Mr. Nobody

Jan Van Dormeal, 2009 (9.5*) 
Belgium-Canada-France-Germany 

It's hard to describe this film without making it sound perhaps incohesive and out of control, but quite the contrary, this is a long, complex work of art that is very well constructed, and one which will warrant and reward the true cinema fan on repeat viewings.

What director Jaco Van Dormeal has done here is not new, he shows us alternate realities in one life, similar to the visual style used for the same by Tom Tykwer in Run, Lola, Run - and triggered by one incident involving a train, like Gwyneth Paltrow's character in Sliding Doors. As a child, Nobody is known as Nemo, and at age 9, he must choose which parent to live with when they seperate. The decisive scene takes place at a train platform, and little Nemo must either stay with dad or get on the train with mom. This being a film, he does both, and we see both lives.

This is really a science fiction story, which is about a Mr. Nobody, who is called that because they don't know his name, and he can't remember it, but it's Nemo, which we find out in flashbacks. Nemo is now the last living mortal at age 118, in a world where apparently everyone else no longer ages and dies (at least not naturally, I'm sure you can still blow people up or shoot them down, because, as they say here, "some people just need killin").

The film begins with a professional type suit, who is interviewing Mr. Nobody (for broadcast live to the masses), about his life and how he feels being the last mortal. When Nemo remembers his life, it's not always the same exact story he remembers, and this is the point of the film. It's not "a story" that matters, but that you travel the journey of life not knowing the final destination. This film has as many visual ideas as 10 average films, in fact, Van Dormeal spent nine years on this one project from writing to completion, and it shows.

There are so many mind-boggling images in this, that its best not to describe the film at all, but to urge everyone to watch it, then watch it again. There is one problem: it's not available at Netflix, you'll have to either borrow or buy it on dvd. You also want only the director's cut (it's 157 minutes, the original is 141, so it's hefty in either format), that's the version I saw and it has one added scene I thought particularly important: Nemo is going through a car wash inside his car, and we see closeups of all the action on the windshield, which is uncannily like nebula activity in space: the macrocosm becomes the microcosm. If you don't understand that, then you may not like this film, and you probably didn't enjoy The Tree of Life either, another visual masterpiece.

Jared Leto stars in this, that's him in makeup as the 118 year old man (Mr. Nobody) as well. He had just made Aronofsky's incredible Requiem For a Dream (2000), so apparently he only stars in a director's "magnum opus", or greatest of his work. He should be a better known actor, he's quite accomplished in every film I've seen. Canadian director-actress Sara Polley (Dawn of the Dead, Go, The Sweet Hereafter) plays one of his wives, Diane Kruger (Inglourious Basterds, Troy) another, and Viet actress Linh Dan Pham (Indochine) the third. All are perfect for what the film required - of the three, Polley is the most accomplished actor having won 31 awards so far, and she shows it here.

This may bore or confuse the more literary cinemaniacs, those who want a beginning, middle, and end of one story. To me, that's like criticizing the impressionists because the realists painted the same scenes more realistically. Do you want life to imitate art, or can art just be the creative expression of an artist's inner philosophy? This film toys with the idea of "string theory", which always baffled me, but the idea is that there may be several universes or realities occuring at the same time, it depends on your choices in life. That's such a scary thought to some, that one reviewer said he couldn't leave his house for three days after seeing this film!

This film is going into my top 100, easily (out of about 10,000 seen, the top tenth of one percent), and also on my short list of must-see science fiction-fantasy films, which is less than 50 at this point. To which I would only say, as Rossanno Brazzi told Katharine Hepburn in Summertime, "You are hungry, senora - eat the ravioli!" EAT THIS MOVIE! Then again, and again..

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Melancholia

Lars von Trier, 2011 (8.4*)
This is a rarity among films, a science fiction film that has little to do, really, with that aspect of the story. Instead, the fact that a hidden planet has emerged from behind the sun and is heading on a path toward earth really is little more than a metaphor for the characters psychogically complex stories.

Von Trier has created his most mesmerizing film to date, full of dreamy, surrealistic images more reminiscent of painters like Magritte, De Chirico, and Dali, than any film references (see film still at the bottom) – except perhaps early Antonioni. 

Kirsten Dunst won five acting awards for her gutsy portrayal of a newlywed bride mired in her own melancholia, and whose dysfunctional personality seems to deteriorate as the planet, named Melancholia, moves closer to earth. Charlotte Gainsbourg plays her long-suffering sister, who seems determined to take care of her sister in spite of the apparent hopelessness of the situation, as her personal demons seems to have no cause or origin.

Like most of von Trier’s films, this one is also slow to develop, and eerily like a Bergman film of introspection and inner turmoil, and may not hold the attention of the average viewer, but if you stick with this one you will be surprised and rewarded, I believe, especially in comparison to his other efforts. This is the type of film rated higher by critics (80 at Metacritics) vs fans (7.2 at IMDB), but those are often the more unique and unforgettable films, as critics see so many of the mundane variety that it takes something different to wake them up from mediocrity.

One of the many surrealistic and artistic images in Melancholia

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Source Code

Duncan Jones, 2011 (7.9*)

Interesting science fiction film that leans more toward the intellectual and less action style, which is a welcome relief on one aspect. However, as usual, you can’t look too deeply at the so-called science aspect of this one.

Jake Gyllenhaal (hey, figure out a better way to spell that, will ya?) plays a man who suddenly comes to awareness on a commuter train to Chicago, but he seemingly has amnesia. As he’s trying to figure out both his own situation and who the woman is that apprarently is his companion, the train explodes, and he awakens to another reality entirely.

He now emerges in a world similar both to that in The Matrix and 12 Monkeys, even Avatar, where a person in one location experiences a digitally based reality through his brain. In this particular case, Jake plays a real life Captain Colter Stevens, a helicopter pilot in Afghanistan, at least in his own memories when they surface - now being used in a top secret experiment in the war on terror. The scientist in control of his world is well acted by Vera Farmiga, but she doesn't have a very demanding part; her character is supposed the be the dispassionate military scientist with only the objective in mind.

This film could have been much better without some useless meandering into pseudo-patriotism that was an unnecessary distraction, and other more sentimental discursions, but it’s still better than most other SF films of 2011 (it was a dismal year for the genre, with dogs like Green Lantern, X-Men First Class, and I Am Number Four).

This film unfortunately reminds one of numerous others, so it’s not very unique. Those who haven’t already should check out 12 Monkeys, Groundhog Day, The Matrix, RunLola Run, Frequency, The Adjustment Bureau, and Sliding Doors (all better than this film) – each of which involves manipulations or alterations of reality in some way.

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2001: A Space Odyssey

Dir: Stanley Kubrick, 1968 (10*)

AFI Top 100

[Updated: 12.31.11]

This groundbreaking SciFi epic was the first to feature totally realistic space effects, and changed forever the way SF films looked. The story, by Arthur C. Clarke, was written for this film because Kubrick wanted to film his incredible novel A Childhood's End, which could not be filmed at the time with existing technology. That book, and this film, are about the next step in the evolution of mankind, from a material to a spiritual being. The previous step, from animal intelligence to human intelligence, is shown in the beginning to give us a major clue, so its surprising that so many people are still baffled by this movie, which has only 20 minutes of dialogue and encourages us to think - what a concept!

Kubrick's film would have been even better had he been able to get phenomena filmmaker Jordan Belson to work on it, but he refused to ever work on commercial films. Belson makes short animated films about things like the birth of a star, or motion through space. All his short films are in the permanent archives at the Museum of Modern Art, and are much better than anything put into commercial SF films. At film festivals, these short films of 3-8 minutes always get standing ovations. Kubrick did make planets and spaceships finally look realistic together, and forever changed the way science fiction films looked going forward. It would be another 10 yrs before Star Wars, but all the action adventure space films that followed looked the way they did because of 2001, so in that regard it was highly influential on the entire industry. Not exactly an exciting film, it was nevertheless a visionary film, and for its time, like nothing else that had ever been filmed.

The sequel, 2010: The Year We Make Contact, attempts to explain the story further, a story which really needed no filmed postscript. That became more of an action film, with much more human interaction between Americans and Russian in a joint venture to activate the spaceship Discovery, and also check out Jupiter from closer range. Worth seeing, and well-done. Clarke himself wrote a third novel in the series as well, 2040, that has not yet been filmed, real SF fans should read the entire trilogy.

Ranked #1 at the Criterion networking film site, The Auteurs, with over 100,000 members.

Note: it's very similar to the parable of Jesus - it's about the birth of a spiritual being, not a corporal one. The awakening of one's spiritual self is a 'virgin birth' that doesn't involve procreation. In 2001, this is symbolized by the floating embryo at the end, a metaphor for the astronaut now being a spiritual being. In Clarke's novel Childhood's End, this happened to the entire race beginning with the current generation of children, so the adults were living out the last physical lives on earth, or the end of the childhood of mankind.

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The Adjustment Bureau

George Nolfi, 2011 (8.0*)

This is another thoughtful and eccentric science fiction excursion from the sometimes brilliant, sometimes dark mind of author Philip K. Dick (Blade Runner, Minority Report), this based on his story “The Adjustment Team”. Director George Nolfi is a screenwriter turned director, who co-wrote the films Bourne Ultimatum (conclusion of Bourne Trilogy (2007)), The Sentinel, and Ocean’s Twelve.

This story deals with fate vs. human endeavor and choice. Matt Damon plays a man whose seemingly unimportant everyday routine is being manipulated by a clandestine team of men, who appear to be some type of secret agents who answer to an unknown master. They watch a futuristic time line of his life in a special book, and if it starts to deviate then they intervene.

This puts into reality the metaphor of fate, which is generally considered a pre-determined sequence of life events over which we have no control, in this case actual people employed to ensure that fate. Damon’s character has a chance meeting with dancer Emily Blunt, and the two have a mutual attraction, which is counter to the plan the agents are using as a guide, and is a potential romance that would cause great deviations from the plan.

The master of this plan is only referred to as The Chairman, and perhaps the story’s major failing is to give no real explanation of the importance of all this. Obvious comparisons will be made to Inception, since each is about altering reality, but this action occurs in the waking state of corporal reality and is not in any fantasy or imaginitive realm.

A common theme of Dick’s novels are reality vs. fantasy, with characters often struggling to distinguish the difference in the two – characters who are usually unbalanced either through insanity or mind-altering drugs. In this story, neither is the case, as a common man is attempting to overcome real people who are controlling his life events, but for an unknown reason.

There is nothing special about the acting here, in spite of a good cast, which features John Slattery of Mad Men who works for the adjustment team. The story could have packed more punch, but is a pleasant excursion for a science fiction film, one that doesn’t have wild west style shootouts. or space wars, or lovably fuzzy aliens, or human-devouring monsters. In that regard, it belongs in a sub-genre with Inception, 2001: A Space Odyssey, Gattica, and Close Encounters of the Third Kind, it’s just not at the same artistic level as these others.

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Metropolis

Fritz Lang, Germany, 1927, silent, bw (7.8*)
[Restored version]
Of course this looks pretty dated now, but when Fritz Lang created his science fiction masterpiece, there were no films as experimental or as striking an individual vision in the history of cinema up to that point. This version has some lost footage restored that was found in 2008 in a film warehouse in Argentina, who didn't return the print when WW2 broke out in Europe, so this is the most complete version available since it's release as all the other copies were destroyed by Allied air raids.

This story is from a novel by Thea von Harbou, who also wrote the screenplay. The heavily symbolic story involves a society where the wealthy live in a club above ground that resembles heaven, while the workers live and work underground in repetitive drudgery running giant machines. Lang's entire film is an indictment of a mechanized world usurping human individuality and choice, where there is no escape from the 'worker's hell' underground.

One particular woman, an angel named Maria, is a voice against the system who incites the workers to stand up. Meanwhile, the head capitalist has an inventor with a female robot he calls "Machine Man", who gets used in a political scheme to destroy Maria and a mysterious coming 'mediator', who can unite the two factions.

A lot of this story is pretty corny ("the head and the hands need a heart to unite them"), yet you can see that it influenced later films like Chaplin's Modern Times, Ridley Scott's Blade Runner, and even the dark mood of Gotham City in the Batman films. In fact, it was decades before sf films even had this much vision again.

This is a must for fans of German expressionism, it's probably the finest example of that movement. It's #96 on the IMDB top 250 films, which is probably a bit high, but you can see its influence in cinema history.

One of the first recipients of  our World Film Awards, as we awarded 15 silents films first.

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Inception

Christopher Nolan, 2010 (9.2*)
If you take the paradoxical spacial anomalies of artist M.C. Escher and use that structure to construct a film narrative, you'll get an approximation of the complexity of the plot of Christopher Nolan's amazing science fiction film. Most of the action takes place in a dream state, which means that you get something based in reality, yet one which seems to have some small anomalies that trigger the uneasy feeling that something is not quite right.

Using the idea that the subconscious may be manipulated from this state, an idea they call 'inception', scientist Leonardo Dicaprio has built a small company that attempts corporate espionage for huge fees. Joseph Gordon-Levitt plays his assistant, always there to help monitor the dream state, while ex-wife Marion Cotillard, who steals the acting kudos in this, usually shows up in Dicaprio’s sub-conscious state.

In a new assignment, he is hired by Ken Watanabe who has a business agenda involving the late Pete Postlethwaite (who recently died of cancer), plays a dying business tycoon who built a huge congomerate that he’s passing on to son Cillian Murphy. He enlists the aid of an architect, in this case student Ellen Page, to build a false world but one based on the reality of the particular subject's.

There are elements injected by Nolan that the non-scientist wouldn't consider, so this is a well-researched idea that gives reality to the subconscious world through some mind and space-bending special effects. Nolan has managed to create an imaginary world so close to reality that the subject is fooled into thinking he's in a real situation and responds to the manipulation.

The man who gave us the complex backward chronology of the murder mystery Memento has once again used a brain-scrambling narrative that will both intrigue and baffle many viewers. Nolan, who also gave us Batman Begins and The Dark Knight and the Sci-fi magic tale The Prestige, is proving to be able to stand apart from a legion of formulaic filmmakers in making us think while he keeps us riveted with action that threatens to propel his main character over the edge of a cliff at any moment.

Currently ranked #6 all-time on the IMDB 250, it's obvious that Inception has enough action to satisfy that lowest common-denominator of film fans, cloaked in an intellectual puzzle sophisticated enough to intrigue and pique the interest of those of us tired of the standard action formula film of good vs. evil with a fight to the death as a predictable climax. The film is up for four upcoming Golden Globe awards, and 11 Satellite awards, and will certainly be a contender for some Oscars® as well.

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Gormenghast

Andy Wilson, 2000, TV, 4 hrs (9.0*)

A BBC production for PBS

A deep, complex adventure fantasy, Gormenghast was a trilogy of novels by British author Mervyn Peake about a huge castle and the birth and life of a new heir to the throne, Titus Groan, which was the title of the first book. The mini-series covers the first two novels, which are quite lengthy.

Describing the plot is futile. Suffice to say there are many eccentric and interesting characters, romances, treachery and machinations over the throne and governing of the feudal castle-state, and enough to interest even jaded fans of science fiction and fantasy. Some truly original ideas are here, such as the castle being built around a huge tree and two sisters who prefer to live in the "room of roots", a maze of giant organic forms.

It's very "Dickensian" in style, yet so unique and rich that it's really incomparable. This is a must-see for fans of these genres, one of the best SF-fantasy series ever made.

Some interesting trivia associated with this
- it was a 19 year project of the producer
- Peake's granddaughters appeared as extras
- Lady Gertrude's white crow was the only known white crow in the world
- the castle miniatures were placed in vats of disinfectant then photographed
- author Peake was also noted for his artwork, he illustrated the books with his drawings

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Youth Without Youth

Francis Ford Coppola, 2007 (8.3*)
Francis Coppola's first directorial effort in ten years is a complex, science fiction edged story based on the novel of Romanian author Mircea Eliade. Underused veteran actor Tim Roth, who is always interesting, plays an elderly linguistics expert, Dominic, whose true love has died, and his own research is at a standstill, when he's struck by lightning while crossing the street one night in Austria in the 30's.

He emerges from the burns a much younger man, and apparently oblivious to aging. His first task is to avoid Nazis and scientists, for he realizes his freedom and life would effectively be over. Dominic eventually meets a woman whose own catharsis is born of lightning, so he finds a new purpose in his research.

Much of the film uses the science of linguistics - languages used in the film include English, Romanian, French, Italian, Mandarin, German, Russian, Latin, Armenian, and ancient (and authentic) Sanskrit, Egyptian, and Babylonian.

This film is another that is not straightforward chronologically, and therefore will anger many viewers who need a nice neat storyline. Here the effort will be rewarding to the more diligent viewer, as the haunting and original story will linger for days afterward.

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The Time Traveler's Wife

Robert Schwentke, 2009 (8.2*)
This science fiction romance poses an interesting dilemna, how does a woman maintain a solid relationship with a man who pops into her life at various times, beginning in childhood, while he himself is various ages?

Rachel McAdams is the woman in adult age, who has to cope with husband Eric Bana (Munich) at times being near, at times being out time traveling beyond his control. He at least seems to pop in and out of his own timeline rather than zip all around the universe or world. One advantage to this phenomenon is that she knows ahead of time that this will the love of her life.

This is both an engrossing science fiction tale and a tender romance. Based on the Audrey Niffenegger novel, I have a feeling that like most novels set to film that her book is likely deeper and more involved than this film, but it's still good entertainment, and far more interesting than the average romance, when the major problem seems to be how to work in 'business time' between all the self-centered interruptions of kids and relatives. This scenario thankfully avoids anything normal.

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The Book of Eli

The Hughes Brothers, 2010 (8.1*)
In a bleak, post-apocalyptic world not much different from the world of Mad Max, Denzel Washington plays a lone drifter named Eli, determined to follow his path of faith and deliver a secret book he's carrying to a place he's never been. Along the way, he comes across a town controlled by evil Gary Oldman, in one of his best performances, who's sending out patrols searching for all books in hopes of finding the one he desires, one that will give him control over the masses.

Oldman's slave, the blind Jennifer Beals (better than usual) is dependent on him while trying to protect her daughter, Mila Kunis, as much as possible, while Oldman uses her as a sex-slave to gain favors. There are some great small roles here filled by Tom Waits as the local pawn shop and engineer; Michael Gambon, who has survived with his wife and a minor arsenal; and the uncredited Malcolm McDowell as a curator of mankind's past.

Though maybe too violent for some, there are enough surprises in this story, good performances (from all except Kunis, whose talent and beauty totally escape me, I just don't see either), and a terrific electronic and futuristic music score, to make it better than the average apocalyptic dreariness, such as the dreadful The Road, from last year. In fact, add it to the imaginary list of top 10 post-apocalytic stories, as the pickings are lean after The Road Warrior.

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Avatar

James Cameron, 2009 (8.1*)

Basically, Avatar is another war/western in space, much like Star Wars and Starship Troopers. The story could easily be the U.S. vs the Souix nation, who are sitting on gold in the Black Hills, their sacred ground given to them in a government treaty, which was then ignored when gold was discovered. In Avatar, on planet Pandora (don't expect any mythology here, it's not that intelligent), the Na'vi are stting on "unobtanium" (silly name, right?), which is under their sacred tree, and of course, a giant earth-based corporation wants to mine the valuable substance like gold, oil, copper, uranium on earth; this 'evil empire' also uses ex-military misfits as a mercernary army to subdue the planet's natural dangers. The natives, like the Souix, the Incans, and countless others, are both expendable and primitive (they shoot bows and arrows for gosh sake!), therefore irrelevant to the profit-minded and anyone with more military power. (Here the big battle is helicopters vs. dragons, land robots vs. men on horses and angry rhinos)

One crippled soldier, played by Sam Worthington, is introduced to the Na'vi culture through use of a computer-connected cloned being, called an "avatar", hardly a God incarnate like the original meaning of the word. In this case, more like soldiers and scientists, who are led by a largely-wasted Sigourney Weaver, incarnated to both study then exploit these natives.

Though the special effects and animation design are superb, the story is not original, has nothing unexpected or new in it, and is actually predictable and frustrating. If you've read science fiction, it's a combination of Ursula K. Le Guin's novella "The Word for World is Forest", Roger Zelazny's novel "Lord of Light", and Cecelia Holland's aliens from "Floating Worlds". At least someone around Cameron has some science fiction literacy, but not much originality.

If you liked Star Wars, you'll like this, as it's aimed at the same roughly 12-yr old audience. Star Trek (the 2009 one) is actually a better sf film, and even won the Empire Award in the UK for "Best SF/fantasy Film" over Avatar. Three technical Oscars® (special effects, art direction, and bafflingly cinematography which won over the great work done in Hurt Locker) were about right for this - it is an obvious crowd pleaser 'yarn', but not very artistic, subtle, complex, or literate. Stephen Lang is terrible as the macho military commander (read "evil incarnate"), but then with lines like "On my mark", "light her up", and "take em out", he couldn't be very good no matter what. I'm not sure that 3-D would help this much, and I'm also not sure why people are going to see this over and over - I suppose because no one reads great science fiction novels any more. Cameron's Aliens is still a better sf film (so is Terminator 2), even that film's limited dialogue was better and funnier, as in "game over, man, game over!", and "then why don't you put her in charge?"

Note: Ironically, the IMDB avg fan rating is 8.4 - I didn't see this until after I ranked it, but that was my original rating, before rewatching it. It's currently #93 on the IMDB 250, but that will probably fall over time as fans are the first to rate these, then they slowly decline to their more proper place. Cameron's Aliens is ranked #53.

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PI

Darren Arnofsky, 1998, bw (8.4*)
Best Directing Award, Sundance
Very interesting puzzle movie that was brilliant young director Darren Aronofsky's first film, shot in b&w and obviously on a shoestring. The film is primarily a metaphysical one, about finding a mathematical key to order in the universe. On his search, he runs across a group of mathematicians who are inputting the numeric values of the Bible's characters into a computer for analysis.

This unusual film is about thinking, about the inside of the director's cosmic thoughts. Light on action, it's about as deep in intellectualism as a film can get, searching for a hidden meaning to life and the cosmos. We all do it, but it's a tough subject to film. At any rate, it's entirely unusual and creative, and is better than many big budget films, and was shot for just 60,000. (For the champion no budget film, check out Robert Rodriguez' El Mariachi, an action film of a mariachi guitarist being mistaken for a gang's hit man who carries a guitar case full of weapons)

Aronofsky's next film after this debut was the brilliant (and mind numbing) Requiem for a Dream (2000), starring Oscar winners Ellen Burstyn and Jennifer Connelly. Also worth seeing is The Fountain, a multi-level story about a brain cancer researcher and the search for the fountain of youth. He also directed The Wrestler in 2008
Awards page at IMDB

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Star Trek

J.J. Abrams, 2008 (8.3*)
a.k.a. Star Trek Zero, Star Trek XI
This was certainly a pleasant surprise for me. In a nutshell, 'this rocks'!
This exciting 'prequel' came as a big surprise, and it has to be what creator Gene Roddenberry intended all along but was always missing: exciting action, believable heroic characters, and despicable villains, in this case a planet-destroying Romulan named Nero (Eric Bana). The cast looks amazingly like young versions of the original tv actors, especially Zachary Quint as Spock, while Chris Pine is adequate as Kirk, and John Cho makes Sulu a real character for once. The others are all better than the original actors as well, but the real attraction is the special effects, finally worthy of a major SF film for the first time in the Trek series.

Since childhood, I've been a fan of good science fiction and fantasy literature, but it took a long time (Kubrick's 2001 in 1968) for films to catch up with the writers to create anything worth seeing. Needless to say, I was extremely disappointed with the original Star Trek tv show, feeling like it was even worse than the intended "western in space". The Star Trek films fared little better, with only The Wrath of Khan being re-watchable for me, as I much preferred the technical class of Spielberg's SF films (Close Encounters, E.T., later Minority Report), or Lucas' simplistic battle in space Star Wars series just because they were so well done, even if poorly written.

TV producer-director J.J. Abrams was talked into directing this by Steven Spielberg, who advised him on the action sequences. Original fans won't be disappointed, nor those who hated the originals, like myself. This is more action, less amateurish moralizing, like it was intended to be. Having now breathed new life into a tired and cliched series, I'm sure many sequels will follow with this cast.

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The Fountain

Darren Aronofsky, 2006 (8.8*)
This is yet another mind-bending film from the talented vision of young director Darren Aronofsky, in just his 3rd feature film, following Pi (1998), Requiem for a Dream (2000), and preceding The Wrestler (2008). His films are intensely involved in each subject, usually involving a personal obsession, and The Fountain is no different. This ambitious story takes place in three distinctly different time periods: a 16th century knight’s quest for immortality for his queen, a modern day doctor searching for a cure for brain tumors (or cancer?) to save his wife, and a futuristic space traveler taking the Tree of Life to a dying star, in a mythical quest that is rarely seen in any genre.

In each case, the man on a mission is played by Hugh Jackman, while the lady he lives for is Rachel Weisz. As his present-time wife, Izzi writes the story called The Fountain, which relates the story of the renaissance knight searching for a legendary tree of Mayan mythology, the tree of life that gives immortality to one who drinks its sap. These two stars make the film believable with their acting, but it’s Aronofky’s unrelenting vision that makes the movie both a science fiction-fantasy and a spiritual journey, perhaps the best such combination since 2001: A Space Odyssey in 1968.

This unique and artistic film won’t be for all tastes, as no Aronofsky film to date has been, as he never compromises his personal vision for commerciality. I think this will make him one of the few current young directors that will rise above the crowd over time.

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The Handmaid's Tale

Natasha Richardson, 1963-2009

Volcker Schlondorff, 1990 (7.6*)
This dystopian SciFi tale is based on the Margaret Atwood novel, and was probably Natasha Richardson's best film. The story is not that pleasant, but the cast is superb: Natasha co-stars with Oscar® winners Robert Duvall and Faye Dunaway, with Aiden Quinn as the romantic interest. The story is a about a post-apocalyptic society that is now controlled by Christian fundamentalists. All individuality and freedom are gone, and the apocalypse left most women sterile. The few remaining fertile women are captured by the government and are used as "handmaid's" for the politically powerful, which is their name for birth mothers (or sex slaves). Sex is only for pro-creation as all pleasure is now basically outlawed by the fundamentalists, except of course, for the politically powerful. Natasha becomes the handmaid for the powerful and self-righteous Robert Duvall and his unhappy wife Faye Dunaway. Meanwhile, she establishes a friendship and romance with their driver Aiden Quinn.

This is not a pleasant film, but it is a good science fiction movie, often overlooked since it doesn't have the special effects and battles we usually associate with science fiction. (Children of Men is a similar recent film) It simply tells a frightening story of a possible future where all freedom and pleasure have been removed, and all actions are controlled by one religious group, who base all their actions on "God's word" (basically the old testament here), or at least their interpretation of what they want that to be.

See Natasha's complete filmography here

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Wall-E

Andrew Stanton, 2008 (10*)
This terrific science fiction comedy is Pixar's best so far. It's rare that an animated film combines both a great story with terrific and imaginative artwork. You would think that after the Toy Story films, Cars, and Monsters Inc that the creativity there would slow down, but Wall-E tops them all. It's basically about a garbage compacting mobile robot living on an unpopulated earth. However, drones are being sent to try to find a return of life on earth, and naturally Wall-E comes into contact with life again (or there'd be no story), as we now know it, and with hilarious results. This film has a lot humor, as well as a lot of heart, making us all somehow care for what happens to a mechanical garbage man! Another rarity: a children's film that adults should enjoy just as much. Winner of over 35 awards already this year, for some odd reason it's not nominated for the Best Picture Oscar, and will have to settle for Animated Feature as a consolation prize.

Link to Wall-E's awards page at IMDB: Wall-E Awards

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Frequency

Gregory Hoblit, 2000 (8.4*)
This terrific SciFi film is also a murder mystery, and it’s hard to believe it gets overlooked on SF film lists with a plot this involving. Jim Caviezal listens to short wave radio as a hobby, and has had his entire life altered by a tragedy. One night he picks up what he thinks is his deceased father’s voice, played by Dennis Quaid. His father may or may not be in an alternate reality or time period, that’s part of the mystery; there's also a potential murder in the works, yet another part of the complex plot. The beauty of good science fiction is that just about anything is possible and if well written, seems natural to the plot. This is hard to describe without any spoilers, so just make sure you watch this film!

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Contact

Robert Zemeckis, 1997 (9.0*)
Astronomer Carl Sagan wrote just this one novel, which blended science, fiction, and religion into a story of mankind discovering we are not alone in the universe, and it intelligently examines potential consequences and effects on mankind. Jodie Foster, as Dr. Arroway, discovers a signal from space while monitoring radio telesopes; first thought a red herring, careful analysis of the signal detected layers of information, which include a translation key.

Suddenly the news is out, religious fanatics once again decry science as 'devil’s work', corporations race to capitalize financially, while nations are both skeptical and appalled at having to spend any money, in short special interests threaten the entire world-shattering breakthrough from even occurring. Matthew McConaughey is miscast as a priest who is Foster’s friend and romantic interest; Sam Shepherd is a jealous colleague, but the film is all Foster’s, who also produced.

Zemeckis also directed Back to the Future, and in this case shows he can direct serious science fiction as well. A little slow if you expect action SF, but one of a few intelligent adult sf books to film, so add another classic must-see to that genre’s growing list.

If you like this theme, make sure you see Close Encounters, and read Arthur C. Clarke's awesome book Childhood's End, which Kubrick wanted to film and ended up with 2001 instead due to the limited film technology of the time.

Note: For a list of my favorite science fiction-fantasy novels, check here, you'll see that Childhood's End is #1:
Top 100 Science Fiction Books

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The Prestige

Christopher Nolan, 2006 (8.9*)
Incredible mystery about the world of magic, based on an award-winning novel by science fiction author Christopher Priest. Christian Bale has a field day here as a talented magician who seems to rub competitor Hugh Jackman the wrong way, as the two resort to dangerous extremes to remain at the top of the game, and to personally stay one up on each other.

Michael Caine has a terrific supporting part as the tutor of both who first hired them. Scarlett Johansson plays Bale's romantic interest.

There are numerous plot twists and surprises here so I won’t give any away. Christopher Nolan (Following, Memento, Batman Begins, Dark Knight) is becoming one of the best modern directors, always making interesting films. This is now #73 on the IMDB all-time top 250


His new film from 2010, Inception, is #6 all-time at IMDB currently

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