Congratulations, Sandra Bullock, for setting space exploration back a few decades.
Call it hyperbole if you will, but how keen are you to join those Mars One settlement folks after seeing trailers of Bullock freefalling into space and hyperventilating in her space suit? Not even the promise of spending a little cramped one-on-one time with George Clooney could coerce me to get into a spaceship now.
In Alfonso Cuaron’s Gravity, out today, Bullock plays Dr. Ryan Stone, a medical engineer on her first space mission who is partnered with veteran astronaut Matt Kowalsky (Clooney). Disaster strikes: when Bullock’s character flies out even of the reach of the mighty Canada-arm, you know she’s in deep trouble. The pair is left completely alone, floating in the darkness of space.
Space movies rarely have happy endings. There are natural disasters up there just waiting for a flimsy little ship to enter into orbit, things like meteor showers, asteroids, black holes and solar flares.
Then there’s the isolation and the cabin fever; the craziness brought on by too much Tang. (Things are further compounded when your co-pilot brings his guitar and starts singing David Bowie hits.)
My math scores put the early kibosh on any dreams I had of space travel, but the terror inspired by these films sealed the deal. Let those 200,000 other schmucks blast off to Mars; in 2023 I plan to be right here on terra firma.
2001: A Space Odyssey
In the HAL 9000, writer Arthur C. Clarke created a formidable computer antagonist. In the 1968 film version Stanley Kubrick crafted such a sinister presence out of a single red camera eye, that the American Film Institute named HAL the 13th Greatest Villain of all time on their list of 100. HAL keeps the systems running on board the space craft, but he can also lip-read: so when he knows his days are numbered he sabotages the ship and sacrifices the lives of the crew members left on board, but not before they see monkeys and giant monoliths. Part of the scariness is the fact that no one seemed to know what the heck it all meant.
Alien
In space no one can hear you scream: doesn’t that say it all? In Ridley Scott’s benchmark sci-fi horror film, kick-butt heroine (Sigourney Weaver as Ripley) answers a distress call from an isolated planet, leaves, and soon finds a nasty stowaway onboard. And the superb John Hurt helped spawn the most oft-repeated gross-out Halloween costume in history: baby alien emerging from a bloody chest cavity. The eponymous alien is number 14 on AFI’s list.
The Black Hole
I was terrified of black holes for years after seeing this Disney film in the ’70s. A research crew is sent in to investigate the appearance of a missing ship right on the edge of a black hole. Robots B.O.B. and V.I.N.CENT were way cuter than HAL and I’m pretty sure you can see a string holding up a prop in one scene. Come to think of it, the only scary thing about the film may have been the funky jumpsuits worn by Anthony Perkins, Ernest Borgnine, Yvette Mimieux and Maximilian Schell.
Event Horizon
Paul W.S. Anderson brings us this tale of a ship that resurfaces in the year 2047, seven years after it went missing. A rescue ship captained by Laurence Fishburne is sent in to investigate, unaware that creepy Capt. Weir (Sam Neill) is withholding the truth, that a presence onboard the ship will mess with everyone’s minds in a big way. A B-movie bloodbath ensues.
Moon
Sam Rockwell’s time as an astronaut miner on the moon is almost up, and he appears to be cracking up, having only had a computer to talk to for the past three years. But the closer he gets to the reunion date with his wife and daughter back on Earth, he begins to realize that the company he works for may have different plans for him. Is he hallucinating, or uncovering a sinister plot? Tom Cruise followed a similar path in Oblivion but made $84 million more doing it.
Sunshine
A worldwide blackout looms on Earth as the sun loses its power. It’s up to a good-looking crew (including Chris Evans, Rose Byrne) to jump-start the sun with a nuclear device before it’s too late. But when the Icarus loses contact with ground control, things really heat up. The crew faces trial by fire, water and zero oxygen, though director Danny Boyle (28 Days Later, Slumdog Millionaire) restrains himself from unleashing a zombie attack.
