Pretty cool. (http://www.cnn.com/2004/SHOWBIZ/Movies/08/26/people.runner.ap/index.html) But then they liked Star Wars too...

What the hell's wrong with these guys? "Quatermass & The Pit" should have at least made the list. Buncha' anti-British pinheads!;) :p

Excellent choices all, and they inclusded the '72 Solaris...these guys have taste and class as well as intelligence.

Of course, the Star Wars films have nothing to do with science, but I assume theiy were judging artistic merit and use of engaging themes in cinema rather than scientific accuracy

The survey was under the auspices of a British paper but I believe the 60 scientists weren't all British.

Thanks for pointing that out. This article makes it more clear. (http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainment/film/3600802.stm)

Gotta say, I'm a little fuzzy on the whole "best" thing. "Blade Runner" is a landmark film, but proclaiming it a better sci-fi movie than "2001" is dubious at best.

It's fine by me if they like science fiction films. A good percentage of the folks at NASA are Trekkies.

In a related story, the Directors Guild of America has named Galileo "Best Scientist of All Time." Albert Einstien came in a close second.

As for the scientists's assertion that "Blade Runner" is ahead of its time, they would do well to consider that genre filmmakers have been pondering the issue of What It Means To Be Human as far back as the original "Frankenstien."

And they left out "Gattacca" which is the only SF movie from the last 10 years I've actually liked. Harumph.
Andrew

Oh, yeah. "Battlestar Gattacca". I remember that one.

I don't know if I would vote for Galileo as best scientist, but I would definitely vote him as best shuttlecraft.

pesky scientists should know better than to mess with science fiction...

Next thing you know, they'll be reviewing model kits!

Model builders declare E = MC2 as the best science equation of the century!

pesky scientists should know better than to mess with science fiction...
I don't know how many times I've had to explain to some scientist or another that having the ships make "whoosh" sounds (in Star Trek and Star Wars, et al.) when they pass the camera isn't due to staggering ignorance on the part of the movie makers.

Qapla'

SSB

isn't it due to the staggering ignorance of the audiences?

Watching "From the Earth to the Moon", the HBO special Tom Hank's produced about the 60's moon race (excellent entertainment), I noticed the command/service module made a definite whooshy noise while orbiting the moon. I cringed.

"In space, no one can hear you fart"

2001 is the only SF film I ever saw that made an attempt at realistic "sounds" in space.

2001 is the only SF film I ever saw that made an attempt at realistic "sounds" in space.
And it's silence works brilliantly - largely due it's juxtaposition to every other "space" movie that had come before it. But drama usually abhor's a vacuum on the soundtrack. Even in "Alien" the ships make noise - and should.

No, in "Star Wars" the ships make noise and should. In "Aliens" the tagline I alluded to would make this impossible.

What if there were gaseous anomalies the ships were passing through and sound were passing to the 'audience' through that medium? What would that sound like?

In college I had a biology professor who raved about the scietific accuracy of ALIEN. Everything from the eggs, the incubation, the defense mechanisms are bilogicaly accurate and mirror actual earth species.

isn't it due to the staggering ignorance of the audiences?
At the risk of overestimating things, I think probably more people know there is no sound in space than not. You don't have to be a big fan of real space science to know that.

I think dramatic license allows for such things. Besides, what science hasn't yet had a chance to discover is that sound can travel in space if you're close to the source and the sound is really, really LOUD.

;)

Qapla'

SSB

FIREFLY did the nosoundinspace thing quite nicely.

There's another way, where you intercut faster and faster between sound on interiors and nosound on exteriors, that would be EXTREMELY effective for suspense and prominent effect, but except for a sequence I did myself for a super-8 movie long ago, I've never seen anybody try it. Too bad, cause it works like gangbusters. But mediocrity (and playing it safe) loves company, so sound will be in space most of the time.

BTW, Alan Dean Foster tried to talk GL out of sound in space in STAR WARS. According to Harlan Ellison, Foster (who ghostwrote the SW novelizations) gave Lucas TWO options (didn't say what they were), but GL said that the audiences expected to hear ships and so he was giving them what they wanted, not what he wanted.
Great 'artist' point of view, huh? -- suppress your own instinct in favor of pleasing the massmind.

I'd prefer a really good orchestral soundtrack over whooshes anyday, more dramatic; within a few moments I'd doubt if an audience would even notice the latter was absent.

i just wonder about their criteria here... i can certainly understand their choices and rankings when you consider entertainment value balanced with something thaty would excite them intellectually. yeah 2001 is scientifically more engaging than blade runner, but at times its a gawdawful bore......

At least they didn't pick at awful piece of crap
"The Fifth Element" with Bruce Willis. For the best.
Blade Runner is dull Fifth Element is garbage.

At least they didn't pick at awful piece of crap
"The Fifth Element" with Bruce Willis. For the best.
Blade Runner is dull Fifth Element is garbage.To each their own there, Rock. The 5th Element is hands down the best Sci-fi comedy I've ever seen. It also offers outstanding production design and effects and successfully creates an alternate "world" that is believable to the viewer. A very entertaining movie in my opinion. Still think "Quatermass & The Pit" should have made the list as serious sci-fi.

To each their own there, Rock. The Fifth Element is hands down the best Sci-fi comedy I've ever seen. It also offers outstanding production design and effects and successfully creates an alternate "world" that is believable to the viewer. A very entertaining movie in my opinion. Still think "Quatermass & The Pit" should have made the list as serious sci-fi.

Not to mention Milla Whateverhernameis looking every inch the "perfect" woman she was supposed to be, not to mention Gary Oldman's unforgettable arms trader.

I'm not sure how I'd classify the 5th element. Comedy SciFi works, but it's more than that. It's more in line with Heinlein's flavor of SF. Its creator, Luc Besson was also responsible for Nikita.

I liked it. Don't remember if the spaceships made whooshy noises, but the actors sure did.

I noticed that there was nothing on the list that predates the late 1960's, I wonder how old these people are.

The movie "Moon Zero Two" (the first space western!) didn't use sound in space for the most part (it's been a long time since I've seen the film and they may have slipped up in a couple of scenes), but the did use music cues which was very effective.

When I first heard that "Firefly" wasn't going to use sound in space I was excited, but I found that in a lot of cases it worked against the drama. They should have learned from MZ2 and used music.

David.

Excellent choices all, and they inclusded the '72 Solaris...these guys have taste and class as well as intelligence.


I finally got around to renting the 1972 original Solaris (http://us.imdb.com/title/tt0069293/). I'd watched the Clooney version a few months ago (and enjoyed it).

If you saw the 2002 Clooney version (http://us.imdb.com/title/tt0307479/) and didn't like it DON'T rent the original. You'll hate it.

Both share the same somber reflective mood however the original expands it to 165 minutes. The original is also distracting with its Russian diologue and English subtitles. The actors all sound the same to me; I wasn't able to distinguish who was saying what most of the time. Not that it mattered a whole lot.

The original had a couple fanciful details the remake didn't (at least that I noticed). Solaris' creations in the original had defects. The entity's attempts at duplicating people's memories was imperfect. Or more likely the memories were (as memories are). I liked this.

Even more interesting was the viewpoint of a Russian movie at the height of the Soviet Union. I didn't detect any politics; just people with sadness, love, anxiety.

The highway scenes of the "future" appeared to be filmed in Hong Kong. At least the roadsigns appeared chinese and the cars japanese. The special effects were OK when they were understated. The rocket launch containing Hari the 1st was a little like a scene from the thunderbirds.

But if you liked the 2002 version don't miss the 1972 version.

If you liked Solaris, you might try out the other Andrei Tarkovsky sci-fi flick, "Stalker". It's seven and a half hours of three guys taking a walk and talking (and occasionally napping).

Okay, that's obviously a wild exaggeration, but that's what it feels like watching it. And yet it was a powerful film that has stayed with me after the one viewing I gave it several years ago. Very much in the manner and philosophy of Solaris.

Russia has been divided by a heavily guarded border that walls off a no-man's land where something crashed to Earth. An alien presence, a meteor...something kept in a room somewhere, which reportedly has the power to grant any wish, any at all. The area is contaminated for miles around by a forsce that can alter reality if disturbed, in lethal ways. "Stalkers" are hired guides who can sneak you past the military patrols, who know the territory well enough to reach the object. Two men hire a stalker to get them there.

it's all talk, almost no action (although getting throught the blockade is tense stuff), and still manages to be hypnotic. People who hated either version of Solaris will ahte this even more, but anyone who enjoyed the '72 Solaris might get into the mindset of this.

I noticed that there was nothing on the list that predates the late 1960's, I wonder how old these people are.

The movie "Moon Zero Two" (the first space western!) didn't use sound in space for the most part (it's been a long time since I've seen the film and they may have slipped up in a couple of scenes), but the did use music cues which was very effective.

When I first heard that "Firefly" wasn't going to use sound in space I was excited, but I found that in a lot of cases it worked against the drama. They should have learned from MZ2 and used music.

David.

I didn't look at the list, but if they omitted THE MAN IN THE WHITE SUIT, then these scientists have got very limited vision in terms of looking back at filmed SF. SUIT is still quintessential SF -- showing the impact of new tech on society -- as well as being damned funny. FORBIDDEN PLANET should be there as well, just as a point of derivation for original TREK.

space$19.99 occasionally used music in place of an explosion sound, but then they'd put the THWOOSH sound afterward, which kind of spoiled the music cue.

I think FF did the sound in space thing quite well ... I just wish the makers had kept straight other simple matters, like telling the difference between a star system and a galaxy. You can't see this issue on the disks, but the title sequence on the fox-aired eps had a couple different narrations that sort of contradicted each other about how much space the show took place in (apparently the whole series DOES take place in a single star system, which seems nutso to me.)