The Sci-Fi Movie Stigma

An anonymous reader writes "MSN has up an article that explores why Sci-Fi is associated with cheesy Space-Operas and children's movies, and cerebral Sci-Fi films don't make it unless they are adulterated into 'Action' flicks. The piece covers upcoming projects like 'The Last Mizmey' and 'Next', and points the finger at the ultimate culprit: George Lucas. 'When Lucas made Star Wars in 1977, he was paying tribute to a subgenre of science fiction that he loved dearly as a boy: the space opera. But although the breathless serial adventures of Flash Gordon and his ilk had their pleasures, they were often treated with tolerance, at best, by more serious science-fiction writers and readers. Nevertheless, the success of Star Wars changed the movie industry's perception of science fiction forever. As much as we love Star Wars for what it is, it nearly killed Hollywood's willingness to fund science-fiction movies that actually said something about the human condition.'"

Comments

'Twas always this way

[Mikkeles]

'points the finger at the ultimate culprit: George Lucas... Star Wars ... '

It was always this way even before Lucas, with the possible exceptions of 'Things to Come' and '2001 A Space Odyssey'.

Re:'Twas always this way

[mackil]

Soylent Green wasn't "about" people, it IS people!

Re:'Twas always this way

[nomadic]

If one can't figure out why the sci-fi genre isn't taken seriously by the time one gets back home, they'll never get it.

Next time say that in Klingon, it gets the point home more forcefully.

Re:'Twas always this way

[vague disclaimer]

I haven't seen "I, Robot", but if it's even a little bit like the book...

Don't go there....just don't go there.

Re:'Twas always this way

[theStorminMormon]

How about you RTFA?

After the serials of the '40s and the atomic monster movies of the '50s, science-fiction cinema seemed to grow up right alongside the literature itself in the '60s, culminating in the ultimate marriage of the two: "2001: A Space Odyssey." Director Stanley Kubrick went right to the source for his visionary classic, enlisting Arthur C. Clarke to write the screenplay with him and presenting perhaps the most serious, adult treatment of science-fiction themes to that date. Other literary adaptations followed. Kubrick did it again in 1971 with "A Clockwork Orange," while "Logan's Run," the remake of "Invasion of the Body Snatchers," "Soylent Green" and the cult favorite, "A Boy and His Dog," all brought real science-fiction novels or novellas to the screen with varying degrees of success. Even nonliterary offerings such as "Silent Running" and Lucas' own "THX 1138" made sobering statements. But "Star Wars" effectively ended all that, substituting space battles, nonstop special effects and simple good-versus-evil archetypes for the more complex shadings and themes that marked science fiction to that point.

Seriously - this would be an interesting article to discuss if people actually read the article instead of treating this as another opportunity to publicly flaunt their indie cred. "Wath me list of sci-fi movies that show I'm so hardcore sci fi."

There goes any hope for an interesting discussion... /me cranks up "indier than thou"

Re:'Twas always this way

[Seumas]

Here is what I, Robot was like:

Robot (does something or whatever).
Will Smith: Dayamn! You did NOT just do that! Nuh-uh! You be trippin'!

And no, I'm not kidding. That is exactly what the movie was like.

Re:'Twas always this way

[geek2k5]

I'm not sure that Starship Troopers would qualify as Heinlein's 'ideal' society. It was more of a controversial political statement than anything.

It may have also been his way of getting out of a contract for writing so called 'juveniles' since it was the last he wrote for that genre. (I seem to recall reading somewhere that he intentionally wrote a book that was good fiction and technically fit the genre, but was too controversial for them to publish.)

Now when you get down to it, the current administration's off and on proposal for mandatory 'civil service', which can include military service, is a trend toward what Heinlein brought up in Starship Troopers.

As a long time Heinlein fan, I watched the movie and listened to the commentary, wondering if the director did much more than skim the book. I also had my doubts that he had read very much Heinlein, especially the stuff after 1959, when Starship Troopers was published.

As with many Hollywood productions of SF classics, I would have to give Starship Troopers a D minus with regards to how well the movie matched the book. While it did cover the suffrage through military service concept, with an iron hand, it missed a lot of the interesting things like the fighting suits. (Budget restrictions, according to the director.)

No

[stoolpigeon]

As fun as it might be -- George Lucas is not the ultimate reason for this. The ultimate reason is that the major film studios are afraid to innovate and want every film to be a sure thing. He didn't make hollywood that way.

Re:No

[ajs]

Very, very true.

It's also true that Star Wars was more responsible for a mental-block on the part of those looking back at film history than it was for a change in later films.

Some films that came before Star Wars:

• Invisible Man, The (1966)
  
• 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968)
  
• Planet of the Apes (1968)
  
• Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1977)
  
• Time Machine, The (1960)
  
• Andromeda Strain, The (1971)
  

Some films that came after Star Wars:

• Blade Runner (1982)
  
• Back to the Future (1985)
  
• Twelve Monkeys (1995)
  
• E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial (1982)
  
• Gattaca (1997)
  
• Pi (1998)
  

You will notice that when you search for movies from these different periods, the primary thing that leaps out at you is that movies that treated science fiction as a serious genre (Pi, Gattaca, 2001: A Space Odyssey, The Andromeda Strain) are about evenly spaced. There aren't a lot of them, but they get neither more nor less frequent over the decades... We just have rose-tinted glasses when it comes to history.

I partially blame...

[nebaz]

The SCI FI channel. They seem to cancel all the good series and throw on mindless movie of the week drivel. (And WRESTLING? What's up with that?) It's too bad, I used to like the network.

Re:Might this yet change (Re: Ender's Game)?

[thrawn_aj]

Bad example IMO. While Ender's Game was brilliantly written, to say that

It has much to say on the human condition is a stretch. The fact is, and SF fans (like myself) should get used to it, most serious SF is NOT simple enough to be adapted to a 2 hour movie without serious losses in clarity. "2001" was understandable only if you'd read the book. Well, by understandable, I mean, all the nuances and the undercurrents. I would say that SF is more suited to the mini-series arena, with Dune being a perfect example. The ill-fated Riverworld is another. SF has a LOT to say about the human condition. However, I feel that the best medium for it will remain books because unlike other genres, which are fairly easy to visualize, the SF writer is precisely the person who goes beyond current memes, else he/she is a failure. Instead of blaming Lucas for the current state of SF cinema, I would applaud him for bringing at least one facet of SF into the public perception, Gordonian though it may be :P. Perhaps if the Sci-Fi channel focused on promoting more intelligent shows instead of the mindless dribble that panders to the paranoid schizoid crowd (wtf do psychics or Government conspiracies have to do with SF? :O), we have a better chance of seeing some of the greater SF works (Asimov's Foundation or Clarke's RAMA - a superb PC game was made of this a decade ago) showcased in all their glory. Of course, the sad fact is that most "SF fans" or at least people who call themselves that are simply X-files fanbois who never grew up.

It's not just Sci-Fi channel; it's the market, too

[CleverNickName]

A few years ago, some friends of mine and I pitched the Sci-Fi channel, and I heard directly from a very highly-placed executive that the network was actually making a conscious effort to move away from SF programming and do more "Scare Tactics" style programming in an effort to capture portions of the SpikeTV market.

I foolishly (for the goal of selling a show to them) observed that running away from the very thing that made the network popular -- and was in the damn name, by the way -- probably wasn't the smartest thing to do, but the geek in me overpowered the hopeful businessman. Oh well.

Those craptacular movies you're referring to (I did two of them: Python and Deep Core) used to go directly to video in the USA, while also being sold to foreign markets to make back money for their investors. However, with the advent of basic cable and channels like Sci-Fi, they usually are produced by, and air on one of those stations (think Lifetime, TNT, etc.) before heading off to the bargain rack at the car wash.

One of the points made in TFA is that intelligent movies have been replaced with action movies, and thoughtful plots have been replaced with explosions and spectacle. One of the reasons I tend to agree with the parent on Sci-Fi being part of the problem here is that they still translate these movies into several different languages, and distribute them all over the world; an explosion and a scantily-clad starlet are essentially the same in any language or culture, so it's easier to sell those films (to Sci-Fi and to the foreign markets) when they're simplistic, "four-color" 90-minute packages, instead of complex 2001-esque masterpieces.