I saw Gravity last weekend. It was pretty great. Visually, I thought it was the best science fiction movie I’d seen since Avatar. But was it good enough to be in my all time top 10 science fiction movies?
10. Avatar I am probably losing some credibility right off the bat by putting this in my top 10, and if I watched it again on DVD, I’m not sure I’d think as highly of it. But the thrill of seeing the world of Avatar in the theater, in 3D, was something I’d only experienced twice before: When I saw Star Wars the first time (the first movie I ever saw at a theater), and when I saw The Matrix. In each case they were movies that were so spectacular to look at that you instantly knew that every science fiction movie to come would try to copy them in some way. Everyone pans the the plot, but I actually enjoyed the story too.
9. Minority Report There are several things I didn’t like about this movie: I’m not a Tom Cruise fan, and I can’t stand the Spielberg moments (like when the guy’s jetpack cooks the food as he flies by a room), but there are also some really great moments too. Some great gadgets and special effects, and more importantly it asks the question of how much we are willing to sacrifice in order to prevent crime.
8. 12 Monkeys I doubt this would show up on most people’s top 10 lists, but it’s always been one of my favorites. Terry Gilliam directed some great, weird, movies, but this was probably the last really good one. Time travel seems to be an over-used gimmick in movies now, but I love how it’s used in this film. What are some other great time travel movies? Terminator, Back to the Future, what am I forgetting? The recent Source Code was pretty good, I guess. Oh, and the next movie on this list.
7. Looper A Bruce Willis time travel section of the list! Special effects are so good now that every year there are a couple of movies that aren’t all that good, but are worth watching just to see the world that is created within the movie (the recent Total Recall and Oblivion are good examples). But a lot of great science fiction movies don’t necessarily have to have great special effects. Looper isn’t effects-driven, it is just a great story that happens to involve time travel. After seeing the trailer for this movie about 10 times I was pretty sure I knew everything about it, but there ended up being a whole second act to the movie that the trailer barely even hints at. A gritty, modern classic.
6. Inception Speaking of modern classics, this is my favorite science fiction movie of the 2000’s. The effects in this movie are stunning, but more importantly they are put to use in a wonderfully creative story, with countless twists and turns, good characters, and one of the greatest fight scenes in movie history.
5. Terminator 1 & 2 By including sequels and an honorable mention, I was actually able to get 20 movies into my top 10! The two movies have some significant differences, but they are both truly great science fiction movies. They are violent, and are filled with gun-fights and some scenes that are truly scary. But they are smart, too. Terminator 2 has one of my all-time favorite chase scenes as well. But that’s for another list….
4. Alien and Aliens When I saw Aliens in the theater, I was 13 years old, hadn’t seen the original, and had never seen an R-rated movie in the theater. It was, and still remains the most terrifying movie-going experience I’ve ever had. I saw it again in the theater a week later. These are the scariest creatures seen in any movie before or since.
3. The Matrix For whatever reason I wasn’t all that excited about this movie when it came out (that probably had something to do with Keanu Reeves) so I never saw it in the theater. When I watched it at home, I was blown away. This movie re-defined special effects not just for science fiction but for movies in general for the next decade. One of the most “fun” movie-watching experiences I can remember.
2. Blade Runner When I watch the trailers for the upcoming Ender’s Game and see a ham-fisted Harrison Ford deliver lines like “You were bred for greatness Ender. You will be the one to save mankind,” it is hard to remember that he’s the same actor that played Indiana Jones, Han Solo, and Rick Deckard, characters from five of my top 20 movies of all-time. Blade Runner is as good as it gets. A beautifully dark world, a captivating story, and at its core, the movie asks “What does it mean to be human?” in a profound way.
1. The Star Wars Trilogy The original Star Wars is my favorite movie. It was the first movie I saw in the theater (at a drive-in, no less), and I have probably seen it close to 40 times. Enough has been said about Star Wars. But I do have a couple of things to say about the sequels. The Empire Strikes Back is also a great movie, and also one of my all-time favorites. But it is not better than the original. It always annoys me when people say they like Empire because it’s darker and a better movie. Yes, it’s great. But it’s not the original, and it isn’t better just because it’s “dark”. It also annoys me when people claim to be Star Wars fans and rip Return of the Jedi. It is ok to be a Star Wars fan and not like (or even hate) the more recent trilogy (for the record I thought they were only so-so, and actually liked the 3rd one). But every real Star Wars fan I know loves Return of the Jedi too. Yes, the Ewoks are a little too cute, and were perhaps the beginning of the end for George Lucas. But even on its own, Jedi is an incredibly entertaining movie. The whole opening act in Jabba’s palace is terrific. The scene where Luke is on the Death Star with Darth Vader and The Emperor, watching as the rebel fleet falls into their trap, then giving in to his anger and fighting Vader is one of the great scenes in the whole trilogy. Let’s hope that the new trilogy is somewhere closer to the original than the most recent ones.
Honorable mention:
Moon A psychological story, with minimal effects, and really only one character (Sam Rockwell) on screen for most of the movie. It starts slowly, but just keeps getting better.
ET One of my favorite movies as a kid, but I haven’t seen it in at least 25 years.
District 9 Smart, violent, creative, and a great all-around sci-fi movie.
Gravity I don’t think any sci-fi movie has captured what it feels like to be in space quite like this.
The new Star Trek movies I didn’t mind most of the older ones, but I thought the two new ones were a significant upgrade.
Back to the Future One of my top 50 of all-time, but after watching it recently, I didn’t feel like it really qualified as science fiction. Just a great movie.
The Adjustment Bureau Based on a Phillip K. Dick short story (that actually isn’t nearly as good as the movie), I thought this movie was criminally underrated. Fun concept, and amazing chemistry between Matt Damon and Emily Blount.
Total Recall (the original one) In the 80’s and 90’s, Arnold was the king of sci-fi. The Terminator movies were the best ones, but I thought this one was the most entertaining. Yet another Phillip K. Dick story (the fourth one on the list).
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