Don't forget to check out what Wandering Through the Shelves picked, the blog that started Thursday Movie Picks.
Metropolis
The master of all android/cyborg/robot films has to be Fritz
Lang’s science fiction epic. I was lucky to study this in college for my A
levels (16-18) as part of the Silent Film and German Expressionism module. I
loved it, others hated it, those who wanted an easy A hated it. But, if they
had opened their minds, these films were a breeze to write about. There is so
much to this film, not to mention the beyond amazing sets, the lower world and
upper world, the storm that robot Maria causes with the workers revolt and the
decline of the machines. It has everything you could want. A mad scientist, a
star-crossed love story, epic scenes, riots, ah what a brilliant film.
FutureWorld
I know I should have seen WestWorld first, but that wasn’t
only £3 in the Fopp bargain bin. I was intrigued by the upcoming TV series
based on WestWorld too so I thought, why not? Peter Fonda and Blythe Danner are
journalists who are invited to re-opening of the pleasure parks after the disaster
at WestWorld. The robots are still the same and the parks are the same, except
WestWorld is closed and FutureWorld takes its place. There is a bigger
conspiracy though, the creators of the parks have made robot replicas of
powerful and influential people and invited them to the park. Sinister. More
like predictable. It wasn’t great and I admit, I fell asleep for some of it, I
woke up at the end but knew what was happening.
Wall-E
This adorable little robot with a love of Hello Dolly,
finding beauty in rubbish and has a bug as a best friend, stole the hearts of
everyone. After humans have abandoned Earth, in the year 2807, a lone trash
compactor android goes about his work. One day an advanced probe unit, EVE is
deployed by a human ship to search for vegetation. From there the film becomes a
beautifully animated and some-what dramatic love story as well as survival
story. As well as being very cute, the film is also a massive comment on the
environment and how we treat it as well as a stab at consumerism.
