Science fiction films are often speculative in nature, and often include key supporting elements of science and technology. However, as often as not the "science" in a
Hollywood science fiction movie can be considered pseudo-science, relying primarily on atmosphere and quasi-scientific artistic fancy than facts and conventional scientific theory. The definition can also vary depending on the viewpoint of the observer. Many science fiction films include elements of mysticism,
occult, magic, or the
supernatural, considered by some to be more properly elements of fantasy or the occult (or religious) film. This transforms the movie genre into a science fantasy with a religious or quasi-religious philosophy serving as the driving motivation. The movie
Forbidden Planet employs many common science fiction elements, but the film carries a profound message - that the evolution of a species toward technological perfection (in this case exemplified by the disappeared alien civilization called the "Krell") does not ensure the loss of primitive and dangerous urges. In the film, this part of the primitive mind manifests itself as monstrous destructive force emanating from the Freudian subconscious, or "Id". Some films blur the line between the genres, such as films where the protagonist gains the extraordinary powers of the
superhero. These films usually employ quasi-plausible reason for the hero gaining these powers. Not all
science fiction themes are equally suitable for movies. Science fiction horror is most common. Often enough, these films could just as well pass as
Westerns or
World War II films if the science fiction props were removed. Common motifs also include voyages and expeditions to other planets, and
dystopias, while
utopias are rare.
Imagery Film theorist
Vivian Sobchack argues that science fiction films differ from fantasy films in that while science fiction film seeks to achieve our belief in the images we are viewing, fantasy film instead attempts to suspend our disbelief. The science fiction film displays the unfamiliar and alien in the context of the familiar. Despite the alien nature of the scenes and science fictional elements of the setting, the imagery of the film is related back to humankind and how we relate to our surroundings. While the science fiction film strives to push the boundaries of the human experience, they remain bound to the conditions and understanding of the audience and thereby contain prosaic aspects, rather than being completely alien or abstract. Genre films such as westerns or war movies are bound to a particular area or time period. This is not true of the science fiction film. However, there are several common visual elements that are evocative of the genre. These include the spacecraft or space station, alien worlds or creatures, robots, and futuristic gadgets. Examples include movies like
Lost in Space,
Serenity,
Avatar,
Prometheus,
Tomorrowland,
Passengers, and
Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets. More subtle visual clues can appear with changes of the human form through modifications in appearance, size, or behavior, or by means a known environment turned eerily alien, such as an empty city
The Omega Man (1971).
Scientific elements as the titular character from
Dr. Strangelove (1964) While science is a major element of this genre, many movie studios take significant liberties with scientific knowledge. Such liberties can be most readily observed in films that show
spacecraft maneuvering in
outer space. The
vacuum should preclude the transmission of
sound or maneuvers employing wings, yet the soundtrack is filled with inappropriate flying noises and changes in flight path resembling an aircraft banking. The filmmakers, unfamiliar with the specifics of
space travel, focus instead on providing acoustical atmosphere and the more familiar maneuvers of the aircraft. Similar instances of ignoring science in favor of art can be seen when movies present environmental effects as portrayed in
Star Wars and
Star Trek. Entire
planets are destroyed in titanic explosions requiring mere seconds, whereas an actual event of this nature takes many hours. The role of the scientist has varied considerably in the science fiction film genre, depending on the public perception of science and advanced technology. Starting with
Dr. Frankenstein, the
mad scientist became a
stock character who posed a dire threat to society and perhaps even civilization. Certain portrayals of the "mad scientist", such as
Peter Sellers's performance in
Dr. Strangelove, have become iconic to the genre. In the monster films of the 1950s, the scientist often played a heroic role as the only person who could provide a
technological fix for some impending doom. Reflecting the distrust of government that began in the 1960s in the United States, the brilliant but rebellious scientist became a common theme, often serving a
Cassandra-like role during an impending disaster.
Biotechnology (e.g.,
cloning) is a popular scientific element in films as depicted in
Jurassic Park (cloning of extinct species),
The Island (cloning of humans), and (
genetic modification) in some superhero movies and in the
Alien series.
Cybernetics and
holographic projections as depicted in
RoboCop and
I, Robot are also popularized.
Interstellar travel and
teleportation is a popular theme in the
Star Trek series that is achieved through
warp drives and
transporters while
intergalactic travel is popular in films such as
Stargate and
Star Wars that is achieved through
hyperspace or
wormholes.
Nanotechnology is also featured in the
Star Trek series in the form of
replicators (utopia), in
The Day the Earth Stood Still in the form of
grey goo (dystopia), and in
Iron Man 3 in the form of
extremis (nanotubes).
Force fields is a popular theme in
Independence Day while
invisibility is also popular in
Star Trek. Arc reactor technology, featured in
Iron Man, is similar to a
cold fusion device. Miniaturization technology where people are shrunk to microscopic sizes is featured in films like
Fantastic Voyage (1966),
Honey, I Shrunk the Kids (1989), and Marvel's
Ant-Man (2015). The late
Arthur C. Clarke's
third law states that "any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic". Past science fiction films have depicted "fictional" ("magical") technologies that became present reality. For example, the Personal Access Display Device from
Star Trek was a precursor of
smartphones and
tablet computers.
Gesture recognition in the movie
Minority Report is part of current
game consoles.
Human-level artificial intelligence is also fast approaching with the advent of
smartphone A.I. while a
working cloaking device / material is the main goal of
stealth technology.
Autonomous cars (e.g.
KITT from the
Knight Rider series) and
quantum computers, like in the movie
Stealth and
Transcendence, also will be available eventually. Furthermore, although Clarke's laws do not classify
"sufficiently advanced" technologies, the
Kardashev scale measures a civilization's level of technological advancement into types. Due to its exponential nature, sci-fi civilizations usually only attain Type I (harnessing all the energy attainable from a single planet), and strictly speaking often not even that.
Alien lifeforms The concept of life, particularly intelligent life, having an extraterrestrial origin is a popular staple of science fiction films. Early films often used alien life forms as a threat or peril to the human race, where the invaders were frequently fictional representations of actual military or political threats on Earth as observed in films such as
Mars Attacks!,
Starship Troopers, the
Alien series, the
Predator series, and
The Chronicles of Riddick series. Some aliens were represented as benign and even beneficial in nature in such films as
Escape to Witch Mountain,
E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial,
Close Encounters of the Third Kind,
The Fifth Element, ''
The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, Avatar, Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets, and the Men in Black'' series. In order to provide subject matter to which audiences can relate, the large majority of intelligent alien races presented in films have an
anthropomorphic nature, possessing human emotions and motivations. In films like
Cocoon,
My Stepmother Is an Alien,
Species,
Contact,
The Box,
Knowing,
The Day the Earth Stood Still, and
The Watch, the aliens were nearly human in physical appearance, and communicated in a common earth language. However, the aliens in
Stargate and
Prometheus were human in physical appearance but communicated in an alien language. A few films have tried to represent intelligent aliens as something utterly different from the usual humanoid shape (e.g. An intelligent life form surrounding an entire planet in
Solaris, the ball shaped creature in
Dark Star, microbial-like creatures in
The Invasion, shape-shifting creatures in
Evolution). Recent trends in films involve
building-size alien creatures like in the movie
Pacific Rim where the
CGI has tremendously improved over the previous decades as compared in previous films such as
Godzilla.
Disaster films A frequent theme among science fiction films is that of impending or actual disaster on an epic scale. These often address a particular concern of the writer by serving as a vehicle of warning against a type of activity, including technological research. In the case of alien invasion films, the creatures can provide as a stand-in for a feared foreign power. Films that fit into the Disaster film typically also fall into the following general categories: •
Alien invasion: Hostile
extraterrestrials arrive and seek to supplant humanity. They are either overwhelmingly powerful or very insidious. Typical examples include
The War of the Worlds (1953),
Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956), ''
Daleks' Invasion Earth 2150 A.D. (1966), Independence Day (1996), War of the Worlds (2005), The Day the Earth Stood Still (2008), Skyline (2010), The Darkest Hour (2011), Battle: Los Angeles (2011), Battleship (2012), The Avengers (2012), Man of Steel (2013), Pacific Rim (2013), Ender's Game (2013), Pixels (2015), Independence Day: Resurgence (2016), and Justice League (2017). Star Wars: Episode I – The Phantom Menace'' (1999) takes an alternative look at the subject, involving an extraterrestrial political entity invading planet Naboo for commercial reasons. •
Environmental disaster: such as major climate change, or an
asteroid or
comet strike. Movies that have employed this theme include
Soylent Green (1973),
Waterworld (1995),
Deep Impact (1998),
Armageddon (1998),
The Core (2003),
The Day After Tomorrow (2004),
2012 (2009),
Snowpiercer (2013) and
Geostorm (2017). •
Man supplanted by technology: Typically in the form of an all-powerful
computer, advanced
robots or
cyborgs, or else genetically modified humans or animals. Among the films in this category are the
Terminator series,
The Matrix trilogy,
I, Robot (2004), and the
Transformers series. •
Nuclear war: Usually in the form of a
dystopic, post-
holocaust tale of grim survival. Examples of such a storyline can be found in the movies
Dr. Strangelove (1964),
Dr. Who and the Daleks (1965),
Planet of the Apes (1968;
remade in 2001),
A Boy and His Dog (1975),
Mad Max (1979),
City of Ember (2008),
The Book of Eli (2010),
Oblivion (2013),
Mad Max: Fury Road (2015), and
Friend of the World (2020). •
Pandemic: A highly lethal
disease, often one created by man, threatens or wipes out most of humanity in a massive
plague. This topic has been treated in such films as
The Andromeda Strain (1971),
The Omega Man (1971),
12 Monkeys (1995),
28 Weeks Later (2007),
I Am Legend (2007), and the
Resident Evil series. This version of the genre sometimes mixes with
zombie films or other
monster movies.
Monster films While monster films do not usually depict danger on a global or epic scale, science fiction film also has a long tradition of movies featuring monster attacks. These differ from similar films in the horror or fantasy genres because science fiction films typically rely on a scientific (or at least pseudo-scientific) rationale for the monster's existence, rather than a supernatural or magical reason. Often, the science fiction film monster is created, awakened, or "evolves" because of the machinations of a mad scientist, a nuclear accident, or a scientific experiment gone awry. Typical examples include
The Beast from 20,000 Fathoms (1953),
Jurassic Park films,
Cloverfield,
Pacific Rim,
Split Second (1992 film), the
King Kong films, and the
Godzilla franchise or the many films involving
Frankenstein's monster.
Mind and identity The core
mental aspects of what makes us human has been a staple of science fiction films, particularly since the 1980s.
Ridley Scott's
Blade Runner (1982), an adaptation of
Philip K. Dick's novel
Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?, examined what made an organic-creation a human, while the
RoboCop series saw an
android mechanism fitted with the brain and reprogrammed mind of a human to create a
cyborg. The idea of brain transfer was not entirely new to science fiction film, as the concept of the "
mad scientist" transferring the human mind to another body is as old as
Frankenstein while the idea of corporations behind mind transfer technologies is observed in later films such as
Gamer,
Avatar, and
Surrogates. Films such as
Total Recall have popularized a thread of films that explore the concept of reprogramming the human mind. The theme of
brainwashing in several films of the sixties and seventies including
A Clockwork Orange and
The Manchurian Candidate coincided with secret real-life government experimentation during
Project MKULTRA. Voluntary erasure of memory is further explored as themes of the films
Paycheck and
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. Some films like
Limitless explore the concept of mind enhancement. The anime series
Serial Experiments Lain also explores the idea of reprogrammable reality and memory. The idea that a human could be entirely represented as a program in a computer was a core element of the film
Tron. This would be further explored in the film version of
The Lawnmower Man,
Transcendence, and
Ready Player One and the idea reversed in
Virtuosity as computer programs sought to become real persons. In
The Matrix series, the
virtual reality world became a real-world prison for humanity, managed by intelligent machines. In movies such as
eXistenZ,
The Thirteenth Floor, and
Inception, the nature of reality and virtual reality become intermixed with no clear distinguishing boundary.
Telekinesis and
telepathy are featured in movies like
Star Wars,
The Last Mimzy,
Race to Witch Mountain,
Chronicle, and
Lucy while
precognition is featured in
Minority Report as well as in
The Matrix saga (in which precognition is achieved by knowing the artificial world).
Robots '' characters at
Universal Studios Hollywood Robots have been a part of science fiction since the Czech playwright
Karel Čapek coined the word in 1921. In early films, robots were usually played by a human actor in a boxy metal suit, as in
The Phantom Empire, although the female robot in
Metropolis is an exception. The first depiction of a sophisticated robot in a United States film was
Gort in
The Day the Earth Stood Still. Robots in films are often sentient and sometimes sentimental, and they have filled a range of roles in science fiction films. Robots have been supporting characters, such as
Robby the Robot in
Forbidden Planet, Huey, Dewey and Louie in
Silent Running,
Data in
Star Trek: The Next Generation, sidekicks (e.g.,
C-3PO and
R2-D2 from
Star Wars, JARVIS from
Iron Man), and extras, visible in the background to create a futuristic setting (e.g.,
Back to the Future Part II (1989),
Total Recall (2012),
RoboCop (2014)). As well, robots have been formidable movie villains or monsters (e.g., the robot Box in the film ''
Logan's Run (1976), HAL 9000 in 2001: A Space Odyssey, ARIIA in Eagle Eye, robot Sentinels in X-Men: Days of Future Past, the battle droids in the Star Wars
prequel trilogy, or the huge robot probes seen in Monsters vs. Aliens). In some cases, robots have even been the leading characters in science fiction films; in the film Blade Runner (1982), many of the characters are bioengineered android "replicants". This is also present in the animated films WALL-E (2008), Astro Boy (2009), Big Hero 6 (2014), Ghost in the Shell (2017) and in Next Gen'' (2018). Films like
Bicentennial Man,
A.I. Artificial Intelligence,
Chappie, and
Ex Machina depicted the emotional fallouts of robots that are self-aware. Other films like
The Animatrix (The Second Renaissance) present the consequences of mass-producing self-aware androids as humanity succumbs to their robot overlords. One popular theme in science fiction film is whether robots will someday replace humans, a question raised in the film adaptation of
Isaac Asimov's
I, Robot (in jobs) and in the film
Real Steel (in sports), or whether intelligent robots could develop a conscience and a motivation to protect, take over, or destroy the human race (as depicted in
The Terminator,
Transformers, and in
Avengers: Age of Ultron). Another theme is remote
telepresence via
androids as depicted in
Surrogates and
Iron Man 3. As artificial intelligence becomes smarter due to
increasing computer power, some sci-fi dreams have already been realized. For example, the computer
Deep Blue beat the world chess champion in 1997 and a documentary film,
Game Over: Kasparov and the Machine, was released in 2003. Another famous computer called
Watson defeated the two best human
Jeopardy (game show) players in 2011 and a NOVA documentary film,
Smartest Machine on Earth, was released in the same year.
Building-size robots are also becoming a popular theme in movies as featured in
Pacific Rim. Future live action films may include an adaptation of popular television series like
Voltron and
Robotech. The
CGI robots of
Pacific Rim and the
Power Rangers (2017) reboot was greatly improved as compared to the original
Mighty Morphin Power Rangers: The Movie (1995). While "size does matter", a famous tagline of the movie
Godzilla, incredibly small robots, called
nanobots, do matter as well (e.g. Borg
nanoprobes in
Star Trek and nanites in
I, Robot).
Time travel The concept of
time travel—travelling backwards and forwards through time—has always been a popular staple of science fiction film and science fiction television series. Time travel usually involves the use of some type of advanced technology, such as H. G. Wells' classic
The Time Machine, the commercially successful 1980s-era
Back to the Future trilogy, the
Bill & Ted trilogy, the
Terminator series,
Déjà Vu (2006),
Source Code (2011),
Edge of Tomorrow (2014), and
Predestination (2014). Other movies, such as the
Planet of the Apes series,
Timeline (2003) and
The Last Mimzy (2007), explained their depictions of time travel by drawing on physics concepts such as the
special relativity phenomenon of time dilation (which could occur if a spaceship was travelling near the speed of light) and
wormholes. Some films show time travel not being attained from advanced technology, but rather from an inner source or personal power, such as the 2000s-era films
Donnie Darko,
Mr. Nobody,
The Butterfly Effect, and
X-Men: Days of Future Past. More conventional time travel movies use technology to bring the past to life in the present, or in a present that lies in our future. The film
Iceman (1984) told the story of the reanimation of a frozen
Neanderthal. The film
Freejack (1992) shows time travel used to pull victims of horrible deaths forward in time a split-second before their demise, and then use their bodies for spare parts. A common theme in time travel film is the paradoxical nature of travelling through time. In the
French New Wave film
La jetée (1962), director
Chris Marker depicts the self-fulfilling aspect of a person being able to see their future by showing a child who witnesses the death of his future self.
La Jetée was the inspiration for
12 Monkeys, (1995) director
Terry Gilliam's film about time travel, memory and madness. The
Back to the Future trilogy and
The Time Machine go one step further and explore the result of altering the past, while in
Star Trek: First Contact (1996) and
Star Trek (2009) the crew must rescue the Earth from having its past altered by time-travelling
cyborgs and alien races. ==Genre as commentary on social issues==