Fears, Anxieties, And the depression
Science fiction can rather nakedly show us who we are as a society. We send a message to the future with our stories and our films, coded through genre, to say what our fears for the future were in the moment we lived in.
We can see it in the films of the 1950s “Atomic Age” where THEM and GODZILLA were the products of nuclear testing. Numerous B-films of the 1960s gave us nuclear articulated villains, atomic inspired nightmares, and dystopian hellscapes.
The 1970s reflected the realities of utopian society-building with a film like John Boorman’s ZARDOZ. In fact, the exploration of utopia has long been a fascination with filmmakers, and continues to this day, with maybe the most daring example being William Cameron Menzie’s THINGS TO COME from 1936. In that film, writer H.G. Wells explores dystopia, utopia, war, disease, and famine all within a 97 minute runtime. Coming out of the Depression and at the precipice of the second World War, THINGS TO COME is one of the most startling articulations of the future from the past.
The 1980s showed the rumblings of a technological dystopia, with filmmakers like David Cronenberg and James Cameron exploring the nightmarish possibilities within their films VIDEODROME and THE TERMINATOR. Both films took then-current jumping-off points (VHS in VIDEODROME and complex machines in THE TERMINATOR) and expounded upon them in ways that are still fantastic 40 years later.
The 1990s took the height of UFO mania into the mainstream with INDEPENDENCE DAY and MEN IN BLACK, and the new century has given us a plethora of films exploring the modern era of artificial intelligence, the multi-verse, and the privatization of space exploration. Each reflects the current climate and extrapolates from the information available to us at the time of its creation.
It’s important to reach back into the past, and see the works of art created before your time on the planet. I know for many, watching an old film can be a chore, a bore, or a struggle because it might be in black and white, it might be told in an unfamiliar way, or you might not recognize anyone on the screen…but that’s the point. Open yourself up to the idea of the buried treasure in the past.
If we don’t show these films and talk about these films, these films will not survive. Keeping them a part of the conversation preserves their significance in the culture. With streaming becoming the predominant way in which people receive their media now, the selection becomes smaller and smaller and corporations increasingly tell you what you’ll be watching instead of the viewer seeking out an interesting piece of art. That keeps the conversations limited, and leaves us at the behest of the gatekeepers who have an ever-increasing chokehold on what content is shown and when it may or may not be made available to watch.
Here at Other Worlds we’re beginning our Pioneer Film Club again on July 28th with FANTASTIC PLANET. This Cannes Film Festival award winner from 1973 is a French language Science Fiction film that is unlike anything you’ve ever seen…but has clearly inspired filmmakers from Terry Gilliam to Hayao Miyazaki. In the past, our Pioneer Film club has previously shown the aforementioned THINGS TO COME, FORBIDDEN PLANET, THE DAY THE EARTH STOOD STILL, and will be showing more neglected gems, problematic favorites, and sinful delights in the months to come.
Our plan is to continue showing the films of the past and examining them in the modern context. Not every film ages well and that’s a part of the exploration as well…what does an older film mean to today’s world? What can we excavate? What can we learn about the way people articulated their feelings, fears, anxieties from before the world wars and into the modern age?
Now, what are the themes of today that we’re showing tomorrow? Deepfakes, extended normalized isolation, and the rise of social media are all things that we couldn’t have imagined a few decades ago and yet here we are, sending that message to the future through Science Fiction.
I hope the future will be watching.