Let's talk about Doomsday.. | 25 comments (25 topical, 0 editorial, 0 hidden)

Re: Let's talk about Doomsday.. (4.00 / 2)

Silent Running

Idaho Transfer (a failure of film making but an interesting failure)

Millennium (lousy adaptation of Varley's bizarro novel)

Grave of the Fireflies (some people have lived through the end of their world)

and of course the expensively bad Day After Tomorrow (yaaaawn, weary Oedipal drama amid gee-wow SFX and questionable physics)

Fahrenheit 451 (the end of our cultural world)

Rapa Nui (easter island drama, schlocky but at times somewhat engaging)

when you think about it the whole Star Trek mythos as fully developed via the movie series and TNG, is a post-apocalyptic redemption story (as someone insightfully pointed out on another thread): humanity wrecks itself and is rescued by benevolent aliens (Vulcans as I recall) who offer (here we go) clean miracle-energy technologies and moral guidance. it's a happy ending grafted onto an implicit crash-n-burn story.

The difference between theory and practise in practise ...

by DeAnander (de_at_daclarke_dot_org) on Thu Apr 13th, 2006 at 04:20:13 PM EST

Re: Let's talk about Doomsday.. (none / 0)

oh and I forgot, that cheeseball flick 'Zardoz' -- definitely at least an 8 on the Plan9ometer.

The difference between theory and practise in practise ...

by DeAnander (de_at_daclarke_dot_org) on Thu Apr 13th, 2006 at 08:02:57 PM EST
[ Parent ]

The effect of movies on impressionable adolescents (4.00 / 3)

Not an atomic apocalypse, but I found Soylent Green (1973) powerful - especially the parts where the old man (Edward G. Robinson, I believe, in what may have been his last role) is remembering the world as it had been. Little things, like strawberries or celery, move him to tears.

And when he's being euthanized while watching a movie of nature long gone, Charlton Heston's character bursts into the room. The old man turns to the young one, momentarily slack-jawed at the beauty we take for granted, and they have the following exchange (courtesy of Google):

Can you see it?
Yes.
Isn't it beautiful?
Oh, Yes.
I told you.
How could I know? How could I... How could I ever imagine?

Fear of leaving a world like that to my children keeps me going, day after day, doing my bit to oppose the current regime in DC...

What is the use of a house if you haven't got a tolerable planet to put it on? - Thoreau

by Dem in Knoxville (green_planet_2000 (at) yahoo (dot) com) on Thu Apr 13th, 2006 at 09:03:49 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Let's talk about Doomsday.. (none / 0)

I really lke the style of Fahrenheit 451. I guess it marks my affection for an older mode of storytelling.

by Metatone (metatone [a|t] gmail (dot) com) on Fri Apr 14th, 2006 at 05:05:13 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Let's talk about Doomsday.. (none / 0)

It's good but not on the top of my list. My problem with it, I guess, is that I read the book, which is superior, before not after.

_{*Lunatic*, n.

One whose delusions are out of fashion.}

by DoDo on Fri Apr 14th, 2006 at 05:19:23 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Let's talk about Doomsday.. (none / 0)

Hah.

If you don't keep a book and a film separate, as in "two presentations on similar themes" then you're unlikely to enjoy any film where the book is decent. There's just a lot more narrative room in a normal book vs. a normal film.

by Metatone (metatone [a|t] gmail (dot) com) on Fri Apr 14th, 2006 at 09:15:26 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Let's talk about Doomsday.. | 25 comments (25 topical, 0 editorial, 0 hidden)

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