s fine; not everyone will like every movie. But I have to echo **Abe’s** comments; a list of great sci-fi films based just on what you personally liked isn’t going to be a very interesting list. I liked “Galaxy Quest” a lot more than “2001” but I’d put the latter on a Top 20 list and not the former. There’s a lot of movies listed I’m not personelly fussy about, but I concede they should be on the list for a variety of other reasons; influence, technical merit, popularity, or the consensus opinion of critics. I appreciate that Jurassic Park isn’t strictly logical in every respect (although you’re wrong about not breeding carnivores; ANYONE running a dinosaur park would have a tyrannosaur. It’s the creme de la creme of dinosaurs, baby!) but you didn’t address any of the key points with respect to the movie’s groundbreaking work in special effects, not to mention the movie’s immense popularity. I’m not saying box office counts for everything, but it has to count for something, and the widespread use of CGI in film is BECAUSE of the success of “Jurassic Park.” Even if you decide you hated the movie you have to give it credit for being a landmark in modern cinema. So we have most people loving it (including me) but some people hate it. Given that unresolvable conflict, I’m inclined to look at “Jurassic Park” in terms of its influence, its durability, and the general consensus about the movie, and on those things it scores very, very highly. ---
**Author:** ![KneadToKnow](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kneadtoknow/32/3999_2.png) [@KneadToKnow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/KneadToKnow)\ **Post date:** [May 22, 2002, 1:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wired-magazines-20-greatest-science-fiction-movies-ever-made/110060/44 "2002-05-22T13:11:27Z")
In hopes of encouraging better understanding of _Close Encounters_, I’d like to say that it is a film, like so many of Spielberg’s early films, about regular people caught up in things bigger than themselves. It is a film about being confused and scared and not knowing what is happening, so expecting it to give answers is expecting it to be something it is not. Not that you can’t expect whatever the hell you want out of a movie. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![doc\_miller](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/f05b48/32.png) [@doc\_miller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/doc_miller)\ **Post date:** [May 22, 2002, 1:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wired-magazines-20-greatest-science-fiction-movies-ever-made/110060/45 "2002-05-22T13:54:52Z")
The fact that list came from Wired! I think explains a lot of the choices. Many of the choices (Blade Runner, The Matrix, Akira, and Barbarella in particular) jump out at me as being chosen to show how cool the choosers are, as opposed to how great the movies are. (Side note: I get this vibe a lot from Wired!, so it might just be me) If they wanted to include an animated movie, I think Iron Giant would have been a better choice. Like Abe said about AI, its more of a fable, but it contributes to one of the great recurring themes in SF, the definition of “humanity”. I think Colossus : The Forbin Project is also a contender. It was a well done, if actionless, movie, and articulated unease with advancing technology remarkably well. More people should see this movie (and read the book) And what the heck, I’ll defend Barbarella. Certainly not a masterpiece, but the archetype for campy sci-fi, a genre certainly worthy of some recognition. If it wasn’t there, Plan 9 should have been. And dittos to Metropolis and Day the Earth Stood Still. On preview, I see Galaxy Quest has come up again. It’s one my all-time favorite movies, but I don’t know if I’d put it on the list. I guess it comes down to what you consider “Best”. ---
**Author:** ![Spoke](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a88e57/32.png) [@Spoke](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spoke)\ **Post date:** [May 22, 2002, 2:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wired-magazines-20-greatest-science-fiction-movies-ever-made/110060/46 "2002-05-22T14:09:24Z")
**RickJay** wrote (re: Star Wars): > [@](#): > > No, in the original release, it doesn’t say "Episode IV: A New Hope in the initial crawl Just a clarification. The original crawl most definitely included an “Episode IV” heading. I remember a very big “Huh?” factor when viewers saw that in '77, until Lucas explained that he envisioned the movie as the fourth episode in a nine-episode serial (taking his inspiration from the old Flash Gordon serials). I am not so sure that the original crawl had the “A New Hope” tag. I think that it did not. I agree with your main point, that the film was released as Star Wars and that the retrofitted title is pretty annoying. **Wendell Wagner** , I can’t agree on La Jetee, though you get points for knowing about it. It’s more of a glorified slide show than a film, being a series of still images, and a short series of images at that. 12 Monkeys is an improvement on the (embryonic) idea, IMO. And I salute **mack** for mentioning **Village of the Damned** (the original British version, of course), and would add that one to my list of egregious omissions. ---
**Author:** ![pldennison](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/9fc29f/32.png) [@pldennison](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pldennison)\ **Post date:** [May 22, 2002, 2:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wired-magazines-20-greatest-science-fiction-movies-ever-made/110060/47 "2002-05-22T14:22:17Z")
> [@](#): > > Two that jump immediately to mind are “Rocky”, which most people forget DESERVEDLY won Best Picture the year it came out “All The President’s Men”? “Taxi Driver”?? “Network”?!?! I think the only reason “Rocky” won is _because_ those other three movies were all nominees (along with the Woody Guthrie bio “Bound for Glory”). “Network” won the Actor, Actress, Supporting Actress and Original Screenplay awards–it should’ve been Best Picture also, IMNSHO. > [@](#): > > Just a clarification. The original crawl most definitely included an “Episode IV” heading. It did not. “Episode IV” and “A New Hope” were both added to the crawl in 1981. See: [http://www.jedisluggo.homestead.com/crawl.html](http://www.jedisluggo.homestead.com/crawl.html) [http://www.jedisluggo.homestead.com/versions.html](http://www.jedisluggo.homestead.com/versions.html) [http://www.kolumbus.fi/lauri.ahonen/stardata.html](http://www.kolumbus.fi/lauri.ahonen/stardata.html) ---
**Author:** ![JRDelirious](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jrdelirious/32/9531_2.png) [@JRDelirious](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JRDelirious)\ **Post date:** [May 22, 2002, 3:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wired-magazines-20-greatest-science-fiction-movies-ever-made/110060/48 "2002-05-22T15:04:14Z")
Y’know, I loved _Sleeper_ ( “It’s tobacco, it’s good for you…”); and _Barbarella_ is my antidote to any temptation to take Jane seriously… but really I don’t see them as properly “great Science Fiction” (or maybe I would have put them in the next tier). _Jurassic Park_ gave us… what? Well-animated dinosaurs for future films and PBS documentaries? I would have left it to _Star Wars_ a.k.a. Ep.IV to be the premier example of SFX-technology-driving film. _Boys from Brazil_, IMO the angle on whether the individuals of a clone are all the same person is buried and relegated to incidentality under an ordinary thriller about Nazi-hunting . The original _Metropolis, Invasion of the Body Snatchers_ and _Forbidden Planet_ should have been in the list, IMO. ---
**Author:** ![gobear](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/8dc957/32.png) [@gobear](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gobear)\ **Post date:** [May 22, 2002, 3:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wired-magazines-20-greatest-science-fiction-movies-ever-made/110060/49 "2002-05-22T15:38:59Z")
1. BLADE RUNNER --Brilliant movie and deservedly #1, if only for Rutger Hauer’s speech as he dies. 2. GATTACA–Another brilliant movie that illustrates why SF is the literature of ideas. It takes one idea–genetic engineering, and from that extrapolates the consequences to a future society. This movie is only boring to people who don’t think. 3. THE MATRIX --A great deal of fun in an exploration of the “brain in a vat” conundrum, althought I could have done without the Messiah complex. 4. 2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY–A classic. It’s not so much a movie as a tone poem of alien influence on human evolution. 5. BRAZIL --Wonderful visuals in a terrific satire of totaliarianism. 6. A CLOCKWORK ORANGE–Kubrick’s twisted turn on Burgess’s exploration of the concept of free will. 7. ALIEN–More horror than SF. 8. BOYS FROM BRAZIL–They cloned Hitler! Hackwork, unworthy of this list. 9. JURASSIC PARK–They cloned dinosaurs! Fun movie, but not great SF. 10. STAR WARS EPISODE IV: A NEW HOPE–This is just a story of a boy’s transformation into a man, and not SF ata ll. Star Wars could have made as a Western with no real differences. Shouldn’t be on the list. 11. THE ROAD WARRIOR–Great action film, crap as SF. 12. TRON–More crap 13. THE TERMINATOR–Terrific movie, with good science fiction premise. (plus it has Arnold AND Michael Biehn nekkid–woof!) 14. SLEEPER–Yes, it’s comedy AND SF. Wonderful movie! 15. SOYLENT GREEN --Harry Harrison hated this movie of his book, which had no cannibalism. Still, it’s an interesting extrapolation of global warming, pollution, and overpopulation taken to Swiftian exaggeration. Good choice. 16. ROBOCOP–Good SF premise. 17. PLANET OF THE APES (1968)–YES! 18. THE DAY THE EARTH STOOD STILL -One of the most cerebral SF films ever made, despite its annoying religious symbolism. 19. AKIRA --Well, if we gotta have an anime choice, this would be it, although I have never cared for it. 20. BARBARELLA --You have got to be kidding! It’s just adolescent wank fantasy from crappy French comix. My choices to replace 5 of these movies would be: 5\*\*. Village of the Damned\*\*. Intelligent, spooky, movie that deals with alien invasion in a novel way. Part of the 1960s British SF wave. 1. **5 Million Years to Earth**. Another great old British film from the 60s, it explains psychic phenomena as relic of genetic manipulation of proto-humans by Martians. Great film. 2. **The Abyss** –Not every alien race needs to come from the stars. This movie is one of my all time favorites, and the Extended Version proposes the same question as **The Day the Earth Stood Still** -Will we choose progress or destruction? 3. **When Worlds Collide** –One of the best apocalyptic films ever made. 4. **Crack in the World** –An obscure film from 1965, it features Dana Andrews as a geologist who tries to tap energy from magma by detonating a nuke deep inside the Earth, and ends causing a crack to circle the world, causing massive death and destruction, which finally creates a second moon. Other Nominations **Invasion of the Body Snatchers** -1978 version **Lifeforce** –terribly underrated version of Colin Wilson’s novel **The Time Machine** –George Pal’s 1960 classic, not the 2002 crapathon **On the Beach** –At times heavyhanded, but still moving film about the death of humanity as a radiation cloud moves ever closer to Australia, where the last survivors of global thermonuclear war wait. ---
**Author:** ![Tretiak](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/a88e57/32.png) [@Tretiak](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tretiak)\ **Post date:** [May 22, 2002, 3:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wired-magazines-20-greatest-science-fiction-movies-ever-made/110060/50 "2002-05-22T15:40:23Z")
No one has still adequately explained to me what makes A Clockwork Orange Science-Fiction? Is it just because it takes place in the future? That hardly seems like an sufficient qualification for the genre, but maybe it is. ---
**Author:** ![lissener](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lissener/32/6139_2.png) [@lissener](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lissener)\ **Post date:** [May 22, 2002, 3:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wired-magazines-20-greatest-science-fiction-movies-ever-made/110060/51 "2002-05-22T15:45:49Z")
Lame list, in keeping with the lame criteria. As a point of information, the greatest science fiction film ever made, and one of the greatest films of any genre, is Andrei Tarkovsky’s _Solaris_.\* Any such list worth anything will also include his _Stalker_ and _The Sacrifice._ [sub]\* (Steven Soderbergh is working his own film version of the source novel, Stanislaw Lem’s _Solaris._ Should be interesting to see his take on it.)[/sub] ---
**Author:** ![gobear](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/8dc957/32.png) [@gobear](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gobear)\ **Post date:** [May 22, 2002, 4:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wired-magazines-20-greatest-science-fiction-movies-ever-made/110060/52 "2002-05-22T16:00:17Z")
> [@](#): > > No one has still adequately explained to me what makes A Clockwork Orange Science-Fiction? Is it just because it takes place in the future? The essence of good science fiction–the _sine qua non_ if you will–is the Big Idea, the What-if… What if Martians invaded Earth? What if one could travel through time? What if aliens made proto-hominids into sentient beings, thus setting humanity onto its evolutionary destiny? In the case of \*\*A Clock work Orange[b/] is what if science can change a person’s instinct toward violence. In the movie, a young man who enjoys rape, ultraviolence, and Beethoven is conditioned through aversion therapy to be nauseated by them. The movie poses the thesis that is beter to do evil thorugh exercisinf free will than to adhere to a moral code involuntarily. Kubrick is saying–well, Anthony Burgess said it, but it’s Kubrick’s film–that a human unable to choose freely ceases to be human, and instead is really an unnatural mechanism that only appears to be natural, like a clockwork orange. ---
**Author:** ![Spoke](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a88e57/32.png) [@Spoke](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spoke)\ **Post date:** [May 22, 2002, 4:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wired-magazines-20-greatest-science-fiction-movies-ever-made/110060/53 "2002-05-22T16:16:55Z")
**pldennison** wrote: > [@](#): > > “Episode IV” and “A New Hope” were both added to the crawl in 1981. I’ll be damned. Memory is a tricky thing. Coulda sworn it was there in the original. (I remember it because we had gone to the movies to celebrate a glorious victory in our war with Oceania. Or was it Eastasia? No, no, it was Oceania. We have always been at war with Oceania.) ---
**Author:** ![bordelond](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bordelond/32/150_2.png) [@bordelond](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bordelond)\ **Post date:** [May 22, 2002, 4:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wired-magazines-20-greatest-science-fiction-movies-ever-made/110060/54 "2002-05-22T16:38:19Z")
Surprising to me that no one has made mention of _Logan’s Run_, _Capricorn One_, or _The Handmaid’s Tale_. BTW, those reading this thread may be interested to learn that [Battlestar Galactica is being revived as a TV miniseries next year](http://us.imdb.com/Title?0314979). Maybe a revived series spinoff too, a la _V_? ---
**Author:** ![bordelond](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bordelond/32/150_2.png) [@bordelond](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bordelond)\ **Post date:** [May 22, 2002, 4:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wired-magazines-20-greatest-science-fiction-movies-ever-made/110060/55 "2002-05-22T16:40:18Z")
Oops – thought of two more: _Brainstorm_ and _Coma_. ---
**Author:** ![Darwins\_Finch](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/darwins_finch/32/20304_2.png) [@Darwins\_Finch](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Darwins_Finch)\ **Post date:** [May 22, 2002, 4:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wired-magazines-20-greatest-science-fiction-movies-ever-made/110060/56 "2002-05-22T16:45:38Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by RickJay \* > \*\*Given the fact that it was > > 1. A pretty good movie, > 2. An tremendously influential movie, > 3. A technically groundbreaking movie, and > 4. Immensely popular, > > …I would say that Jurassic Park is UNQUESTIONABLY one of the 20 best and most important sci-fi films ever made. \*\* I disagree. _Jurassic Park_ was unquestionably influential in terms of _filmmaking_, but in terms of the _story_, it said nothing that hadn’t been said before, and better even. It was groundbreaking in the use of computers for making movies, but the science _within_ the movie was wrong, wrong, wrong. The _techniques_ used in making the film were important. The film itself was a loss. I say scrap it from the list. I would also say that movies such as _Alien_ are less sci-fi and more akin to “horror”; they’re just dressed-up monster movies. Including _elements_ from traditional science fiction movies(spaceships, androids, alien beings) does not necessarily _make it_ a science fiction movie. There was very little actual science in the film. ---
**Author:** ![gobear](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/8dc957/32.png) [@gobear](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gobear)\ **Post date:** [May 22, 2002, 4:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wired-magazines-20-greatest-science-fiction-movies-ever-made/110060/57 "2002-05-22T16:54:57Z")
> [@](#): > > Surprising to me that no one has made mention of Logan’s Run, Capricorn One, or The Handmaid’s Tale. **Logan’s Run** possibly, if only because it has an interesting What-if and I have always dug the Carousel scene–“Renew, renew!” **The Handmaid’s Tale** is a ridiculous feminist screed tricked out as marginal SF, and **Capricorn One** is not only bad SF, but a bad movie as well. But at least O.J dies in it. ---
**Author:** ![Tuckerfan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/eada6e/32.png) [@Tuckerfan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tuckerfan)\ **Post date:** [May 22, 2002, 4:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wired-magazines-20-greatest-science-fiction-movies-ever-made/110060/58 "2002-05-22T16:57:47Z")
Okay, at the risk of totally hijacking this thread, I’ll explain in greater detail why I don’t think that _Jurassic Park_ belongs in one of the top 20 SF films of all time. 1.) The story is totally derivative and wholly unoriginal. You have the amusement park gone amok of _Westworld_, the stalking silent animal killer of _Jaws_, plus the brilliant scientist’s creation gone awry of _Frankenstein_. Not to mention the idea of a whole family trapped with a bunch of dinosaurs was the central theme of the TV series _The Land of the Lost_. 2.) Apparently, no one involved in the production had ever worked at an amusement park. I say this because I spent one summer working in an amusement park and the scene where they get out of the trucks to look at the T-Rex had me screaming. Any fool who’s ever spent a lot of time in an amusement park knows that the automated rides all have passenger locks of some kind that are set by the ride operators and not by the passengers. Why? Because people are stupid and will do things that’ll get them killed and unless you prevent them from doing so. You couldn’t even get anyone to manufacture the vehicles they used in the film without some kind of remote locking system to prevent the passengers from getting out on their own. 3.) The T-Rex. Golly, gosh, yeah everyone wants to see a T-Rex, but that doesn’t make it a good idea. Sure you can go to a safari park and see lions, tigers, and other dangerous animals, but none of them can batter a car around like it was a toy, and all of them can be stopped with a bullet. Again, no insurance company would _ever_ allow a place like Jurassic Park to open up with a T-Rex right away. We’ve all seen dinosaur movies where people get eaten by T-Rexes, so the first thing an insurance agent’s going to say when he/she hears you’ve got a 40 ton meat eater running about is, “Hell no.” 4.) The mix of human actors and CGI created elements. Original in the sense that its the first time it was done on such a large scale, but IMHO, not enough to get it on the top 20 list. After all, there’s been plenty of films in the past that mixed humans and cell animated characters long before _Jurassic Park_. The use of CGI in the movie was simply evolution and not revolution. If you’re going to include _Jurassic Park_ in the list because of that, then you might as well include _Terminator 2_ for its use of CGI. 5.) I don’t really see the influence in other films of _Jurassic Park_ (Well, maybe _Carnosaur_, but that’s about it.). Lucas had been planning on doing CGI characters since _Star Wars_. Speilberg just got to make a movie before Lucas (though it was Lucas’s company, I do believe, that did the effects). ---
**Author:** ![bordelond](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bordelond/32/150_2.png) [@bordelond](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bordelond)\ **Post date:** [May 22, 2002, 5:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wired-magazines-20-greatest-science-fiction-movies-ever-made/110060/59 "2002-05-22T17:36:32Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by gobear \* > \*\*Capricorn One is not only bad SF, but a bad movie as well. But at least O.J dies in it. \*\* Hmmm … different strokes. The conspiratorial element of the movie appealed to me a lot – that’s the “What if?” appeal of this film for me. Not that the movie is without its sins (tokenism in casting OJ and giving him no dialogue; a biplane evading modern-day copters?!?), but my recall of this movie is that it commanded rapt attention to the impossible situations faced by the characters. I concede that it’s been a good while since I’ve seen the entire movie, so maybe it doesn’t hold up so well. I’d be willing to give _Capricorn One_ a second full viewing, though, just to guage my reaction. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [May 22, 2002, 5:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wired-magazines-20-greatest-science-fiction-movies-ever-made/110060/60 "2002-05-22T17:57:50Z")
Quoth **Abe** : > [@](#): > > **Chronos** , I notice you’re speaking evil of Dark City again; do you have a reason this time for calling it “meaningless trash”? I call it meaningless because it is. The movie is just screaming that it has some Deep Intellectual Message, but every time it starts actually _delivering_ one, it goes and blatantly contradicts it in the next five minutes. The soul is something that can’t be imitated. Um, no, the main character falls in love with one of the fake personnas created by the aliens. Humans will always persevere. No, the aliens end up getting exactly what they want. Reality is better than the best fantasy. So why does everyone just go on living in the fantasy world? There’s no cohesiveness. As for criticisms of _Star Wars_, that it could just as easily have been made as a western: Yes, it **could** have been made as a western, but it wasn’t: It was made as a science fiction film. Similarly for _Alien_: Yes, it was a horror film, by any definition of the genre. It was also a science fiction film, by any definition of the genre. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wired-magazines-20-greatest-science-fiction-movies-ever-made/110060.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wired-magazines-20-greatest-science-fiction-movies-ever-made/110060.md?page=4)