I can rave for hours. It was that good.
Although it's not really sci-fi (I don't think...or maybe it is *shrug*), it brings to mind another sci-fi movie I thought was well done: The 5th Element. They were both exceptional, in my opinion.
"What's the point?" you ask? Did I bring you here to give you my opinion? No. Well...yeah, but not just for that. My point is that these are only two of the great sci-fi flicks out there. Which others would you list? Which ones are worth watching again and again? Which ones are not? Why? What makes a good/bad movie good/bad?
And please, let's not speak of Battlefield Earth. We have different opinions, and let's leave it at that.
still just wonderin',
CVG
[This message has been edited by cvgurau (edited May 30, 2004).]
The 5th Element was good, but not exceptional. I would reserve that kind of praise for a movie like Time Bandits...now that was a really cool movie.
5th Element was stylish. I wouldn't say it was a brilliant film, but it certainly had a lot of enjoyable characters, and was put together very well.
I really enjoyed Event Horizon, although that was really horror in an SF setting. Other than that, mostly everything has been films of novels lately, and very few of them worked, if you ask me.
quote:
Most of the raving I've heard has been from scientists, and it's the foaming at the mouth kind, not the enthusiastic sort.
Yeah, every time I hear the words "The Atlantic current shut down!" in one of the previews I start laughing hysterically. (The bad kind of hysterically. The hysterically where other people give you funny looks and start edging away.) Then I say "Like there's only one current in the Atlantic?" And then I start raving about the North Atlantic Deep Water and climate regime change time frames, and man, it just goes downhill from there.
If I see the movie, I'll do what I did with The Core, and wait until I can be reasonably sure of being one of the only people in the theater. The sad thing is, I really enjoy watching bad science movies. Especially with friends. MST3K in real life, and with good special effects.
"The Core is a marvel. It has everything: common physics misconceptions, blatant misrepresentations of physical laws, a complete range of stereotypes, ridiculous feats of engineering, and pure fabrication of scientific "facts". "
Unfortunately it looks like they haven't done anything new on the site since I was there last: http://www.intuitor.com/moviephysics/
That redeemed them somewhat in my eyes. It is science-fiction after all.
The best dystopian film is A Clockwork Orange.
The best science fantasy film is the original Star Wars trilogy.
Time Bandits -- which I haven't seen since I was a kid -- was great; I'd guess that would fall under the "time travel" category of science fiction.
What about a good alternative history? I can't think of any A. H. film, much less a good one.
As for soft SF -- again, I can't think of one.
For horror SF, you've got Alien and Aliens. (Yes, this is a legitimate category--see the old SF films of the 1950s.)
And for adventure SF, my favorite is probably either Terminator or T2. Would these fall under hard SF?
If you wanted to open this up to fantasy as well, I'd say Conan the Barbarian is the best sword and socercy film out there, and that The Lord of the Rings trilogy is the best epic fantasy ever made.
[This message has been edited by Balthasar (edited May 30, 2004).]
Shawn
I think there was a TV film based on Robert Harris's Fatherland, although I haven't seen it.
As for hard SF, 2010 was pretty good. OK, so it was working in the same universe and attempting to explain the weird ending of 2001, but I think it manages to qualify. Certainly a lot of the plot revolves around realistic science concepts, even if turning Jupiter into a second star doesn't sound plausible
Like Mary said, the best thing that I've heard anyone say about The Day After Tomorrow is that its heart is in the right place...and that is really open to interpretation. After all, Waterworld's heart was in the exact same place, remember?
Even people who agree that ludicrous scaremongering has a place in our national policy debate (and there are a surprising number of these sorts) feel that The Day After Tomorrow overdoes it. It's merely patently silly, only persuasive to the most gullible.
As for good SF, I think that Lilo and Stitch takes the prize for movies released in the past decade. Time Bandits isn't SF at all, it's religious fiction. I just mentioned it because I was watching it the other day.
2001 and 2010 probably have the honor of being the premire "hard" SF entrants, though they both postulate hyper advanced aliens (which should be the hardest of hard SF concepts--but is out of favor for some reason or other).
Deep Impact was also surprisingly hard SF (but the title was so mercilessly stupid it obviated any accuracy in the science). There were two main science flaws. First, our nuclear powered rockets are better than the Russian's nuclear powered rockets...the only reason to have a Russian reactor was to have a Russian on board so the plot wouldn't be waving the flag too much. Second, if you're catching the comet before it reaches perihelion, it is a heck of a lot easier to simply deflect it so it misses Earth entirely than to blow it to smithereens (a fair number of which will still end up hitting the Earth).
Most of the other flaws were only incidental to the plot. For instance, if you detonate a fusion device, any other nearby fusion devices will have their deuterium charges detonated by the blast front and neutron sleet, and even their fissionable cores will give almost the full energy yield. There is no need to rig them to go off simultaneously. Likewise, nuclear missiles cannot reach true orbit or anything like it, they are designed for suborbital trajectories. You simply couldn't rig them for a last ditch strike at an inbound comet. Since these errors had absolutely no significance to the plot and occupied only a couple of lines of dialogue and a few seconds of footage, they were less than totally egregious.
I did not want to see The Day After Tomorrow. I told my friend, on Saturday, that I had no wish to see that movie. Nevertheless, this was an awful weekend for movies and they dragged me to it.
I laughed....but only to save my sanity.
As we walked out of the theatre, me, my husband, and our two friends who wanted to see it, we tried to decide if we'd ever seen a worse movie before. We think Battlefield Earth might be in the running, but we actually started turning to B horror films to really find something worse.
There was nothing, and i do mean NOTHING, either politically, socially, or scientifically accurate about that movie.
Now, I was willing to give its faulty scientific premises a break, since I knew in advance that they were coming and I assumed, in advance, that I could just ignore them and still try to like the movie.
I couldn't. Mostly because not on ly was it not scientifically acurate, it was not even internally consistent.
Don't worry, for those who haven't seen the movie, I'll tell you if I change my mind and decide upon a spoiler. But really, you don't want to see this movie anyway.
The President who kept turning to the VP and asking what we should do was awful. Also, oh, I did decide to put in a teeny spoiler, not that it matter much, but avert your eyes and skip to the next paragraph if it will both you. Then the President is the last one to leave Washington! Puh-lease!
skip line
Ok, then let's talk about those buffoons in Arctic equipment that didn't ever have their coats and hoods buttoned up properly. And in the parts where it was supposed to be cold (another ice age is coming...the premise of the whole movei) I felt no cold. The actors failed us in that respect.
And the writers didn't know how to establish or maintain suspense. They basically just kept dishing it out to the main characters, twisting the knife in wish obviously contrived and cheesy new developments. But then, this might have fallen from a totally unbelievable situation at the core, which prevented me from liking but a single moment of the movie.
I did like one joke...with the nerd in the library....it made me laugh. That, IMO, but the one reedeming moment in the movie, and certainly not worth $16 and 2 hours of my life.
As I left the theatre one of my friends said, in an attempt to give them some credit for having picked upa a science text at some point in their lives, "Well, snow is white." But another said, "It's not THAT white."
I think I'm done now. I feel dirty having dredged that memory up again.
[This message has been edited by Christine (edited May 31, 2004).]
I think they accomplished what they set out to do and that was give somebody 2 hours of entertainment. I think if you don't like a movie you should walk out. That is why they have the doors marked EXIT.
quote:
I think they accomplished what they set out to do and that was give somebody 2 hours of entertainment.
quote:
Some people expect too much from movies, and it just ruins the experience.
Billions of dollars are pumped into these movies and asking for continuity and good acting is like asking that a novel have believable characters and a coherent plot.
Although I did read this book once that had amazing battle sequences and, man, I LOVED the font style.
[This message has been edited by MaryRobinette (edited May 31, 2004).]
I have not been to see this new one, cause I thought it looked like something I did not want to spend even $5 on--(our local in bad shape theater has movies for $5 all the time) (cheap date night)
Though, i did like Dante's Peak. LOL
And I do think people can overthink a movie--my hubby does this and often spoils a movie for me. Sometimes it is escapisim we go for--
As to me, I'd rather see Shrek II or Scooby Doo for pure escapisms--we know it's not real or meant to be like real life.
Shawn (can't believe no one saw or liked Soilent Green)(sheesh, I'm not that old )
I generally love disaster movies, period, so I'll be going into The Day After Tomorrow wanting to like it. Well, maybe a little biased against it since I know it's trying to sell global warming. I guess that makes me neutral toward it.
Neon Genesis: Evangelion--overall, the number one best SF anything that I've ever seen. Yes, it's that good.
Serial Experiments Lain--For psychologically disturbing anime, this is the best (except for Eva, the anime world's slang for Neon Genesis: Evangelion."
Cowboy Bebop--The best space opera I've seen. (Except Eva).
X--The best apocalypse SF story (except Eva. That show is pretty much everything genre in SF).
Escaflowne--The best Fantasy SF I've seen (Umm, I actually don't think Eva fits in here. Surprise!)
I'm a bit of a layman, at the theater. When I give up my six bucks (sixteen dollars! I can't imagine paying 16 bucks for a movie. I guess if I did, I'd be a little more critical, too ) my IQ drops ten or twenty points. The ticket taker holds onto them and I pick them back up when I leave.
I go to movies to be entertained, and when I encounter a movie like Day, I watch it, if it looks interesting. I don't sit in the theatre and laugh at the ridiculous flaws in their science.
I mean, the heroes in Independence Day won with a computer virus! I realize this is a bit of a modern send-up War of the Worlds (where, for the two of you who don't know, seemingly indestructible aliens from Mars were destroyed by microscopic viruses...the common cold, I think), but still. A virus?
I'm not looking for scientific plausibility. I'm just looking for a good story. For me, the movie was about this great weather change, yeah, but it was also about people trying to survive. The grsoup of kids, for example, didn't know the science of it. They just knew that it was getting really cold, really fast, and they didn't want to die.
CVG
PS--maybe I'm remembering wrong, but I only recall the president asking once for the VP's advice.
PPS--you are correct, however, when you comment on the acting. For all their trying to convince me that a new ice age was coming, I really didn't feel the cold, here. I didn't see it in the actors, sorry to say.
PPPS--You had respect for me? Wow. 
PPPPS--I saw Shrek first, too, though, so I guess I kind of went in suspending belief. *shrug*
[This message has been edited by cvgurau (edited May 31, 2004).]
)Also, one of the reasons I liked the movie so much was the ice-covered image of Earth at the end, and the creative questions it raised. Like, how is the planet going to live, now? How different will life be? How would I handle it?
And so on.
CVG
It's a movie about global warming and the planet ends up ice-covered?
Huh?
joking! I'm pretty sure an accurate movie about climate research would put the theater to sleep, although it's still great fun for the dorkier, like myself, to watch these ones for the mistakes). The basic idea is that the North Atlantic transport of cold, salty water gets shut down because the water gets too warm to sink, and this causes some majorly bad climate effects. However, this is a pretty controversial theory.My personal favorite for global warming arguments is the comparison to the Paleocene Thermal Maximum, when a methane release from methane hydrates bumped the temperatures up considerably. It's the best paleo-analogue for the present experiment (what many earth science people call the fact that we've, you know, like tripled our atmospheric carbon dioxide).
If you want interesting ideas from an ice covered planet, don't just limit yourself to the glacial periods we've been going through for the last 2.5 million years. Go for the whole hog, back in the Proterozoic and the Neoproterozoic: the Snowball Earth. Basically, once ice covers a certain fraction of the globe, an unstable feedback is introduced, with more light reflecting off the lower-albedo snow, and the entire Earth's surface, land and snow, freezes over. Carbon dioxide then builds up over millions of years-- carbon dioxide is being emitted by volcanoes, but it isn't being deposited because the water cycle's gone-- and you get a severe greenhouse that blasts you out of the snowball in a very short period of time. More information on the snowball here (technical) and here (less technical).
Not just for the action, or the queasy moments, or the sci-fi tech stuff, but because it was a compelling story about the value of individual liberties (ironically something that Cruise is not well known for supporting--at least in the way the founding fathers intended). A good story, well told, with a theme that speaks to us universally.
This one isn't a record breaker by any means, but it sure wasn't Gigli, either. I did see Shrek II, and it was good, but not as funny as the first.
Soylent Green, simply ROCKS.
I agree. I go to movies to be entertained. I liked Independence Day well enough to own the movie at home. I don't by the computer virus crap for a second, but it was a fun, fast-paced action movie that kept me on the edge of my seat. I felt for hte people when the all died and I cheered victory when the ships came down. I went ahead and saved the computer virus ridicule for outside the theatre when I left with a group of half a dozen fellow comp scis.
And I think I mentioned that when I entered the theatre, I as willing to set aside the scientific implausibility of the movie, because I already knew it was coming.
I was actually more bothered by the other implausible things, and the internal inconsistencies.
Yes, a movie's job is to entertain. Ovverthinking a movie (or a book or anything else) can rip the entertainment value right out. I have this problem sometimes when receiving feedback on my stories. Do you know the ones I mean? When it is obvious someone was reading it to LOOK for errors and this crippled their ability to enjoy the book at all?
I did not watch The Day After Tomorrow in this way. I was waiting for it to surprise me. The trouble was, the flaws in it jumped off the screen and punched me in the nose. Unlike in Independence Day, where a single plot hole developed near the climax, dozens of tiny plot holes and problems began at the outset of this movie.
Here's a problem...for a movie that shows the entire northern hemisphere being threatened by an ice age that comes awfully doggone quickly (was wliling to overlook that last part...), it was amazing how they summed up the entire northern hemisphere by showing the city of New York. This actually personally offended me. they ripped up L.A. a little bit, too, but I looked at that map of the US, and I saw the sattelite things they did with it. My hometown was well-buried as well, and I had no sense of the impending threat to any part of the U.S. EXCEPT New York. I had no sense ot the loss of life. This is a serious flaw in a movie that tries to build suspense around the idea that a lot of people are going to/have died.
Spoiler alert for the next paragraph...
And the evacuation....they evacuated the entirety of the southern states (actually, the line was well north of the mason-dixon line, so they evacuated more people than that) to Mexico in a week? And then the Mexican governmnet tried to close off the border, whidch was obviously thrown in as part of their political statement, but the truth is we wouldn't have made a deal with mexico, we'd have taken over their country. No niceness, no "thank you for helping us" at the end...guns and a bigger military and a serious taking over a Mexico. And since we would surely run out of room in Mexico, we'd go ahead and start taking over the rest of central america as well. This situation would have turned into a blood bath, and it was just terribly amusing that it did not.
end spoiler
Oh yeah, and the passage of time was shown very poorly. I have no idea how much time elapsed, only a guess.
So yes, movies are about entertainment, but I have my standards. Scientific concerns aide, this movie failed to draw me in, get any sympathy from me either for a single character or for the world it threatened, and then it tried to twist in the knife with obviously bogus answers to the question, "How can I make things worse for my herO?" You should not be able to SEE the author asking that question, btw. For all of you wondering how to get your plot going after the start....these things you do to make the situation worse should flow naturally from the plot.
quote:
individual liberties (ironically something that Cruise is not well known for supporting--at least in the way the founding fathers intended
Christine's spoiler ahead:
quote:
but the truth is we wouldn't have made a deal with mexico, we'd have taken over their country. No niceness, no "thank you for helping us" at the end...guns and a bigger military and a serious taking over a Mexico. And since we would surely run out of room in Mexico, we'd go ahead and start taking over the rest of central america as well.
If you haven't seen the movie, it's difficult to explain. This is a differnet situation. The entirety of the U.S. has basically become uninhabitable. I'm suggesting that given hot-headed American blood and culture, we would become imperialistic again if such a situation arose. This is a hypothetical situation, completely differnet from current political climate. Keep in mind that we have been quite imperialistic in the past, and I think the right situation would bring those tendencies pouring back to the surface.
And yes, Soylent Green is great, and my enjoyment of it has been enhanced ever since I saw Phil Hartman's timeless rendition of the final scene. His Heston was breathtaking...
[This message has been edited by Nick Vend (edited June 01, 2004).]
quote:
given hot-headed American blood and culture
Nor do I believe we're imperialistic at heart. If any country could flex its muscles in that direction, it's the U.S., but she chooses to be a gentle giant.
[This message has been edited by Kolona (edited June 01, 2004).]
And I had totally forgotten about Logan's Run. Excellent stuff.
In any case, it was a minor point and I didn't want it mucking up the board.
[This message has been edited by Christine (edited June 01, 2004).]
But a really good one is the Venus Wars, THeres something about Bike-racers turned Soldiers that's appealing. Fifth Element was good.
BUt I think the Best from what I consider Sci-fi was Western World. It had all THat I love about Sci-fi.
Man I wish someone would make a decent movie out of 'Farenheight 451' there was one but it was filled with nazi's.
As for scientific flics, do documentary's work, There is an excellent one on Buckyballs. And Nova's string theroy one was nice.
Blah blah blah blah blah. (Doctors note: Brain was removed because it proved too scattered. Will be replaced with goldfish
quote:
Battlefeild Earth (sorry i had to, just pretend you didn't see it.)
OK, I haven't seen Battlefield Earth. But I have read the book... so, what was wrong with it?
quote:
BUt I think the Best from what I consider Sci-fi was Western World. It had all THat I love about Sci-fi.
You mean Westworld... Early 80s Michael Crichton story with AI robots running around killing theme park guests? That was kind of fun, in a way
[This message has been edited by Jules (edited June 02, 2004).]
Actually, as a laugh riot nearing Rocky Horror Picture Show proportions, it isn't bad at all...invite the friends, pop in the DVD, and prepare to snark.
As a supposedly serious science fiction movie? It stinks on ice. Hammy acting, ridiculous plot holes, even the costumes and makeup are poor. It makes the much-maligned Waterworld look like high art.
Not that I have an opinion or anything.
This might sound perverse, but I like end of the world tales in which people actually die. A lot of them. One of my favorites is Deep Impact. I love that movie for several reasons: First, we have real suspense that something bad is going to happen to the world. Second, we had real characters to identify with, from all over the country so we weren't just centered in New York which, despite popular movie belief, is not the only city in this country. Finally (and this is the spoiler so avert your eyes if you haven't seen the movie.) people actually died. Part of the tragedy was averted, but in the end, i shed some tears for the millions who died. And I saw their deaths. In this most recent flop, I intellectually knew that people had died but not emotionally. We didn't really see it so much. In Deei Impact, I started bawling when the parents just stood there next to the van and let the wave hit them...when the woman went to the beasch to make up iwth her dad instead of going to safety and at the same time saved her friend and the little girl.
quote:
we weren't just centered in New York which, despite popular movie belief, is not the only city in this country
LOL. You're right; there's LA as well. And San Francisco, but only if you're going to have a car chase.
The main problem, mild confusion of the story, was simply because of omission. It was a very long book (the film only covered half of it.) The only major science problem was that of the harrier jets not requiring maintainence (or even working at all) after sitting for 1000 years.
The characters and acting were exactly what I had expected from the book. The aliens were very much over-the-top and arrogant. They couldn’t possibly conceive of the humans being equal (intellectually or otherwise) because they weren’t people, just animals capable of labor. Look at how the British colonies were run and increase it by a level of magnitude, if you need help absorbing the concept.
I think that it’s obvious that this movie was panned because of real-world social issues and not the movie itself. John Travolta, a known Scientologist, dared to make a film based on L. Ron Hubbard’s, the founder of Scientology, novel. So, it must be a film about Scientology right? Well, no. But that didn’t stop any of the critics from saying it was.
If you honestly compare Battlefield Earth to successful movies like Jurassic Park, E.T., Independence Day, Deep Blue Sea, the remake of Planet of The Apes, and Signs, you’ll see it’s possibly the best of the bunch.
My God, Signs was awful!
Just so I don’t leave you wondering... The other two movies that I like, but everyone else hates, are Dune and Hudson Hawk.
I don’t quite know how to fit this on the end of this post, but Outland is another excellent sci-fi movie.
With that out of the way, let me turn your attention to one of the best semi-forgotten science fiction films of the last decade: Gattaca. It was thought-provoking, and (considering the usual level of scientific accuracy in SF films) relatively accurate in its science.
1. Saw Lynch's adaptation. Found myself utterly confused by the whole concept, and wondering what on earth it was all about. Can't say I particularly enjoyed it. This probably put me off reading the book for several years.
2. Watched the Sci-Fi channel adaptation of a few years ago. More interesting; perhaps 6 hours is enough time to get most of the story across. It was certainly possible to understand at least half of it.
3. Read the book. Understood at last.
4. Watched the SciFi adaptation again, and understood that.
I think the entire problem with Lynch's adaptation, well... two problems really. You can't fit that story into 3 hours, or however long it was, and Lynch isn't a very good director, IMO, and screwed it up by concentrating on the most unusual aspects of the story and neglecting the parts that let you actually understand what's going on.
Maybe Battlefield Earth is the same... it's certainly a very long story (I think it runs to about 1,100 pages in the book), and if you miss the wrong bits, nobody who hasn't read the book will have the slightest clue what's happening.
I think I'll have to watch it to find out.
Now can't forget the original Terminator ( Michael Biehn was excellent, even tho Arnie was in the running for the role of Reese )and the story behind it.....
that's about it for my rantings....
And of course one of my fav's " Cast Away "
Thanks for reading and lemme know what ya'll think....
Ok...Instead of posting again...here's a little reply....If you don't see the HUGE IMO WetWilly ( you need glasses ) I was expressing that it was in my opinion ( again not wanting to infuriate any one ( nice word, huh? ) But I watch stuff that I like and would be willing to watch other anime ( if I can get ahold of it )to give an honest opinion......
Another of my fav's is Bruce Campbell vs. The Army of Darkness ( and the other two Evil Dead movies ) Forgot to mention this.
[This message has been edited by Monolith (edited June 03, 2004).]
[This message has been edited by Monolith (edited June 08, 2004).]
and . Now, let me defuse your frustration. I have seen the movie. But seeing it has lent no light to our point of contention. You began what you call a 'hypothetical' with the words “the truth is.” That’s where I disagreed and still do.
Seems to me we were both speaking hypothetically as far as what the U.S. might do regarding Mexico in an impossible situation. I should have phrased my response as a very specific hypothetical supported with the Kuwait comment, in which a non-imperialistic America worked with Mexico (although the movie did that for me, strangely enough, and it was your unequivocal objection to that scenario to which I objected). I used a current event, Kuwait, to support my view as you then used a past event to support your view (I’m assuming you were referring to the American Indians.) I might be tempted to say “touché,” but I think logic dictates that recent actions are more likely to be patterns for future actions than actions long past.
And if, as you say, a hypothetical situation is completely different from any current political climate, why is it okay for them to be very similar to any past political climate, as imperialism? The U.S. has also been magnanimous throughout its history, both recent and early. It’s just as likely that its magnanimity would come “pouring back to the surface” rather than its past imperialism.
Propaganda? The Day After Tomorrow oozes with it. I can just imagine how many mush-headed kids are going to be scarred for life. 
Spoiler Alert:
Actually, I thought the fellow who played the President resembled Al Gore, which kind of messed up the Bush/Cheney attempts for me. And I’m sure homeless people mumble all day about cars and pollution. Kyoto got its play, of course, with the U.S. as the big bad meanie for not signing on so that the U.S., too, could become a Third World country; then – surprise -- we all end up in Third World countries anyway and we all live happily ever after in equal squalor. My favorite, though, were the comments about how man survived the last ice age and he’d survive this one, as long as he learned from his mistakes. So man caused the last ice age, didn’t learn from his mistakes, and here we go again. Special effects were great, though, and the characters were likable.
I have to say I liked the movie (it’s a disaster movie, after all), and see all the global warming bunk and the ending on a par with the ending of Mars Attacks: “I think we should all live in teepees.” (Maybe they should have had Slim Whitman as head of the U.N. )
BTW, I saw Starship Troopers II in a video store. When did that happen? No one seems to have liked the first one. 
quote:
I would put this movie in the same category as all the other "disaster" movies that have been made, Deep Impact, Armageddon, Twister, Dante's Peak, and give it a passing grade.
The *current* event in Kuwait has less relevance than centuries of *past* events in U.S. history for this reason: Kuwait is half a world away in the middle of hostile territory that, in my opinion, we might own but never really control. And the owning is a bit dubious because the entire world would be against us if we were to make such a move. There are no Americans there, it is not worth it.
When we have wanted territory, however, really wanted it. When Americans reached out and put their foot on land and said "mine" the government has said "ok!" And I'm not just speaking of American Indians, although that is a good example. We also ripped Texas and the southwestern states away from Mexico for no good reason. Thomas Jefferson's "Manifest Destiny" drove us, and we bought into it without hestitation.
There are no Americans trying to settle in Kuwait. They have oil, true, but we can be benevolent with that country for the reasons I mentioned above. It is an entirely different scenario.
Now, let's go to the movie's imposible hypothetical. The continental U.S. and Alaska are covered by a big sheet of ice. They are uninhabitable. Every U.S. citizen who could escape has crossed the border to Mexico, and the U.S. government is ther ein exile.
All of a sudden, we want that land. We have American citizens there and a real need for it. Does this situation seem more similiar to Kuwait or to us ripping Texas away from Mexico? Heck, w've got bettter motivation this time...survivalist motivation, because we dcan't go back to the U.S. and we certainly are too superior to accept governing by the Mexicans.
I do not believe that the U.S. is a gentle giant today. I just think there's nothing we particularly want at the moment. How easy to sound benevolent when you've reached your "manifest destiny" and popular opinion would be against you because there's no reason to send our boyus off to fight and die for a place where no Americans live. We are very ego-centric. We got into WWII because suddenly American lives were at stake, despite the fact that the president would have preferred an earlier entry. We got into Kuwait because American oil interests were at atake. We fought the Indians because Americans wanted that land. We fought Mexico because Americans wanted that land.
So please, show me where in history Americans would stop from taking Mexico if all of a sudden that land became attractive to them.
BTW, Kolona, I don't understand your attack at all. You had not seen the movie, and yet you were trying to argue as if you knew exactly what I was talking about. Now that you have, I feel like I can talk to you about this. It was not a foolish concern, it was quite valid. To be honest, i failed to understand how you could disagree with me once you knew what the situation was. Obviously, I was wrong about that. (Oh my God I was wrong! ) And I do think you have fallen for propoganda. The whole "gentle giant" line is utter bologna (I don't like to cuss or I'd use the other word ). I've never seen any evidence that the U.S. is anything but a self-centered, opportunistic giant that has not, in recent years, found any oportunities worth seizing. If you can show me an example of true benevolence I will rethink that claim, but just because we don't take over a tiny, oil-rich country, doesn't mean we're benevolent. It may just mean there are other forces at work, such as the global society we are a part of and a hostile population that would not welcome U.S. control. In other words, it's more trouble than it's worth.
How about Cuba? It's close and communist. It used to be a beautiful vacation spot and could be again. It would be in the United States' best interest to take it over. Since the fall of the Soviet Union, I doubt the international community would bat an eye if we invaded.
So why don't we? Because we're not an empire. Maybe we were an empire once, but I doubt anyone looked at it that way. The American Indians were just "godless savages" and the borders with Mexico were still in dispute with rival colonists. (Texas was also under the impression it would be a soverign nation.)
Perhaps we'd consider invading Mexico if they wouldn't take our refugees in a disaster, but we'd never have time to mobilize the army if the earth froze over the weekend. Of course, unless Mexico was willing to shoot them all, scads of private citizens would just pour over the border anyway. I doubt anyone would remain civilized and patient (regardless of nationality) when a glacier just rolled over his country and home.
Not that the situation is even possible. The glaciers aren't going to roll down to Southern California in 48 hours. The most radical, believable, theory takes at least 30 years to start things in motion. It's more likely it would take hundreds.
But it's amazing what humans start to do when survival is at stake. When we are competing for resources. It's not really an American thing as much as it is a human thing...although Americans have not absented themselves from this observation of human nature. In our hypothetical situation all bets are off....it's a new land grab. And frankly, Americans have GUNS, a lot of them. We've got more guns that people.
I have very strong feelings, but they are mine and I don't think that this is really the place to go into them. The US is not a homogenous nation.
In Africa: Bechuanaland, British Togoland,
Cameroon, Gold Coast, Egypt, Kenya, Nigeria,
Northern Rhodesia, Sierra Leone, Somaliland,
South Africa, Southern Rhodesia, South West Africa, Sudan, Tanganyika, Uganda.
In the Americas and Atlantic: Ascension Island, British Guiana, British Honduras,
Canada, Falkland Islands, Newfoundland, West Indies, Anguilla, Antigua and Barbuda, Bahamas, Barbados, Bermuda, British Virgin Islands, Cayman Islands, Dominica, Grenada, Jamaica, Montserrat, Saint Kitts and Nevis, Saint Lucia, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, South Georgia & South Sandwich Islands, Trinidad and Tobago, Turks and Caicos Islands, St Helena, Tristan da Cunha.
In Antartica: British Antarctic Territory.
In Asia: Aden, Bhutan, British New Guinea,
British Indian Ocean Territory, Brunei, Burma, Ceylon, Hong Kong, India, Iraq, Kuwait, Malaya, Maldives, Palestine, Nepal, North Borneo, Oman, Qatar, Sarawak, Singapore, Transjordan, Trucial States.
In Europe: Cyprus, Gibraltar, Malta, United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland.
In the Pacific: Australia, Ellice Islands, Fiji, Gilbert Islands, Nauru, New Zealand,
Pitcairn, Solomon Islands, Tonga.
The ones marked in bold are the ones still controlled by the British Empire today (and I must point out that it controls only Northern Ireland now, not all of Ireland.)
Now, the point of this infodump is to show that the world situation has changed dramatically since the 19th and early 20th centuries. The vast majority of the territory that is no longer under British control was not taken away from the British Empire; it was released because Britain no longer had the will to maintain an empire.
Now, given that the British arguably have the second most powerful military in the world (because they are technologically superior to the Russian and Chinese militaries), if Britain decided to start re-conquering its Empire, much of it could be re-taken without serious opposition. (Oh, there would no doubt be low-level fighting that would continue for a while, as there is in Iraq today, but by any historical standards, the casualties taken by the U.S. and its allies in Iraq are extremely low.)
But conquering territory in order to add it to one's country is something that really isn't considered acceptable any more -- particularly by democracies.
If the U.S. wanted to take over the oil wells of Mexico, does anyone here think the Mexican military would be able to stop us? Why don't we do that? We don't want to.
To some extent, it may look like I'm validating Christine's point that the U.S. has not found anything worth seizing in recent years.
But I think there are other things at work: our threshhold for what's worth seizing has changed. The parameters for what we consider to be acceptable conduct on our own part have changed.
As our recent invasion of Iraq has shown, if the U.S. wants to do something, it doesn't matter much what "the global society we are a part of" thinks about it. The disapproval of France, Russia, China and Germany is not much of a restraint on U.S. action.
Look at how outraged we were about the abuse that happened at Abu Ghraib. We were upset as a nation -- not because of what the Europeans would think of us -- but because that went against how we like to think of ourselves.
The U.S. has deliberately been less destructive than we are capable of being. Not because of world opinion -- even if you accused U.S. soldiers of eating fried Iraqi babies for breakfast, world opinion of the U.S. wouldn't sink much further than it already has -- but because we really would rather not cause civilian casualties.
What does restrain U.S. action? Our own beliefs about our nation. We want to believe we are fighting on the side of good, on the side of freedom. That is why we try to act like a gentle giant.
The restraints on our actions are internal, not external.
Now, with all that said, if the U.S. were facing annihilation (whether by weather or other forces), I doubt we would go gently into that good night. Would we use our military to take over part (or all) of Mexico? Possibly, maybe even probably.
But we tend to judge things that people do in trying to survive differently from the things they do at other times. We tend to judge nations similarly.
So I believe Christine is right that in extreme circumstances such as those in the movie, the U.S. might seize territory by force. But I believe Christine is wrong in thinking that the only reason we don't seize territory now the way we used to is that we've run out of things worth seizing.
But that doesn't make our country "evil imperialists." Your scenario requires the destruction of our way of life before we brake our moral code. That say to me that we are, in fact, the "gentle giant" we believe ourselves to be.
I wonder if this conversation is still related to writing in some way.
My only point, from the beginning, whatever my garbled postings since then have become, is that in a survivalist situation wherein the entire U.S. has become unihabitable, we would not stop at grabbing any territory we could get our hands on. I felt that this made the movie unrealistic in yet another way.
All this stuff about imperialist tendencies is compltely irrelevant, though I let myself stray that way. I do not believe that the U.S. currently has any imperialistic tendencies. They have in the apst, they might again in the future, but I am no expert. My only suggestion was based on a hypothetical situation, which was why I did not really want to get into Kolona's response in the first place...the one in which she pulled current political scenarios into play in a completely hypothetical and extreme situation that would completely change the world, political climate, and culture of the U.S. as we know it.
I apologize for not making sense. This was my only point. I will no longer comment on any other point. In fact, I'd really prefer if the conversation ended since this has lost any connection it might have had with writing, but I understand if you want to put in your final words.
[This message has been edited by Christine (edited June 03, 2004).]
[This message has been edited by Christine (edited June 03, 2004).]
I think you're probably right.
I'd like to encourage you all to go back to discussing SF movies, now, though.
(And fantasy movies--I've heard that the latest Harry Potter movie is getting much better reviews from the critics than the previous two. I'm going to see it tomorrow.)
quote:
My only point...is that in a survivalist situation wherein the entire U.S. has become unihabitable, we would not stop at grabbing any territory we could get our hands on.
quote:
So I believe Christine is right that in extreme circumstances such as those in the movie, the U.S. might seize territory by force.
quote:
but the truth is we wouldn't have made a deal with mexico, we'd have taken over their country.
My objection is to the idea that we wouldn't first attempt to deal, but would use force immediately. Sure, if Mexico or whoever put our backs against the wall in refusing to deal or giving wholly unpalatable ultimatums, all bets would be off. But Christine’s point was that “we wouldn’t have made a deal.”
In passing, I have to wonder why we’re besieged on every side to paint other cultures in the best possible light, but not our own. If that’s multiculturalism, leave me out.
There's no disagreement from me, Gen, with the "impacts of climate change" -- there have been ice ages in the past, after all. It's "anthropogenic climate change" that's the problem, if, as I understand the term, means man causes it. (And of course I’m talking about cataclysmic stuff, not cloud seeding or any such thing. Actually, I’m not even sure if cloud seeding works. ) I wouldn't pretend to be an expert, but I have read a bit and there are enough reputable science figures not buying it. I think we can probably be safe in saying that since there have been ice ages in the past, there probably will be in the future, man or no man. The Earth has warmed and cooled in the past, it'll warm and cool in the future without any help from us.
I like what someone named Spengler (?) wrote in the Asia Times Online:
quote:
Anaylsis of global temperature is a subtle issue about which reasonable men might in good faith reach different conclusions. The evangelical zealotry that motivates the global-warmers has a different source than the facts."
[This message has been edited by Kolona (edited June 03, 2004).]
quote:Monolith--
....lemme know what you guys think...about my latest posting...
I'm afraid I don't really have anything to say about the content of your post, but I've been absolutely itching to say something about your posts in general, and this is my chance:
Lay off the ellipses.
I tell you, all those dots are driving me nuts. Do you use that many in your fiction? If so, do yourself a favor and absolutely forbid yourself to use any for about a month. You might want to cut them out of your posts for a month, anyway, even if you don't usually put them in your other writing.
I hope this doesn't sound rude. I'm just trying to point out something you might not have noticed.
One thing you've overlooked is Mexico's territory WOULD be incredibly useful for us to own right now, and we do not make any moves to take it. There is a lot of oil, and there are a lot of other really useful resources down there that would be fantastic for us to own, but the U.S. imperialism of times past has now faded away. For that matter, Iraq would be INCREDIBLY handy for us to own, and we've got a really good opportunity to take it, but we don't because we want them to be free and independent. That's about as unimperialistic as a country can get. When is the last time the U.S. took over any country/land/entity that wasn't already part of the U.S.? The U.S. has changed a LOT since the era of manifest destiny.
[This message has been edited by Christine (edited June 04, 2004).]
No it doesn't.
Err, hold on...
quote:
M: Oh look, this isn't an argument.
A: Yes it is.
M: No it isn't. It's just contradiction.
A: No it isn't.
M: It is!
A: It is not.
M: Look, you just contradicted me.
A: I did not.
M: Oh you did!!
That should do us for now.
No it shouldn't.
And I liked it. I didn't even mind that Gary Oldham played Sirius Black. Michael Gambon did a good job as Dumbledore, and Emma Thompson was obviously having lots of fun.
We just got back from taking the kiddos, and it was great fun. Having said that, I felt that it was a movie simply for those who have read the book. So much was left out, and so little explained, I wonder how those who haven't read the book followed along.
But, then again, I build myself up for these things like it's Christmas, or something! And after recently reading Book #3 aloud to my munchkins, I was a bit disappointed.
Ah, well. It was great eye candy! Weren't the hippogriff scenes great?!
~L.L.
My daughter said that there was a lot missing, but she's said that about the other two movies as well.
You can't get all of a book into a movie.
For anyone interested in how someone turns a book into a movie script, I'd recommend William Goldman's two books on the subject:
ADVENTURES IN THE SCREEN TRADE
WHICH LIE DID I TELL? MORE ADVENTURES IN THE SCREEN TRADE
That said, GATTACA was a pretty cool surrealist fantasy.
I agree with Christine that if the existing territory of the U.S. became uninhabitable, then we would invade Mexico. I agree with Kolona that this would not be an official action of the U.S. government.
But you send 350 million people across a border, many of whom have guns and refuse to live by the laws of foreigners (or even learn Spanish), and it doesn't matter two cents one way or another what the respective governments think of what should happen.
As for The Day After Tomorrow being 'thought provoking' because it can get otherwise sensible people to fight like cats...do I really have to say what I think of that notion? A 'thought provoking' movie provokes thought, not mindless arguments.
SPOILER:
I didn't buy that the father and his two buddies walked from just outside Philadelphia, where they hit the truck, to downtown NYC. In the best of conditions, it's doubtful but in the conditions shown in the movie...nuh-uh. Didn't happen.
Also, why'd Dad do it? He himself said that the worst of the storms would pass in about seven days. Why didn't he just go to Mexico with the rest of the evacuees and then fly a helicopter back to get his son? Why risk his life and his buddies to get there only three days' sooner...his son, for all he knew, would have been just as dead or just as safe for three days.
I'm so overthinking this. On the plus side, the special effects rocked...loved the tornadoes in L.A.
In fact, that last word there, while not dispositive, tends to place a work of fiction into the science fiction genre. As does the fact that it takes place in the future and involves genetic engineering.
I don't know what the markers are for surrealist fantasy (other than fancy business suits, but a lot of legal dramas have those, too), but I didn't notice any dragons, wizards, spells, or magical items that are the usual fantasy markers.
As technology, that's the stupidest thing you could imagine...but it very effectively makes the device a magical artifact.I mean, we're not talking about a passanger liner, it's a rocket with a crew of six or so, all of whom are...EJ, you did see the movie, right? That scene was totally surreal. And the premise of the movie wasn't genetics from a science fictional standpoint, but as a fantasy element.
It's like saying that if Valinor were in orbit rather than in the West (so that in the end Frodo and Bilbo leave in a spaceship rather than a sailship), then The Lord of the Rings would have been science fiction. Such is simply not the case.
quote:
Like the way that the little genetic scanners would display static that gradually cleared to show a picture As technology, that's the stupidest thing you could imagine...but it very effectively makes the device a magical artifact.
It looks cool on screen, but it's totally unrealistic -- either the computer would have the whole launch code or else it would have a rejected launch code.
So, that means the computer was really a magical artifact, and Wargames was fantasy, not science fiction?
No, it just mean the people who made the movie wanted something that would look cool on screen.
quote:
It's like saying that if Valinor were in orbit rather than in the West (so that in the end Frodo and Bilbo leave in a spaceship rather than a sailship), then The Lord of the Rings would have been science fiction. Such is simply not the case.
Let's assume that J. R. R. Tolkien did write that Valinor was in orbit and Frodo and Bilbo leave in a spaceship. Those would be markers for science fiction, true.
Does LOTR have dragons? Yes.
Does LOTR have wizards? Yes.
Does LOTR have spells? Yes.
Does LOTR have magical items? Yes.
Hmm, I'd have to say that LOTR is fantasy, despite some science fiction aspects.
quote:
My point is that in GATTACA, all the SciFi props unabashadly serve as magic, not technology or science.
I can make an argument based on inferring the response time in rejecting an incorrect code that would allow WOPR (AKA Joshua) to infer whether enough of the code was similar to the correct code (ala MastermindTM), but I won't bother. The fact is that there were plenty of things used in that movie that were to make it look better on screen (one technique they used a lot is the thing where they project the image from a screen the character is watching onto the actor's whole face, since you can't really see it just in their eyes the way you can in real life).
But the fact remains that they were trying to make it as realistic as they could. The artistic intent of GATTACA was fundamentally different. It isn't a case of "rubber science" or whatever you want to call it (which is why I brought up Godsend)...this is a difference that goes beyond being scientifically accurate. In the case of GATTACA, we have a surreal portrayal of one man's struggle against the unreal people.
Fantasy doesn't mean dragons, wizards, spells, and so forth. And most especially surrealist fantasy, which is what I called this. But if you like, all the fantasy elements are there...they are in most stories, though. The main reason I point to GATTACA as surrealist fantasy is because that is how the director chose to portray it.
OSC says that he doesn't really write science fiction. He writes fantasy with science as the magic.
I submit that over half of the so-called science fiction writers out there probably do the same thing.
I have to agree with Survivor on GATTACA. It was about science/technology, but it was presented in a surrealistic way, and the science really was treated like magic.
In a more general definition of science fiction (how a certain technology would affect our lives if it continued on in a certain way), GATTACA qualifies as science fiction. But it was only metaphorically science fiction.
The movie wasn't really about how the technology affected people's lives as much as it was about how people use whatever is available (in this case technology) to oppress each other and how the human spirit will not allow itself to stay oppressed. Humans will always find a way out of oppression.
I have not seen Day After Tomorrow yet, but know several people who have. They basically told me to “enjoy the special effects but bring along some hearing protection for scenes where one of the 'scientists' opens his/her mouth.” They said the precaution would save me a bit of trouble and a mild headache. I liked OSC's review of the film where he said something along the lines of "leave your brain at home, it'll only get in the way." That just about sums it up for me, though I'll probably end up ignoring his advice, carting my analytical thought processes along anyway. Foolish, but that's the way things go…unfortunately.
Inkwell
------------------
"The difference between a writer and someone who says they want to write is merely the width of a postage stamp."
-Anonymous
The concept I simply do not understand in what you are saying is the idea that the science/technology in the movie was treated like magic.
What do you mean by that?
You can't mean that the technology didn't work the way such technology actually would work, or that the science/technology in the movie is used merely to produce the desired result without regard for actual science, because by that standard probably 99% of what people consider to be science movies fiction are actually fantasy movies.
You can't mean that the characters did not understand how the technology worked within their world, because the vast majority of people do not understand how cell phones work, but that does not mean they think cell phones are magic.
So, what do you mean?
I grant that that definition of magic goes against what was discussed a while ago with Survivor. I submit that part of the reason Survivor caught so much flack in that discussion is because a lot of people tend to think of magic as being as arcane to them as science (or at least some science) is--whether they consider it a technology or not.
When I say that I think a lot of science fiction writers use science as the magic, I don't mean they don't believe it's a technology, I mean that they don't really understand it the way a scientist does--they just use it. Some don't even check with real scientists to make sure that they can use it the way the use it in their stories.
And I think that all Survivor was saying about GATTACA is that the people who made that movie were using the science not as science but as metaphor.
How about if we just say that Survivor is sensitive to what he perceives as the surrealistic aspects of the movie, and that since "surreal" and "science fiction" don't really go together, he put "surreal" with "fantasy?"
I do presume to think that I "get" what he says most of the time, and I don't think that's because I've met him and talked to him in person. I think it's because my brain is able to sort of quirk itself around the ideas he shares with us.
From my point of view, when deciding whether something is science fiction or fantasy, it matters whether the people using a device consider it to be of magical or technological origin, as well as whether the audience would consider it of magical or technological origin.
Ask someone from our society whether a cell phone is technology or magic, and he'll say it's technology.
Well, of course he thinks that -- he has a cell phone (or at least knows someone who does.)
What about a cell phone that could send and receive 3D holographic images? Not currently possible, but still technology.
What about a cell phone that allowed FTL communication (instantly translated) with an alien species in another galaxy? Even if it's impossible and ridiculous technology, it's still technology.
What about a cell phone that allowed communication with dead people? Now that would be magic. That puts it into the realm of fantasy.
Email me if you want to take a look.
So, treating science as if it were magic doesn't change anything for me. But if the "science" being used seems magical because it follows different rules than the science we know, then yeah, that matters a lot. (I don't mean it can't go beyond our current day science, or even contradict it--as long as it's made clear that in the future they found out we were wrong about something.)
[This message has been edited by rickfisher (edited June 11, 2004).]
quote:
What about a cell phone that allowed communication with dead people? Now that would be magic. That puts it into the realm of fantasy.
Not too be nitpicky, but using technology to store a human consciousness after death is an old SF staple by now. You've used that idea yourself. By the standard you cite, the story was fantasy.
Even the idea that there is a physically existing "soul" or somesuch which retains the memories and personality of a dead person is presented in good SF, as are devices to detect and communicate with such entities. So really, if it was a cell phone that you could use to talk to a dead person of even this sort, it could easily be SF.
That's why I shied away from using Lutherian definitions of what is fantasy and what is science fiction. In my view, it depends on how the writer chooses to portray it, as having the characteristics of a science based technology or an arcane technology.
In GATTACA, there are the surrealist effects chosen by the director. But there is also the way that the technology of genetic prediction and identification is treated as arcana. We never get an examination of how myopia tends to be genetically linked to greater imaginative and intellectual capacities, or how a gene that predicts heart failure might be linked to greater drive, or how a man that lacks any genetic predisposition towards violence can nevertheless carry out a brutal crime.
And yet, all of these are elements in the movie. By not chosing to examine the technology from a scientific standpoint in these cases, the writer (not the director) chooses to paint the technology as having an arcane basis rather than a scientific one. It is part of the point made by the movie, that this technology is treated as magic rather than science.
That said, the surrealist presentation should be clue enough.