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The Wired Top Twenty Sci-Fi Movies 518

Posted by michael from the not-a-date-movie-in-the-bunch dept.
blamanj writes "The June issue of Wired includes a list of the top 20 Sci-Fi movies, based on ranking a combination of Adrenaline, Vision, and Precision. Somehow, they came up with (yawn) Gattaca as the #2 SF movie of all time!?! Their rating system was based on one by Josh Calder, who also uses a three-point (Futurism, Entertainment, Plausibility) system, and has the same movie at #2, BTW. Clearly, I think using such a scale gives odd results, but what if it were weighted differently, e.g., Vision is worth 2x Adrenaline, would it be a better list? And, more importantly, what are the real top 20 films? And wouldn't that list have to include Forbidden Planet?"
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The Wired Top Twenty Sci-Fi Movies More

The Wired Top Twenty Sci-Fi Movies

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  • Hells yeah, it would have to include Forbidden Planet. Id, Krell Metal, Leslie Nielson as a starship captain, ROBBIE!

    And GaTtaCA? I rarely use it myself, sir. It promotes rust.
    • Oh yeah; was glad to see "The Day the Earth Stood Still" made the list. Klatoo, Verada, Nickto gets too much recognition from Army of Darkness. These kids today; bunch of savages. Ooh! Silent running should be on the list, too. (No, not Logan's Run or Blade RUnner. The other one... the one about flying forests and such.)
      • The list has to be a joke.
        What about the following movies:

        Destination Moon
        Invaders from Mars
        Fantastic Voyage
        It came from Outer Space
        Fahrenheit 451
        When Worlds Collide
        The Blob
        1984
        Dr. Strangelove (well, maybe not)
        War of the Worlds (!)
        The Thing
        Invasion of the Body Snatchers
        The andromeda strain
        Fantastic Planet
        Westworld

        Having the matrix beat out any of the above shows exactly how silly it is. And what's this Barbarella shit? There are teems of drug-influenced sci fi movies with naked women that are better.

  • All English-language (Score:3, Interesting)

    by mccalli ( 323026 ) on Monday May 20, 2002 @06:33AM (#3549245) Homepage
    What about Solaris? Alphaville? And the legend...Metropolis?

    Cheers
    , Ian

    • Oops...missed Akira.


      Cheers,

      Ian

    • Re:All English-language (Score:4, Funny)

      by skroz ( 7870 ) on Monday May 20, 2002 @06:41AM (#3549271) Homepage
      What about Solaris? It hasn't been the same since version 2.6, I say. All of that weird skipping of versions and everything just got strange. It's unnatural, I tell you! See, first we had version one, thentwothenthreethenfourthenfive. OK, we're doing well. Then we jumped to one again, but the five was still in there. So really it was two versions. Then we had some other weirdness for a while, and 5.6 was 2.6, but... ok, I could deal with that. Then SEVEN, which was really 5.7 which was really 2.7. Huh? Where does five become 2.6 then become seven? Huh? Now eight and nine? It's unnatural! You just don't DO that. YOu may as well write parts four, five, and six, then promise seven,eight and nine, make one,two, and three and decide not to make seven, eight and nine, then decide to make ten, eleven, and twelve! It's not right! Not right, I tell you! Soylent green is JAR JAR! JAR JAR I TELL YOU!

      What were we talking about again?
    • Solaris - terrible, one of the worst films ever made. Not read the book, though, so I don't know where the blame lies.

      Alphaville - Not seen it.

      Metropolis - classic, everyone should see it once.

      TWW

    • Solaris was not really a sci-fi movie. Yes, visually and superficially it had all the characteristics of a sci-fi movie : space travel, aliens, technology from the future, etc, but that wasnt the point of the movie. The director was really exploring the boundaries between perception and reality. If your mind is convinced that something is real, is that reality distinguishable in any way from a "reality" that exists outside of your mind?

      Solaris falls into the category of "art" movies - movies that incorporate an artistic vision rather than offering entertainment value. Since the vast majority of movie goers watch movies for entertainment rather than art appreciation, I can understand how Solaris doesnt come up in any of the movie lists. But as a movie - it is magnificient! (So are so some of the other movies by the director (Andrei Tarkovsky)).

      In response to another poster in this same thread about how it is slow paced - not really. Generally art movies are slower paced only to folks who lack the training to appreciate the genre. If you know what to watch for, a higher tempo in an art film can cause one to miss the zillion different nuances that art movie directors incorporate into their vision. Like paintings, these movies are painstakingly crafted - not filmed.

  • Pffffft! (Score:4, Insightful)

    by davmoo ( 63521 ) on Monday May 20, 2002 @06:34AM (#3549249)
    Any list of sci-fi that does not include either Forbidden Planet or Fantastic Voyage in the top 20 cannot be correct. Likewise, as much as I do love Bladerunner, it cannot possibly be rated as the number one sci-fi movie of all time by any sane person. Altered States has to be in there somewhere too. Finally, the fact that Barbarella even appears anywhere on the list only serves to remove any shred of credibility for the author...
    • I agreed with Bladerunner being #1 on the list. I did miss, however, Total Recall. IMHO that should have been on the list. Although a Clockwork Orange is a good movie, does it really qualify as Sci-Fi? Perhaps Total Recall could have taken that spot.

      I'm a little unsure about Jurassic Park being on the list. Sure it's another good movie, but these are supposed to be the best Sci-Fi movies. I would have put Aliens or T2-Judgement day on the list in order to have 2 from the same series.

    • Finally, the fact that Barbarella even appears anywhere on the list only serves to remove any shred of credibility for the author...

      I've banned myself from watching Barbarella any more -- it's a regular at our summer outdoor theater, and every time I saw it, I'd laugh so hard, for pretty much the entire duration of the film, that it was incredibly painful...

      Good for a laugh, but not particularly in the way the creators intended. :)

  • heh (Score:2, Interesting)

    by murat ( 262137 )
    Star Wars is #10 and Jurassic Park shit is #9. This is not fair.
    But what makes a truly great sci-fi flick isn't just popcorn appeal; it's how well a world is conceived, developed, and realized. Wired's team of serious science fiction fans - led by Josh Calder, who rates films in depth at Futuristmovies.com - determined our rankings by three calibrating factors: a film's power to enthrall and excite (Adrenaline), how well it presents a scenario for the future (Vision), and whether the science behind the fiction holds up (Precision). Disagree?

    Yes, i disagree. I think "Precision" is not that important. (Read: Bugs in matrix does not make it a bad movie. It's rated #3 though.)
    BTW, Sci-fi does not mean a "Vision" of future. Take Star Wars. It says "a long time ago, in a galaxy far far away".

    • Re:heh (Score:2, Interesting)

      by eXtro ( 258933 )
      Star Wars is no more science fiction than the Lord of the Rings. It's a fantasy with robots and spaceships instead of trolls and horses. To me science fiction has to include "science" as an important plot point, it can't just be part of the setting. There aren't actually many movies that really are science fiction, most would more accurately be called period pieces where the period happens to be some point in the future or in Star Wars case some futuristic past.
    • By this standard, Jurassic Park should not have made the list. The "science" presented there is painful to think about after four years as a biology major. Star Wars, likewise; mystic fields surrounding every living thing sound more like Scientology than Science Fiction. The difference is that Star Wars doesn't ever try to pass its bullshit off as realistic. Forbidden Planet might actually score high on this scale; I thought the Id monster was sort of cool (and effects hold up surprisingly well for a '50s film).

      I'm sick of top-whatever lists. They invariably fuck something up and piss a bunch of fans off, and are always too smug in their rating system. Don't tell me what sci-fi films to *like*, just tell me what's worth watching that I haven't seen yet.
  • So genetic reconstruction of dinosaurs ranks above blurred virtual reality and a revolt against videogames in plausibility? I think there are some serious omissions in this list :(
  • a viable scale should put Science fFirst, fFiction second. just as the genre name implies. (sorry, star wars fFans) however, also important are vision, and precedent.

    fFor example, fForbidden planet earns more points than any star trek movie, simply because it is more ground-breaking. essentially, they are similar concepts. so the one which is older gets higher points.

    of course, age isnt necesarilly a winner. AI should get a high score based on it's clarity of concept.

    see, there's a lot more categories fFor scoring than these people are allowing. so of course it will come out weird with uncommon movies with high ranks. they arent taking into account the Cool fFactor, and the directoring skill and all those things that make a movie into a Good Movie.

  • T1 (Score:3, Interesting)

    by 3141 ( 468289 ) on Monday May 20, 2002 @06:40AM (#3549268) Homepage
    Excellent! At last someone recognises that Terminator is superior to Terminator 2. I have to wonder, though, how could anyone rate Jurassic Park higher than Star Wars?

    What a shame the write-ups are so cursory. A few sentences more and maybe a few images wouldn't have hurt.

    • Re:T1 (Score:3, Interesting)

      by Sloppy ( 14984 )

      I have to wonder, though, how could anyone rate Jurassic Park higher than Star Wars?

      In terms of how enjoyable the movie is, it is hard to do; I prefer Star Wars as well. But if you just look at the movies in terms of science fiction aspects, it makes a lot of sense. Jurassic Park contains actual elements of science fiction: if someone figured out how to get dinosaur DNA, what might happen? Now look at Star Wars -- is there any science fiction in it at all? It probably doesn't even belong on the list any more than Leprechaun 4.

  • Perhaps it would have been more informative if they stored each of the three components' rating and gave you a gauge to choose the rating formula that suits you?

    It would be interesting to see the top20 when setting both Vision and Presition to 4, and Adrenaline to 2...

  • What a load of... (Score:4, Informative)

    by Mwongozi ( 176765 ) <slashthree&davidglover,org> on Monday May 20, 2002 @06:42AM (#3549274) Homepage

    IMDB have a much better weighted ranking system based on user votes. Their top Sci-Fi movies are:


    1 Star Wars (1977) [imdb.com] 8.7/10 (77559 votes)
    2 Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb (1964) [imdb.com] 8.7/10 (31705 votes)
    3 Star Wars: Episode V - The Empire Strikes Back (1980) [imdb.com] 8.6/10 (58919 votes)
    4 Matrix, The (1999) [imdb.com] 8.3/10 (69300 votes)
    5 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968) [imdb.com] 8.3/10 (36486 votes)
    6 Metropolis (1927) [imdb.com] 8.2/10 (5187 votes)
    7 Donnie Darko (2001) [imdb.com] 8.2/10 (3590 votes)
    8 Alien (1979) [imdb.com] 8.2/10 (32155 votes)
    9 Clockwork Orange, A (1971) [imdb.com] 8.2/10 (32662 votes)
    10 Star Wars: Episode II - Attack of the Clones (2002) [imdb.com] 8.2/10 (11199 votes)
    11 Blade Runner (1982) [imdb.com] 8.1/10 (42768 votes)
    12 Spider-Man (2002) [imdb.com] 8.1/10 (10504 votes)
    13 Aliens (1986) [imdb.com] 8.1/10 (35399 votes)
    14 Iron Giant, The (1999) [imdb.com] 8.0/10 (6877 votes)
    15 Star Wars: Episode VI - Return of the Jedi (1983) [imdb.com] 8.0/10 (44823 votes)
    16 Abre los ojos (1997) [imdb.com] 7.9/10 (2873 votes)
    17 Brazil (1985) [imdb.com] 7.9/10 (17398 votes)
    18 Terminator 2: Judgment Day (1991) [imdb.com] 7.9/10 (39419 votes)
    19 Day the Earth Stood Still, The (1951) [imdb.com] 7.9/10 (5131 votes)
    20 Back to the Future (1985) [imdb.com] 7.8/10 (34951 votes)
    • While I agree that in general, IMDB ratings give a good impression of the "quality" of a film, they are somewhat biased towards new films, as shown by the positions of Episode II and Spider-Man, probably The Matrix and also Donnie Darko (haven't seen the last). The rating tends to be signifcantly higher shortly after release than a few years later. Audience overwhelmed by the cinema experience versus video watchers?

    • Re:What a load of... (Score:3, Insightful)

      by ajs ( 35943 )
      The IMDB shows popularity. It swings with the times, based on what fan and commercial sites (and Amazon itslef, which owns IMDB) are directing people to the movie pages. Apply some age-based weighting in your head based on that. If you've never heard of a movie and it's on the IMDB top 250 (or top 50 in a genre), it's probably brand new or a pretty damn good movie. If it's on the list and it came out in the last six months, it's probably just popular. Every now and then something current will get on the list and stay, but it's rare, as well it should be.

  • Gattaca: Yes; Jurassic Park, etc: No (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Damek ( 515688 ) <[adam] [at] [damek.org]> on Monday May 20, 2002 @06:44AM (#3549284) Homepage
    Yes, as a few others have said, this list leaves out some obvious classics in favor of some obvious blockbusters. eXistenZ is definitely a great movie, and Jurassic Park was a waste of time. Shiney and pretty, yes - good movie, no.

    But, come on, Gattaca being a "yawn" ?? Gattaca is an excellent film, and it is science fiction. It's one of the most "real" science fiction films I've ever seen. The acting is superb, and the ending is terribly emotional. No, it doesn't have lasers and battles and monsters and millions of dollars of special effects, but as a sci-fi film I've always thought everyone should go see it. People who complain that sci-fi is just for geeky teens who never really grow up would do themselves a favor by seeing that film. It's quite brilliantly done.
    • There was an epilogue which was dropped, however it was put on the DVD in the extras showing the perils of judging people by their heritage by listing some of the persons with defects and what they have achieved.

      Excellent film, and very much a warning notice which is one of the functions of Sci-Fi.

      An interesting side note is that one of the 'features' tested was how futuristic the film was. In Gattaca, the building where most of the action took place is a 70s public-library and the cars/clothing used was out of the 50s (but the cars had a turbine like whine to them).

    • But, come on, Gattaca being a "yawn" ?? Gattaca is an excellent film, and it is science fiction. It's one of the most "real" science fiction films I've ever seen. The acting is superb, and the ending is terribly emotional. No, it doesn't have lasers and battles and monsters and millions of dollars of special effects, but as a sci-fi film I've always thought everyone should go see it. People who complain that sci-fi is just for geeky teens who never really grow up would do themselves a favor by seeing that film. It's quite brilliantly done.

      I agree 100%. I rented Gattaca on video just becuase it was "a new sci-fi I hadn't seen". I didn't remember seeing it promoted in the theaters. Sci-Fi, Uma Thurman (yowza), Ethan Hawke. A cheap way to spend a couple hours.

      Since I had no expectations, I was totally blown away by how good that movie was. "There is no gene for the human spirit." I bought it on DVD and have seen it 10 times. It's one of my favorite movies. I recommend it to anyone.

    • Re:Gattaca: Yes; Jurassic Park, etc: No (Score:4, Interesting)

      by Jonathan ( 5011 ) on Monday May 20, 2002 @10:08AM (#3550711) Homepage
      I didn't care for Gattaca, but as I'm a molecular biologist, it seemed to me about as plausible as "The Net" or "Hackers". Nobody in the field seriously believes that there exist individual genes for different talents, so the whole central idea of the film -- that hard work can overcome lack of a custom genetic background is just fighting against a straw-man argument that nobody holds.
      • Right, I think you missed the point of the movie. The supposed genetic superiority was more ideology than science. The genetically "superior" got the best jobs, the inferior got the menial jobs, and it was all justified by pseudoscience *exactly* the same way that northern european whites justified their ruling position in America in the late 1800s.

  • Why this happenned! (Score:4, Funny)

    by squaretorus ( 459130 ) on Monday May 20, 2002 @06:48AM (#3549304) Homepage Journal
    Ed: Fuck! Readership is down, we're becoming irrelevent!!!

    Guru: Write another list of top SciFi - wind em up and watch em go!

    Ed: But thats so old hat!

    Guru: NOT if we have a seemingly scientific rating system!

    Ed: I think I've just come!
  • Of course I think that Forbidden Planet was to be in, yet I also think that Metropolis is absolutely outstanding from most points of view (Moroder's re-edition is more suitable for our times).
    In general, "classics" seem to be forgotten from this list, apart from "The Day Earth...", and there seem to be a strong bias toward recent titles.
    Apart from that I'm obviously convinced that no schema could ever list a proper parade for what is inherently a matter of taste and opinions...
  • Anything with many written words visible on screen should be disqualified and burnt. All that does is confuse prople.

    I vote for Ferenheit 451

    Warmest regards,
    Guy Montag
  • I'd make a different list, but I'm not going to complain that any list that doesn't have Spaced Invaders on it isn't worth including.
    Having said that, Robocop deserved to be higher on the list, and I wouldn't have included Jurassic Park at all in terms of the criteria given.
    Of course, the criteria are bullshit. Futurism? that excludes every time travel movie ever made (probably). The same could be said for plausiblility. That means Terminator made it in by Entertainment values alone.

    Anyway, all kidding aside - I realise I'm the only person on Earth who thinks that Spaced Invaders (aka Martians!!!) is a truly great movie - I would've included a few other movies...

    Ghost in the Shell
    A far more visionary peek at the future, IMO, than anything listed (except, perhaps, Gattaca). For the sake of brevity, I'll list this as the only anime, even though I could fill the list with better films than these

    The Abyss
    Not just included cos it's Cameron's last good movie. There may have been better First Contact movies, but I can't think of any offhand.

    Star Trek: Generations
    Only kidding.

    • There may have been better First Contact movies, but I can't think of any offhand.

      Close Encounters of the Third Kind. I still think it's a beautiful movie, and one of Spielburg's best.
    • I agree. The Abyss, while it had some flaws, was a pretty damn good sci-fi movie. On another note, I was surprised not to see any mention of Close Encounters of the Third Kind. A little light on Science, perhaps, but pretty good.
    • Ghost in the Shell is definitely better (and more relevant) Sci Fi than Akira and any early Star Trek movie should have overtaken Star Wars (since the latter isn't Sci Fi.

  • I'm going to troll and agree with this list (Score:4, Insightful)

    by mav[LAG] ( 31387 ) on Monday May 20, 2002 @06:59AM (#3549337)
    From the article:

    But what makes a truly great sci-fi flick isn't just popcorn appeal; it's how well a world is conceived, developed, and realized. Wired's team of serious science fiction fans - led by Josh Calder, who rates films in depth at Futuristmovies.com - determined our rankings by three calibrating factors: a film's power to enthrall and excite (Adrenaline), how well it presents a scenario for the future (Vision), and whether the science behind the fiction holds up (Precision).

    The reason why I think they have it nailed can be seen in the superb replay value of most of those films - and the endless debates that they still provoke. It's not that there aren't others which are more exciting, more vision or more precision, but that the combination of the three in the ones chosen is something special.
  • First of all let me just say that I support Gattaga being in the #2 slot.

    I think that Plausibility above everything else should matter in a SciFi movie. It helps to suspend our disbelief, and truly get inmersed in the movie. For example, it is much easier to see myself, or my future children, living in a world like Gattaga rather than a world like Star Wars or Trek.

    Of course, there are many other factors involved in that, and I would say that Vision/Futurism should be a very close second, with Adrenaline being the last. That does not mean that it is not important, just that I like movies that leave me thinking after I watch them.

    Accuracy does not mean that bugs in the movie make it bad. It defines the movie as SCIENCE fiction, instead of just fiction/fantasy. That is the beauty of SciFi, the possibility that one day all the things and ideas presented in the movie will come to pass.

  • What about these landmark films? (Score:4, Interesting)

    by damianlewis ( 264542 ) on Monday May 20, 2002 @06:59AM (#3549341)
    1. Solaris
    2. Metropolis
    3. Until The End of Time
    4. Demon Seed
    5. The Lawnmower Man
    6. Slaughterhouse 5
    7. Fahrenheit 451
    8. 1984
    9. Final Fantasy
    10. They Live
    • 3. Until The End of Time

      Do you mean Till the End of Time (1946) or Until the End of the World (1991)?

      9. Final Fantasy

      Oh, come on. If you're going to pick a computer-animated movie and call it "landmark," then at least pick the gold standard: Toy Story. First full-length wholly computer animated film. Final Fantasy was terrible, both as a movie and as animation.
    • Several of those were good books but bad films. The Lawnmower Man was trash, licensing debacle notwithstanding. I did notice Metropolis was missing when I read the list, though.

  • Barbarella? (Score:4, Insightful)

    by miniver ( 1839 ) on Monday May 20, 2002 @07:02AM (#3549348) Homepage

    Who in their right mind would rank Barbarella on a Top 20 list of anything? It wouldn't even rank well on a soft pr0n list. For that matter, Sleeper doesn't belong on the list either, and much as I may have enjoyed Tron in the day, it's not a great movie.

    On the other hand, IMHO, the other movies on the list are great movies, and would make reasonable candidates for a Top-20 list, even if you or I wouldn't agree with their ordering. Just keep in mind that Top-X lists are just tools that you can choose to use or ignore them as necessary.

    • Re:Barbarella? (Score:4, Insightful)

      by Artifex ( 18308 ) on Monday May 20, 2002 @10:39AM (#3550977) Journal
      much as I may have enjoyed Tron in the day, it's not a great movie.

      I agree. It may have been groundbreaking in its graphics, and we may all believe secretly that little people live in ou computers, but it's not that great a movie.

      On the other hand, Wargames is. Ignore the surface silliness, and treat it as a near-future parable of what could happen now that machines run our "defense" networks, etc. This is a classic tale of the creation almost overthrowing the creator.

  • no Zardoz ? (Score:2, Informative)

    by DrSkwid ( 118965 )
    1. Blade Runner
    2. Gattaca
    3. The Matrix
    4. 2001: A Space Odyssey
    5. Brazil
    6. A Clockwork Orange
    7. Alien
    8. The Boys From Brazil
    9. Jurassic Park
    10. Star Wars
    11. The Road Warrior
    12. Tron
    13. The Terminator
    14. Sleeper
    15. Soylent Green
    16. RoboCop
    17. Planet Of The Apes
    18. The Day The Earth Stood Still
    19. Akira
    20. Barbarella

    Copyright © 1993-2002 The Condé Nast Publications Inc. All rights reserved.

    Copyright © 1994-2002 Wired Digital, Inc. All rights reserved.

  • Gattaca isn't suprising.. (Score:5, Insightful)

    by MongooseCN ( 139203 ) on Monday May 20, 2002 @07:11AM (#3549382) Homepage
    ...if plausibility was a major factor in it's ranking. Think about it, wouldn't employers love to use DNA testing to see if you would be a good employee? Employers can interview people in person to see what they are like but the result is just an opinion saying if the person would work well at the company. DNA testing gives you cold hard numbers though. These numbers may not represent your actual abilities but that won't stop employers from using them. Why? Employers like numbers and statistics. When employers are dealing with a 1000 employees, statistical averages is the only way employers can understand what everyone is doing, they can't look at every individual employee. Employers can say "99% of our employees have the XYZ genome sequence which means they are great workers." as oppose to "Our hiring staff only hires the best people, even though they all have different opinions about what is the best and would rather hire someone because they are fans of the same sports teams instead of actually knowing how to program...".

    Remember, you're not a person when you walk into a corporation, you're a "human resource".
    • Hrm, the Dilbert cartoon seems relevant:

      PHB: "I've been saying for years that employees are our most valuable asset. It turns out that I was wrong. Money is our most valuable asset. Employees are ninth."
      Wally: "I'm afraid to ask what came eighth."
      PHB: "Carbon paper."

  • Let it go.. (Score:5, Insightful)

    by swein515 ( 195260 ) on Monday May 20, 2002 @07:11AM (#3549384) Journal
    ...based on ranking a combination of Adrenaline, Vision, and Precision

    ...but not Writing, Acting, Direction. Don't bother flaming this folks, the premise is flawed and misleading. The article (actually a sidebar) should have been titled "Top Twenty Sci-Fi films, quality aside"

  • Effects change over time. (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Spudley ( 171066 ) on Monday May 20, 2002 @07:13AM (#3549386) Homepage Journal
    The biggest problem with a list of the "best movies of all time", in whatever category is that things change. The quality/realism of effects has obviously changed over time, but also taste (people like different sorts of movies now than they did twenty years ago), plausability (things that seemed highly probable twenty years ago look very dated now), and what's allowed to be shown (the censors have gotten more lenient over time), so that at the end of the day the best movies of all time - especially in the Sci-fi category - are going to be a highly subjective, and likely to change over time as well as from person to person.

  • Mental adrenaline? (Score:3, Interesting)

    by guygee ( 453727 ) on Monday May 20, 2002 @07:15AM (#3549402)

    Obviously, the absence of Forbidden Planet destines the Wired list for the dustbin of history.

    An ominous sense of Kafkaesque suspense actually can evoke more adrenaline than ten speeder chases. Vision and sociopolitical relevence should be weighted much more heavily than "adrenaline", anyways. The movie version of Orwell's "1984 [batcave.net] " is a case in point, on the strength of the story and its continuing social relevence, it deserves a place on the list. Also, on my list, the 1973 cult classic Zardoz [zardoz.com] blows Robocop away.

  • Where are:

    Ice Pirates
    Spaceballs
    Mars Attacks
    The Adventures of Buckaroo Bonzai
    Weird Science

    ? Any and all of these would make my top 20.

  • Stupid system, dumb results (Score:4, Interesting)

    by dipfan ( 192591 ) on Monday May 20, 2002 @07:22AM (#3549423) Homepage
    Of course these lists are only done as a piece of trollery, which is fine, but what annoys me is when they claim some psudo-scientific system behind it all - such as this ratings "system". Adrenaline, fine, that's excitement, but the other two? "Vision" - how well it presents a scenario for the future, and "Precision", whether the science behind the fiction holds up. Well, most of the movies on this list fail those two.

    I mean, take The Matrix: great film (IMHO). But vision - yeah, I can just see a near-future where man and machines fight a war, the machines win and enslave us all as power generators while building a convincing virtual world. Oh yeah, and the science holds up on that as well. Pfffft.

    Yeah, Alien as a precise and visionary view of the future: we are going to be chased around space ships by huge monsters. That works on so many levels (Homer Simpson). Terminator - yes, I can see the day (soon perhaps) when metal killing machines are sent back through time. In fact it's probably happening now, and the cyborgs are all working at Wired writing crappy ersatz movie ratings. Based on these ratings, Soylent Green shouldn't be on this list at all because none of the things it predicted for right now have come true: it's Malthusian "vision" made in the 70s turned out to be way off beam for the 21st century - unless you count playing Asteroids.

    On the other hand, under vision and precision, Robocop should probably come tops.

    Don't get me wrong, I like all the movies on the list, but all this "precision" and "vision" crap is mere justification for someone's sci-fi movie tastes.
    • Well, I have to disagree on Alien and Terminator. They score high in two areas that most science fiction films fail miserably at - technological consistency and behavioral consistency.

      In Alien, the technology is handled solidly and well. There are a few things that we don't know how to do (e.g. FTL travel and "air density" motion detectors) but those items behave consistently. They don't pull any Star Trek "dechyon fields" deus ex machina BS.

      Terminator is the same. Okay, you have to suspend disbelief about the way the time machine works ("field generated by a living organism"?) but it's consistently handled, and if we could build an AI cyborg, it could plausibly have roughly those physical capabilities. Even the time loop is consistent, not paradoxical. (Self-causing events are strange, but not self-contradictory like paradoxes. You expect time travel to have no strange consequences?)

      And the people in both movies behave like real people. They don't just split up for no reason, they don't walk into obvious traps, they fight and argue and panic. As has been pointed out, the corporate malfeasance in Alien is entirely plausible. Bill Joy and others argue that AI might well destroy us humans - it's not so silly as to render a movie about it unworthy.

      In terms of science and behavior, though, The Matrix blew chunks, as you note.

  • Gattaca is oft overlooked... but good (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Geek In Training ( 12075 ) <cb398&hotmail,com> on Monday May 20, 2002 @07:24AM (#3549431) Homepage
    I agree largely with Wired's list, with the exception of Brazil and The Boys From Brazil, neither of which I have seen. (The two don't appear related.)

    Call Gattaca a snoozer if you must, but I would place it in the top 10 SciFi films that I have seen; definitely top three on the scale they used for futurism and plausibility.

    I caught Gattaca on HBO by accident (before they jacked up the price to $13.95 a month... I don't like HBO *that* much). By the end of that month I had seen it 4 times. From the cameo of Ernest Borgnine as head janitor to the all-telling final scene; it was so completely and totally plausible that it scared me. (I won't spoil the ending if you haven't seen it, but the good doctor gives us hope that the human spirit will not be overcome by science and "genetic discrimination.")

    Rent it! Or if you are a cheap bastard, er, sorry, "poor college student with 10 megabit bandwidth and several hundred gigs of storage," download it. Some put the poo-poo on the film because it does not have enough action (AKA fight scenes and explosions), but the suspense does honor to the memory of Hitchcock. And it is a good story, despite the cardboard cut-out performance of Uma Thurman in the female lead.

    Ethan Hawke is excellent, and Jude Law is good as a spoiled genetic-elite with a spinal injury. I liked Jude better as "Gigolo Joe" in AI, though. :)

  • I looked at the list and while I don't think Blade should be #1 much less even on the list I can say some good things about it.

    I don't care what list someone comes out with but as long as it has Brazil on it has got my vote for being at least somewhat well researched. Brazil is 1984 meets Fear and Loathing. The later of which is also by Terry Gilliam. Brazil should be watched many times to fully "get it" and it should not be watched for at least 2 hours after the acid has worn off.

    I also saw that #20 was Barbarella. A must see movie. Jane Fonda in the prime of her life in some of the sexiest costumes around. I only own two movies and Barbarella is one of them. I have no VCR to play it on and I have no TV, but I can bring this to a party and pop it in after Army of Darkness and people will sit glued to their chairs.

  • It's a borderline case, but certainly more in the sci-fi vein that Barbarella was. And it's not a ray-guns and rockets knida movie, either.

    As for the Tired list, who cares about what order they're in? Just make it a 'club' of sorts, the top 20 in no particular order.

    My prefs:
    Scratch off: Clockwork Orange, Boys From Brazil (more a political pic than sci-fi), RoboCop (hardly original at the time), Barbarella (a drug fantasy more than sci-fi).
    Add on: Forbidden Planet, Metropolis, Altered States, and some choice among the original Frankenstein movies (perhaps Son of Frankenstein).

  • Gattaca *is* one of the best sci-fi movies (Score:5, Informative)

    by seldolivaw ( 179178 ) <me@NOsPaM.seldo.com> on Monday May 20, 2002 @08:21AM (#3549811) Homepage
    Not if you're looking for action and explosions, no. But 2001 is clearly a brilliant SF movie, and it's got no action at all. If action is what you want, then choose the best action movie of all time -- but for pure SF, Gattaca is definitely up there.

    And the fact that Ethan Hawke and Jude Law are total hotties is neither here nor there, obviously :-)

  • Brazil Underrated (Score:5, Informative)

    by stinkydog ( 191778 ) <<sd> <at> <strangedog.net>> on Monday May 20, 2002 @08:34AM (#3549920) Homepage
    Given today's headlines, Brazil seems to be the truest version of the future. From terrorism [yahoo.com] to coporate abuse of the population [yahoo.com] to environmental damage [yahoo.com] , Terry Gilliam has hit the nail on the head. Even the smaller details like abuse of the phone system [slashdot.org] , rouge technicians bucking the establishment [yahoo.com] , and lousy technical support [slashdot.org] ring true.

    (Leans back in chair and softly hums Brazil theme song.)

    SD

  • Movies to make you think (Score:3, Interesting)

    by theolein ( 316044 ) on Monday May 20, 2002 @08:40AM (#3549973) Journal
    I appreciate that they made Gattaca, Blade Runner and Brazil rate highly for the simple reason these movies do some justice to one of the real strongpoints of science fiction - The ability to use an abstracted situation to point out conflicting situations of the present. Whether they do it well or not is another question but they do ask to you to think.

    This is not a put down of technical effects films such as the Matrix, which also has that element of abstraction (where are we going with our preoccupation with things digital?) or terminator or the star wars series. There is a need for pure entertainment as well and everybody loves a simple action filled story full of effects and fairy tales. But disliking films because they ask you to think says more about you than it does about the movie.

    Some films that didn't make it
    A film that was never popular but also had a good mix of action and the think factor (if higly simplified) was Enemy Mine.

    And my own favourite fantasy film with brilliant acting and huge laughs was Time Bandits, also by Terry Gillam who made Brazil.

  • What I think they missed (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Rand Race ( 110288 ) on Monday May 20, 2002 @08:43AM (#3550007) Homepage
    Repo Man

    Omega Man

    12 Monkeys

    Ghost In The Shell

    Metropolis

    The Lathe of Heaven

    The Fly

    Things To Come

    Invasion of the Body Snatchers

    Rollerball


    If any confusion arises, the original is the one I'm talking about (The Fly, Body Snatchers, Rollerball).

    • Rollerball should definitely have been on the list, especially if plausability is a major factor -- blood sports, corporate-run government? Other than the fact that killing is just slightly against the rules in football, how far away are we from *that* reality?

      I also think that the original Mad Max was a much more plausable reality than the Road Warrior. A bunch of S&M types with pneumatic arrow guns that could get a supply of nitrous and not gas is far less plausable than a government that can't govern sinking into biker chaos.

      I'd vote for the Omega Man, too, as well as They Live.
  • The Day the Earth Stood Still is greatest Sci Fi movie ever made.

    And C'mon, Total Recall is the Bomb.
  • That would be great. Something along the lines of "I Heard Ramona Sing".

  • Seems like every time a new list of top n movies (as the AFI top 100 films) or television shows (as the TV Guide top comedies) or whatever shows up, there's invariably a hue and a cry from folks who don't appreciate the rankings, or the content, or a series of egregious omissions.

    It's a whole lot easier to stomach these things if you take them as a signpost and not a destination. In fact, the debate here about what does and doesn't get included and why (the why is the particularly important part, IMO) pretty much validates the creation of the list, even if I don't agree with its contents or its order. Fortunately, there's even a means of redress:

    "Disagree? Send your own picks to movielist@wiredmag.com [mailto]."

    The most unfortunate part of the article as presented is that it explains the three ranking criteria, but does not provide any evaluation as to how the movie satisfies them (for example, I imagine that it's nigh-universally agreed that The Matrix is an "adrenaline" movie, but probably much less so that it's a "precision" movie, owing to some spotty scientific principles).

    (I also have my reservations about the breadth of knowledge of films that the panel has, but the article did say "fans" and not "experts")

    I'll also echo the sentiments of some of the other Gattaca sympathizers that it's probably the most "science-y" science-fiction that I've seen in recent memory, but that's the age-old argument between the "hard" and "soft" views of whether the science or the fiction part of science fiction is what gets the emphasis.

  • I think it strange, that Dune is absent in this list, IMO it should rank among the top ten. It's definitely better than "Jurassic Park", but maybe i'm the only one who thinks, that a good story outranks special effects.
  • Hmmm.... what about THX1138? Another early 70's disutopian movie. I liked the look and the feel of it. Computers and robots have basically taken over. I can;t quite recall the point of the whole thing... it was more an exercise in examining what could be, rather than being a traditional story. It's been a while since I have een it, though.

    Oh, I heard the director of the film went on to make a few other movies that seem to be a bit more popular.

  • Forbidden Planet (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Krelnik ( 69751 ) <timfarley@@@mindspring...com> on Monday May 20, 2002 @09:21AM (#3550292) Homepage Journal
    Barbarella [imdb.com] is in the list, but Forbidden Planet [imdb.com] is not? Blasphemy!

  • 12 Monkies (Score:3, Insightful)

    by theolein ( 316044 ) on Monday May 20, 2002 @09:30AM (#3550368) Journal
    I missed it in my other post, but if there ever was a science fiction film that had a brilliant story (The Anthrax scare last year) excellent acting (Madeleine Stow plays the part of a woman who is intelligent , warm and not some male macho replica, and we all love to see Bruce Willis suffer), Gillamesque wierdness (the strange society under the earth) and a refreshing sad and sweet ending (the tragic hero dies but humanity is saved), this was it.

    I actually wonder why this didn't make it onto the list? I think possibly because of the ending. I think it frightens audiences to see the hero die.

  • Historical Bias and Original Work (Score:3, Interesting)

    by awol ( 98751 ) on Monday May 20, 2002 @10:16AM (#3550771) Journal
    One of the problems I have with judging SF in general, but SF cinema in particular is the extent to which the cinematic realisation is based on a preexisting work, in particular literature. Can one really judge the merits of the cinematic realisation of the future apart from the original author's vision? (and more based on than say, Blade Runner).

    I think that by any standard, there will be an inherent bias against older SF cinema, particularly if the original (as in innovative) idea presented in the film has become passe (Planet of the Apes for example) or SF is merely the setting for an old story (The Forbidden Planet as The Tempest for example) or the vehicle for allegory (The Day the Earth Stood Still for example).

    The prevalence of Dystopic future visions, suggest SF as vehicle for allegory and pure SF story telling is actually pretty rare.

    Some glaring omissions (IMHO). 1984, 'nuff said. Have there really been no good implementations of a work by HG Wells? What of Verne? A cinematic execution of an illusory world, what about Dark City, if not as good then certainly better than The Matrix. What about Cube? Anyway the list of omissions is, as ever always extensive. But most of all, why isn't Star Wars number 1. Surely by any criteria (except maybe acting :-).

  • These don't belong (Score:3, Interesting)

    by pmancini ( 20121 ) <pmancini@ y a h o o.com> on Monday May 20, 2002 @10:52AM (#3551077) Homepage
    Here are some movies in the list I think don't belong and why:
    5. Brazil
    Brazil uses some sci-fi imagery but doesn't really pose any "What If?" type of questions necessary for true sci-fi. It is mainly an exercise in psychology.

    8. The Boys From Brazil
    This movie uses the concept of cloning as a what if, but is mainly a suspense thriller. Where are the killer androids? (just kidding)

    9. Jurassic Park
    Action film, again uses cloning as a plot device. Totally forgettable.

    10. Star Wars
    Certainly not worthy of the top 20. A great bit of entertainment, but it doesn't advance sci-fi at all. Mainly an exercise of Lucas's ego.

    11. The Road Warrior
    Entertaining, to be sure, but is this really sci-fi or an action film?

    12. Tron
    This is sci-fi but the acting is weak, the story is weaker. If you are going to have this one on the list you might as well knock off 2001 and replace it with "The Black Hole". Otherwise an entertaining film.

    16. RoboCop
    Duh. If this is here why not Predator? This is simply an action film with sci-fi as a backdrop.

    18. The Day The Earth Stood Still
    18. Eighteen? Are they nuts? This belongs in the top 10. One of the only two movies from the entire 1950's to belong on the list at all.

    20. Barbarella
    This makes the list? Jeez, why not put Zardoz here or the pr0n version of "Blackula"? This movie sucks worse than "Flash Gordon" (70's version with Queen music).

    Where is Highlander? Where is The Beach? Where is War of the Worlds? Where is "The Lathe of Heaven"???? Where is "The Man Who Fell to Earth"??? Barbarella makes it and these classics don't? Are they out of their collective minds? Bah! I am so glad I cancled my subscription years ago. I would have written a nasty letter to the editor and gotten all worked up had I paid for this insipid opinion!

    Anyway, rant over. Back to work...

  • Mod me redundant, but... (Score:3, Insightful)

    by KFury ( 19522 ) on Monday May 20, 2002 @11:29AM (#3551356) Homepage
    I thought Gattaca was fantastic, because it wasn't fantastic. It was plausable, a good warning, a compelling story, and relevant.

    I believed in the complex characters and, unlike a few recent blockbusters I could mention, I cared what happened to them. That's a much better benchmark than box office receipts.

    That and I'd never walked out of a scifi movie before thinking "they're robbed if they don't get the Oscar for artistic direction." Well, they didn't get the Oscar, but they did get a nomination, and that's close enough.

    It's great to see this (non-yawn) movie get some much-deserved recognition.

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