Saturday, July 30, 2005





This time Paul Kimball's counting down his 10 favorite science fiction films. Here are mine, if you're interested.

18 comments:

Gerald T said...

Viewed the Director’s cut of Donnie Darko it for the second time last night, my brother, Frank was visiting from out of town, had not seen the movie before.

So when the motivational speaker asks Donnie his name in the auditorium, Donne makes one up, what name does he give?

Mac said...

That's funny! "Darko" is like some synchronistic nexus. I'm embarrassed to admit I don't have it on DVD; it's really up there on my list.

Mac said...

"Barbarella" had a great visual feel but left me pretty bored. Although I love her shag-carpeted spaceship.

Gerald T said...

You got Naked Lunch at number four Mac? O’ Boy, I will be sending you a check for therapy tomorrow.

Contact at number 7? I have so many issues with that move, OK, you have a Jodi Foster hang up, you’re not the first, and we will let it go…

Still haven’t seen Total Recall, by the time it came out I had just about had it with Arrrnullled. Pity, because it is a Verhoven movie.

Speaking of, no Starship Troopers? I went to that movie expecting a loving treatment of Heinlein’s Neo Fascist tale of a ‘good’ war.
And Paul shows that the Empire Never Ended! Right in our fresh scrubbed Imperialistic face that man was, how dare he treat the good ol USA so, you’d think he had some kind of a bad experience with a Nazi out look on life or something.

I especially like his treatment of the hero’s friend who joins the psyker corps.


Number one;
Yer lucky Mac,
I am willing to throw down with any one who does not have Blade runner at number one.

I am ashamed that I don’t have a copy in my library!
(Much wailing and gnashing of teeth.)

Barbarella? Hu? Wuuat?

Mac said...

I should probably note that the movies on my movie page aren't in any particular order, although "Blade Runner" probably really is my #1 favorite.

Gerald--

I have issues with "Contact" too, but it did enough right that I saw it multiple times at the theater and bought both the DVD and the soundtrack. It's actually much better than Carl Sagan's novel.

Gerald T said...

OK, will view Barbella some day; with hold any judgment until I have actually seen the movie.

Blade Runner is the perfect science fiction movie, not one thing wrong or out of place.

I think what happen is that Philip K Dicks impending death caused a rift in the space time matrix, some kind of singularity, after all a mind like his has a presence, and the disappearance of that colossal presence in our plane of existence had to have created a huge rift in all the information energy fields associated with him, including the move.

So how much of the movie is what was shot on film, and how much of what we view is a holographic overlay? Remember all of reality is a holographic information projection, Philip hyper evolved at the very end, its possible that he altered the information matrix pattern of Blade Runner as a parting gift, why underneath his holo overlay there may be a move like Barbarella .

Sorry! Sorry! I will check out the shag carpet spaceship, promise!

Mac said...

Actually, there's one poorly edited scene in "Blade Runner": when Deckard is talking to the snake merchant. We see the dialogue behind a pane of glass, and their lip movements don't even vaguely match what we hear. That's always bothered me, because it's an otherwise impeccable movie.

Mac said...

Of course "Barbarella" is on DVD! *Everything's* on DVD! ;-)

Gerald T said...

OK Mac, go with my hypothesis for a sec, i.e. The move that we see is a holographic overlay, an added weave to the information energy matrix that we call reality, grafted on by the spirit of PKD as he rocketed out of the 3D realm.

Now if the movie is perfect, ok, but what if Philip wanted to leave us a secret message?

To make something stand out it has to be different, so the hidden message would be in the one flaw in the movie, with me so far?


You say the flaw is;

“We see the dialogue behind a pane of glass”


So this is Philips message, but what’s he saying?

We are behind a pane of glass? Trapped behind the reflective Sphere perhaps?



“their lip movements don't even vaguely match what we hear”

Our communications our out of sync with reality?

Reality(lip Movements) Does not mach what is really being communicated(words)?


Hope I have been able to push your blog a little more in to the Twilight Zone tonight Mac, because what we all need is a little more weirdness in this big ol mundane world of ours.

I Gotta get that movie!

Gerald T said...

Having trouble with the holographic overlay concept?

Our mind-vision is like a reality-matrix paint brush, let me give you an example, say I wanted to mod the information energy pattern that is called “The Movie Donnie Darko”, not change the movie in any great way, but some thing that would get your attention, say replace the name that Donnie calls him self when the motivational speaker asks him his name.
Replace that name with my name, Gerald, for instance. And while I am at it I will change the name of the rabbet to Frank, my brother.


Remember, it’s a holographic universe, so when I change one shard in the hologram, they all change.

Now, all over the world, any information energy nodes that are referenced as ‘Donnie Darko movie”, whether they be a DVD information energy node, or a memory of viewing, writing, acting in the move node, or a film print node or a script node,, they all change, they all have the new names replacing the old.
And you have no memory of this replacement, because the past is also changed, see at 1200, it is not am or pm or before noon or after noon, at that moment time does not exist. And when time is rendered meaningless, then it is just as easy to change the past (Memories) as it is the present.

This is what the aliens did in Dark City, and it is what the Trans Dimensionals are doing here, right now, to you.

You also have this power, this paint brush, but you are afraid to use it.

Gerald T said...

Perhaps I am being a little too critical of you, and for that I do apologize, of course you use your dream weaver ability every day in the War, on the battle field we call Ruins on Mars.
It is a daily struggle, you see the truth(original holographic field, well, as laid down by the people on mars a long time ago), you create a magnifying mind mirror (Book, interview), in order to expand the peoples information-energy conversion-awareness capability, but then one of the Ghouls from Dark City shows up to warp and bend the matrix. To put down a twisted holographic overlay distorting the clear reflection that you had held up.
And then with the next book, you attempt to reweave the distortion back to its original form, you remake the matrix anew.
What I am saying is that the arms race, like in any war, is escalating and you may have to develop your reality shifting abilities to a higher level to keep up.
A good series of books on this phase shifting subject is Chronicles of Amber, By Roger Zelazny.


That little demon boy Ghoul from Dark City, you know what his name is, who he is, why that’s our own little ankle biter, Phil Plait.

Mac said...

Gerald,

I agree that the universe is effectively a hologram. Have you ever read anything by physicist David Bohm?

Re. "Blade Runner": Here's a challenge. When you get the DVD/cassette, see if you can figure out what the snake merchant and Deckard are *really* saying behind the glass.

Gerald T said...

http://www.cs.uu.nl/wais/html/na-dir/movies/blade-runner-faq.html

Holy shit this data base is huge!

Getting sleepy, to...much...innformation...head heavy..........


PS Mac, I don’t consciously try to alter the reality matrix,

They made me do it!

Mac said...

Oops. "Alien" and "Aliens" both belong on my list; I love both of them.

Gerald T said...

Perhaps a different list for Military SF, my first love before I became a daisy sniffing Goddess worshiper.

Mac said...

I always looked at the Queen Alien as the negative side of the feminine principle.

I'm thinking of a name for this; it starts with a "b"...

Kyle said...

Hi all -

If Sigourney had bigger boobs, Alien and Aliens would garner higher rankings. :)

But when you remind people of that incredible android "milk meltdown" scene they usually accept it as bona fide sci-fi.

Alien was lightning striking...Ridley Scott(a new sci-fi director), HR Giger(a new wet, ancient, sensual "look"), and Sigourney(A new kind of virile female).

John Hurt's scene was the biggest shocker since Carrie reached up from the grave.

Kyle

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