hey sugar...
After watching the sci-fi thriller, “Children of Men” I have realized that the tone of sci-fi movies, as well as our view of the future, has drastically changed from say fifty years ago. We have all geared our taste towards movies with a very cynical and mundane outlook of the future; there will be a deterioration of society and technology is seen as a drawback rather than a benefit. In the earlier days, the future was seen as a sleek and sexy world, filled with flying cars, robots, and jetpacks. Early science fictions like Buck Rogers, 2001 a Space Odyssey, Star Wars, and Star Trek believed that this “future” was inevitable. However, Daniel Wilson states in his book, Where’s My Jetpack, that that this “future” is theoretical, and that none of the predictions of those days are true and asks the question, “Where’s all that stuff?”
Today, we know this to be true; we aren’t driving flying cars or jetpacks, we aren’t living in the sleek or sexy world proposed in those movies, in fact we are in a massive global recession and climate crisis. Our once esteemed fantasy has been disheartened. I think that our current sci-fi movies reflect that fact. Movies like, Blade Runner, Children of Men, I am Legend, Battlestar
- Scene from “Children of Men” 2006
Gallatica –they all view the future as an almost post-apocalyptic world. It shows the future in a way that can be believable to the modern audience by reflecting on the society as well as on its views and outlooks. However back in the day, the sleek and sexy sci-fi films were very appealing and believable to their audiences because it reflected on the peoples’ views; there were many scientific breakthroughs and people believed that the rapid pace of technological innovation would remain constant. It has, but not in the way they had expected. But although we have evolved from the chimerical futurama science fiction, the heart of our sci-fi movies still remains the same.
Links:
http://www.cnn.com/2009/TECH/science/05/29/jetpack/
http://danielhwilson.blogspot.com/
http://www.classicmovies.org/articles/aa050299.htm
http://www.technovelgy.com/ct/ctnlistPubDate.asp
http://morrischia.com/david/portfolio/boozy/research/futurama.html