In Time (2011). Time is currency in the dystopia in the film - paying for something decreases your lifespan, earning wages increases it.
The movie sets up a really cool class structure, wherein there are rich people born with/inheriting hundreds of thousands of years of life, and poor people barely managing to scrape enough hours to stay alive until they can earn more the next day. There are segmented areas of the city that cost years to get into.
Overall incredible premise, but the story wasn’t exceptional beyond a couple of the cool mechanics you might expect based on said premise.
Agree. Great premise and decent world building in the film, but it just felt like a generic action thriller after 30 mins.
And Justin Timberlake is good at pop music
In time is absolutely an idea that I wish would get revisited for a TV show.
When I was a kid, for some reason, I loved the original West World movie, which is about 20% high concept and 80% “how do we copy terminator when all we have are a bunch of random Wild West, medieval and classical back lots?”
Obviously a few years ago HBO picked it up for a show, and that first season explores some of the richest philosophy I’ve seen on TV, in the way only Sci-Fi can; by building characters and technology directly around their philosophical takes and stress testing them. Also simultaneously it created an incredibly compelling story and characters. All of this stemmed from the idea “what if there was a wild west theme park manned by perfectly realistic animatronics?”
In Time may not have the cult classic reputation of the first Westworld but it’s got appeal and charm, while being basically only interesting in it’s high concept, and therefore perfect to pull apart and explore an HBO style branching plot. I bet you could get Justin Timberlake to appear in it again too, for added audience appeal. A show like this can also explore multiple characters in different classes, and those who interact with both. It’s just wasn’t that suited to a movie.
I loved the original West World movie, which is about 20% high concept and 80% “how do we copy terminator when all we have are a bunch of random Wild West, medieval and classical back lots?”
I’m sorry what? ‘West World’ came out in 1973, ‘The Terminator’ came out in 1984. Am I missing something here?
Oops, you’re right. It is copying something of its time because it’s all my dad would tell me when watching it growing up, but I can’t remember which film.
The Cube.
Most people saw it as an average horror movie where a bunch of people try to get out of a giant torture box. But there was a pivotal scene that stuck with me where one of the prisoners realizes he helped build part of it. The whole thing wasn’t some intentional torture device but just a bunch of people doing their day jobs that were lost in a bureaucracy not ever questioning what their work was creating.
A stark reflection of society and the systems we create and the dangers of not ever looking at the bigger picture.Of course they proceeded to shit all over this idea in Cube2 where it ended up being just another evil government experiment.
I actually liked Cube Zero for the backstory and set styles. I don’t remember much else so I’m assuming it was shit, but you can give it a try if you want.
I think OP pretty much summed up Cube Zero. The first installment is really just a horror fiction also depicting the structure of human society.
Yeah, Cube 2 is shit. It’s a scientific concept show.
Just to ask, nobody understood the full picture of what they were making? Or was there someone who created the concept but intentional obfuscated it from everyone else via bureaucracy?
Granted it’s just the viewpoint of one of the prisoners but it’s the one I found most intriguing. To quote the movie: “Nobody knew what it was, nobody cared…there is no conspiracy, nobody is in charge. It’s a headless blunder operating under the illusion of a master plan…somebody might have known sometime before they got fired, voted out, or sold it…this is an accident, a forgotten perpetual public works project. You think anybody asked questions? All they want is a clear conscience and a fat paycheck.”
Ok the last time I watched it was well before being exposed to corporate culture. That’s awesome.
That’s awesome sci-fi right there. It’s a bit campy, but it’s campy in the same way that all great social commentary is, until it isn’t and it’s too late.
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Jupiter Ascending
They seed the galaxy and harvest whole planets to create an immortality serum. Fantastic world concept … but a subpar story to make a movie about within that world.
oh yeah, I remember liking the genetic aspect of that too. But yeah, poor story, and not Mila Kunis’s best acting
I thought if they took out the werewolf thing, it would’ve been so much better.
There was this movie I saw once called Time Trap. I definitely would not call it good, but the premise was interesting.
Archaeology professor goes missing while exploring a cave which was once thought to be the location of the fountain of youth. His grad students go looking for him, find the cave, weird things start happening when they enter.
Spoilers below:
The cave is revealed to cause some sort of time distortion which grows in intensity the further in you go. The professor who had been missing for days was only in the cave for a few hours. By the time everyone realizes what is happening, months go by, then years. They exit the cave at one point only to find an apocalypse has occurred, with the cave becoming the only safe haven for them to exist in at this point. Without spoiling the rest of the movie, the story plays in to the fountain of youth legend by including a group of Spanish Conquistadors and a tribe of paleolithic cavemen living in a deeper part of the cave, all living as if only days have passed, but in reality centuries/millennia had gone by outside.
Time trap was awesome. The scene when they realize the flickering lights are time passing and then they poke their heads out of the cave to see a complete departure of the old world.
The end got a lil weird tho.
Nonetheless it’s a movie that will stick with you for a few days of conceptualizing.
*Time Trap was directed by Ben Foster, which I just discovered. It’s also streaming for free (w ads of course) on YouTube.
The kind of spoiler tag you used is the kind that doesn’t work on every Lemmy app. Fortunately, that’s not a problem, as I’ve already seen Time Trap, and despite forgetting its name, do sometimes think about it.
Thanks, I actually went out of my way to look up the native Lemmy markdown format for spoilers because I was worried the one I was used to using wasn’t universal, but I guess the opposite ended up being the case. I’ll try to fix it.
I believe this is what you’re looking for:
::: spoiler Visible Text
hidden content goes here
:::Looks like:
Visible Text
hidden content
Thanks! Does that look any better now?
It doesn’t, it still has some exclamation point action that might be the issue. If it helps, you should be able to copy and paste my example markdown. I gave it a try and it still works.
There, third time’s the charm (or 10th, more accurately, since lemmy.world is shitting the bed right now).
I think I figured out what was going on, too. The app I use was automatically re-parsing spoiler formatting into its own syntax, but then was erroneously applying that same syntax to text when attempting to view source. So even the example you posted looked different to me when viewed in app versus on the actual site. I made the edit from the site this time and I think that should be good now.
I had a series of 3 stomach surgeries and I delved into some shows I wouldn’t watch. I stumbled on this one. I really loved the premise. It is one of those late night SyFy feeling movies. The end did get weird, but I like where they were going with it.
might give this one a watch!
I’m surprised how many people in the comments have (A) seen this movie, and (B) liked it. I didn’t care for it, although I do like the basic premise.
The timing of your comment is a kind of a funny coincidence for me, because over the past few days I’ve been editing the next episode of my podcast, which will come out on Tuesday, and in it I mention Time Trap a couple times. Maybe the film is having a moment?
This was the first thing I thought of when seeing the prompt. I actually love this movie and have seen it several times, but the acting is abysmal.
Hot take, “Hitchhiker’s Guide To The Galaxy”. The radio play, books and 80s bbc show were not represented very well at all. They missed well over 75% of the jokes, Mos Def and Zooey Deschanel added nothing to it, and they added plots and scenes, I think just to get more “blockbuster actors” in, that ruin the original story of the radio play. Sam Rockwell, Alan Rickman/Warwick Davis and Bill Nightly were the highlights. One of the few movies I wish they would remake.
Sam Rockwell as Zaphod was spot on. He was the only one who actually read the books, and had to even tell the director to add “Froody” to the script. What a shitshow it must have been for the director not to know that…
That director doesn’t sound froody
Agreed, it was a big letdown unfortunately, compared to any of the other versions (including the text adventure!)
Shame, because Martin Freeman was perfect for Arthur, and Stephen Fry as the voice of the Guide was a great choice too. Though Mos Def was ok as Ford, although not on a par with David Dickson (TV) or Geoffrey McGivern (radio).
Zaphod and Trillian weren’t right at all though IMO.
I quite like the movie. I mean all your points make sense and i agree, but at the same time, it’s that movie that even introduced me to the books, and i now read them every year or two. The movie is far from perfect, but if you look at other things they try to convert into movies, this could’ve been so so much worse. Like imagine they made that movie now or somewhen in the past 5 or 10 years, it would basically be a disney marvel movie with marvel quips and: “he’s right behind me isn’t he’s?”
Not a movie, but a TV show. Revolution.
A sci-fi post-apocalypse show where the premise is that all of a sudden all technology (specifically anything that uses electricity) just stops working and nobody knows why. The show takes place 15 years into the apocalypse. The US has Balkanized into various regional states (although you don’t learn this until later). Some regions have devolved into chaos while others have basically reverted to a steam-punk type of society. Since all modern ships use electricity, they’ve begun to revive large ships from the age of sail. The remnants of the US military at Guantanamo Bay eventually return to the mainland and try to reestablish a much more explicitly authoritarian control over the US. You eventually learn that what caused the global blackout was the creation of a self-replication nanotech which rapidly spread across the planet and shut off all electricity.
Great premise, but it got too much into the soap-opera CW-style of writing and didn’t last more than 2 seasons.
Yep. Sounds like what happened with Jericho. Mystery and intrigue in the starting seasons, and then just weird petty soap-opera style squabbles towards the end
If the writers want to tell a story focused on inter-personal relationships, that’s perfectly fine. There are PLENTY of people who enjoy that kind of thing. They just don’t tend to be the same type of people who enjoy post-apocalyptic sci-fi puzzle-box shows. I don’t know why you go through all the trouble of creating this expansive world and lore only to focus your show on character dynamics that aren’t centered around the conceit of the show.
If you’re going to build this complex world, let us explore that world!
Poor Jericho, I need to hunt down the graphic novels that supposedly gave it a proper ending.
Ah yes, the Lost-likes.
Manifest, Fast Forward, Continuum, Revolution, Terra Nova… loved them all. All of them canceled.
From isn’t canceled yet.
Haha fair, that fits the definition of Lost-like, but I was thinking of that narrow era of network mystery boxes that popped up in the immediate aftermath of Lost chasing its success.
No matter how good they were, none of them were Lost so they got canceled. (Except for Fringe thank god)
From at least gets to live outside that shadow.
Yeah really fun premise slathered in boring characters.
If I recall it devolved into some CW-flavor bullshit revolving around the girl, who is her real father, why is she special. Blah blah blah.
Interstellar is like Neo-Posadism minus Marxism. The premise was awesome. Climate apocalypse and space travel. But the movie doesn’t have humanity solve either of those problems. Instead it pops it’s collar and says *don’t worry bro,
the marketMarxist space alienssome scientistsa famous shirtless hot actor guyfuck you who cares the green guy behind a curtain made a worm hole or something".I have a feeling Chris Nolan goes into films with some specifically detailed poignant character moments in mind, and then he just hastily weaves a plot to tie them together. It’s interesting to watch at least, but maybe too high brow(?) to call entertaining
For Interstellar, at least, I’d say it’s incredibly low-brow. The resolution is just “the power of wuv saves humanity!”, which is extremely simplistic and easily understood by the masses.
Well I meant mostly the talking parts which we were told to care about but most people forget
That would explain why his best films are based on books
I thought the bigger issue was the premise. If earth is in a climate apocalypse, and we have extremely advanced technology that lets us bring life to far out planets, then why are we leaving earth? Can’t those same technologies be applied to saving the earth people?
The whole “we have to go space” feels like manifest destiny and the desperate urge of capitalism to expand.
The wormhole doesn’t feel that far out, the whole movie is already far out. Griping about the realism of a fictional space movie is a losing game
I also didn’t like the “I’m going to fuck off and let everyone else die” philosophy of not solving the climate issue at home.
Basically every Terminator movie after T2. They have some great “what if” premises that could add so much depth to the world, but then struggle to see the vision through is a satisfying way.
T3: Let’s actually show Judement Day
T4: Let’s show the turning point in the war against the machines (edit: and why people follow John Connor as leader of the resistance)
T5: Exists
T6: What if all this time travel actually branched the timeline? What would it look like if one of Skynet’s terminators succeeded?
The Sarah Connor chronicles was the only sequel media that ever made sense to me
I know, right? I was quite mad when l heard the show was cancelled after season two. I still want to know if she survived after taking a shotgun shot to this day.
Christian Bale faking an actually decent London accent, Gerard Butler being a loveable scot, and Matthew McCaughnehey doing his best Norse/Spartan Warrior impression?
Horrible acting all around (except Bale at times), the lead female character was basically there to soothe/flirt with the lead (wish i was joking), you can barely understand anyone, and yet really impressive set/castle and overall atmosphere. You believe you are there, and that the world is gone.
Huge gaps in logic on the hunting patterns of dragons, helicopters seem to run on infinite fuel, and the final plan to take down the main dragon is just stupid at best… but the execution of fighting dragons in the air with nets dropped by guys without parachutes was a phenomenal air sequence.
Also, the dragon CGI holds up. You never quite see it, but when you do, you believe it’s there, and the CGI team did a great job with consistency in that the dragons are always depicted expelling fluid that they ignite, and you see it every time they cast fire.
Brilliant movie, and one of the best opening 5 minutes in terms of origin story. Just a lot of bad acting, and some questionable feats in logic plot-wise.
Christian Bale is English. His accent in Reign of Fire is not far off his normal accent.
You are shitting me!
He’s crazy good at assimilating accents so a lot of people don’t realise. Here’s his real accent (apologies for the YouTube link).
his real accent sounds fake… I almost don’t believe it…
It took me a while to figure out what movie you were talking about. But it’s “dragons invade the modern world, with Christian Bale!” (I can’t remember the name)
reign of fire
Eragon: Returns
One of the movie series I was sad to see die before it even began. Read the whole series of books.
I’d watch this, but only because sometimes I need to watch bad movies
I’m a crazy, or did you completely fail to mention what movie you’re describing?
I remember being extremely well entertained by awesome dragons, and that’s it. Which means you’re probably correct.
What Bale’s native accent?
I know it’s a British one, I was wondering what region, since OP was talking about his London accent.
its vaguely welsh, but I actually can’t tell
As featured in the picture, Reign of Fire. I had forgotten about it. I truly don’t think there is a film out there that has represented dragons as I see them better.
I really think about Quinn’s character a lot. How the world entirely changed for him on that pivotal day he discovered that male dragon, and the decades he spent running and surviving and living in fear of something that he inadvertently set in motion, and then the turning point as an adult as he confronts his fear and wields it to put an end to what he started.
What I like about him, is that he’s not actually that unique – anybody could have woken that dragon, and if Quinn hadn’t been there on that day, one of his mother’s coworkers would have. He’s not particularly heroic as an adult either, opting to hide and scrounge for survival, and openly admitting to everyone that he’s winging it on the leader front. And yet he inspires his community with fierce devotion to keeping them all alive. When he finally goes to confront the dragon, he does it almost alone, inspiring no one with his courage other than himself.
As a character I find him weirdly relatable as someone just coping with heavy trauma the best that they can
Passengers had the possibility to be really creepy, I still liked it but without seeing Chris Pratts time alone first, we would have all been confused and on guard with Jennifer Lawrence.
I think it would have been a much better film if the audience had also been kept in the dark about him opening her pod as well. That way we can also go through the range of emotions with her at the same time when she finds out.
Just start the movie from her perspective. Pod opening and Pratt is already there. He tells her his pod just opened and he’s confused too. Then we get the whole “wandering the shipn for the first time” montage where they could drop subtle hints that it’s not actually his first time doing any of those things.
His character is absolutely a bad person, but it’s a situation we can sympathize with because being truly completely alone for any amount of time fucks with people badly. She has every right to hate him for the rest of their lives, but it turns out that if he hadn’t done what he did they all would have died because of the damaged engine or whatever it was (I can’t remember).
They could have made the movie much harder hitting and/or creepy for the first half, but they opted to try and make you sympathetic to his situation from the start.
It’s the movie that always pops into my head when thinking about wasted potential.
Pandorum is, to me, what Passengers was trying for. The claustrophobic horror of hurting through the void, other humans being both your salvation and your tormentors, all that.
The execs ruined it to make a vehicle for some big names.
I love Pandorum. I have a huge FanTheory on it on reddit from years back if you want to check it out.
https://www.reddit.com/r/FanTheories/comments/gmlo53/pandorum_earth_took_serious_countermeasures/
Me, too.
Can you imagine the creation myths that would evolve in the society that developed from the survivors? There were just a handful who had survived and experienced that descent into hell. The others had blissfully slept.
I’ll check that out!
The movie In Time (2011). The premise was interesting but I can’t even remember the plot because it was so meh.
I also think Idiocracy could have been better. It had good moments, and that’s what most people remember, but the overall cohesiveness falls flat. Great moments, iconic scenes, but could have been a better film.
In time, has such a awesome premise.
But what we got was a “poor little rich girl” story.
What we got was Bonnie and Clyde. I liked it though.
At first I thought you meant there was a movie inside a movie called Time.
Not a film, but a TV series? It’s called Jericho, and the synopsis in the Wikipedia reads:
Jericho is an American post-apocalyptic action drama television series, which centers on the residents of the fictional city of Jericho, Kansas, in the aftermath of a nuclear attack on 23 major cities in the contiguous United States.
But yeah, the execution is mediocre at best. Both the action and the drama are unbearably flimsy and cliche, even the argument flops as metal.
I love Jericho. On my third watch right now actually. Would agree that it’s frequently cliché, but overall I’d say it’s very good. Skeet Ulrich is transfixing.
Did you read the season 3 in comic books? I was surprised about the following they’ve got as I was reading that Wikipedia entry.
yeah but it’s been aaages, I forgot about what happened in those.
Oh man I haven’t thought of Jericho in a minute. I used to watch that after The Unit.
Nuts
I remember starting watching that. I have no idea how far I got, but I don’t remember a thing about it.
Same here. Aamof I just try watching it last year. Visually, it was cool to come back to those years, but I don’t think I finished season 1.
Man in the High Castle tv show. The premise was interesting, Nazis taking over the US and the population figting back. However, the show quickly devolved into a confusing mess.
Nazis are in charge of the US government, yet there’s other Nazis on the run from the Nazis in charge? And they’re hiding bibles? I was left scratching my head wondering if there were any characters that weren’t Nazis. I guess it’s a story about how bad guys always turn on each other?
Also The Witcher season 1 tv show. I’ve never played the games before and knew nothing about it. I was hoping the tv series would be my introduction to the games, but… what in the actual fuck. Was the director drunk? Is this a show about medieval fantasy time travel and I’m just not getting it?
As far as the witcher and time travel kind of. At some point in the future there was a disaster and Earth was destroyed. However some humans and lots of monsters from alternate realities ended up in the world of the Witcher. Elves and dwarves were the original inhabitants.
Humans used a mix of genetic engineering they had and magic taught to them by the elves to make the Witchers. The Witchers helped solve the massive monster problem and the world ended up with humans mostly on top.
Witchers age very slowly and if not killed can live a very long time. Powerful magic users are basically the same. So the stories from session 1 are spread over about 80 years with some long lived characters.
The first book that season 1 is primarily based on is also different from the other books. It’s a bunch of short stories that are based on classic stories. So there is Sleeping Beauty, Snow White, Beauty and the Beast, etc.
I own the Witcher 3. Should I start there? Cause you just made me very interested.
Witcher 3 the game is a fine place to start. I’d say you can start in any of the games and Book 1 the Last Wish, Book 2 Sword of Destiny, or Book 3 Sword of Destiny. The games were in line with the books cannon but telling there own story. The popularity of the games made Sapkowski write more and they have now diverged somewhat. Here are some notes on all of them as far as a starting place.
Last Wish (book): Short stories based on classic stories. Good intro to the world and the writing style. No main plot so it can be skipped or read later without much problems. The Sleeping Beauty story is the opening cinematic of Game 1.
Sword of Destiny (Book): More short stories but we introduce a lot of the main characters in the rest of the books.
Blood of Elves (book): This is where the main story of the Witcher starts proper. After this you should read them in order.
Witcher 1 (game): Game play is ok but I think has the most interesting ideas and storytelling. It has the choose between two bad choices and find out later what the effect is. It doesn’t spoon feed you the lore and there are lots of hints about what is going on you can catch if you are paying attention. For example echinops grow where terrible crimes were committed if the crime wasn’t atoned for. Every place you find a echinops growing is a clue as to the nature of what happened there.
There is another great non obvious story element that I love. I think it’s more fun to know this and see how it plays out in the game. I recommend reading the spoiler but it’s up to you.
Main Villain
Alvin the boy who almost dies in the barghest attack in part 1 is also the main villain Jacques de Aldersberg. Towards the end of the game Alvin goes back in time and grows into the adult Jacques de Aldersberg. The various things you say to Alvin will change what Jacques says during the game. And when you kill Jacques at the end you use your silver blade. He looks so upset saying “That sword is for monsters.”
Witcher 2 Assassins of Kings (game): Improved gameplay with much more focus on combat and combat mechanics. Better graphics. Ok story but nothing compared to 1. The combat is very hard early and is required so that can be a drawback.
Witcher 3 Wild Hunt (game): The best game as far as gameplay. Fun lots different things to do and a solid story. It’s a very Ciri focused story and thus can spoil some of the books somewhat. As far as a starting place you are going to have a lot of fun but it does throw a fair amount of characters at you and expect you to know them. Also the spoiler from 1 is specifically confirmed at one point so if you don’t want that beware.
If you didn’t actually finish high castle, it just keeps getting good weirder.
ahhh yeah Man in the High Castle, that’s one where you oughta just read the book
i’m ditto w/u on how annoying constant time displacement is in television YES EVEN ANDOR DAMMIT
Wanted (2008) - The comics are brilliant, sharp, funny and intelligent. By leaving out everything smart/interesting from the comics they managed to create a mediocre action movie.
The comics were ‘edgy’ and somewhat needlessly abrasive, but yeah they were enjoyable
Except for shooting around corners and that thing with the car, those bits were cool.
