First of all, thank you all so much for helping me get to 1,000 subscribers.
My original plan once I hit this milestone was to make my long awaited video on
Stanley Kubrick's 2001: A Space Odyssey, but then my genius son told me that I
can't do that until I hit 2,001 subscribers, so instead, I thought I'd acknowledge
all of those commenters who keep telling me I don't talk enough
about my own opinion. For this video, we're going to look at my five favorite
films from all the ones I've covered, along with my five least favorites.
Just so we're clear, though, I at least appreciate even my least favorite film,
or else I probably wouldn't have made a video for it. Maybe one day, if I do this
long enough, I'll cover a movie I genuinely hate, but truth be told,
whenever I learn all the ins and outs of a movie, it tends to make me like it
more, not less. So let's start with my least favorites, movies I like but which
I'm not likely to watch again just for fun.
I'm glad I can get this controversial choice out of the way first, because even though
Close Encounters is an incredibly well- made movie that I grew up loving and that
cemented Steven Spielberg's place as one of the greats, I was really surprised by
how much I didn't like it when I was working on my video review. Maybe it has
something to do with me being a happily married man with a kid of my own, but I'm
no longer able to relate really to Roy Neary, who treats his family like crap
even before he gets obsessed with aliens. On top of that, the movie offers no
evidence that the aliens are as benevolent as the movie clearly wants us
to think they are, and for a movie about the importance of communication,
it seems weird that there is so little communication actually taking place.
It's not my least favorite Spielberg movie-- that would probably be War of the Worlds,
which I discussed at length not too long ago on my website--but it still pains me
to talk badly about one of my favorite directors. Spielberg is great, and I look
forward to discussing some of his better sci-fi films in the future.
I wanted to love this movie so much, but it's a movie at war with itself.
I respect the hell out of the filmmaking, because it's pretty impressive,
but a lot of the science-fiction elements feel really half-hearted
and contradictory, for reasons I explain in detail in my review.
A few simple tweaks and a more fleshed out world outside of the rollerball arena
would have gone a long way to making this one of the greatest science-fiction movies
of the 70's, but as it stands, it has more potential than anything else.
I mean, sure, James Caan is pretty good in it, and I absolutely love John Houseman
as the evil corporate warlord, but none of the other characters are particularly
interesting, not even Maude Adams'. Every scene not in the arena just sucks the
life out of the movie, and I'd almost rather watch a cut version that takes all that out
and focuses 100% on the rollerball sequences. Of course, this movie is
approximately 3,000% better than the remake, which is, without hyperbole,
one of the worst big-budget movies I've ever seen, and I've seen Wing Commander.
This video review was a blast to make, but the actual subject is a really, really
stupid movie. I took a little bit of flak for my older viewers about not being
meaner to Jane Fonda, but that's not why I don't like Barbarella. As I mentioned
in my review, its tone is all over the place, and the humor doesn't always land.
It's more frustrating than that, because you can see where the humor could work
if handled a little better, if it leaned a little more into the absurdist, rude humor.
If this were more like a Monty Python flick or a Farrelly Brothers-style
screwball comedy, it could be great fun, but it insists on taking itself
seriously at the weirdest times. I talk in my review about how it should be
applauded for following its comic book source material as closely as it does,
but that's actually one of the reasons I don't like it.
I'd be fonder of it if it weren't afraid to be irreverent.
I have no doubt that, in its day, Logan's Run was spectacular. It's one of the most
fondly remembered mid-70's sci-fi classics, and I get why. That said, man,
has it aged badly! The effects are embarrassing, the pacing is awful, it has
one of Goldsmith's weakest scores, and as much as I love Michael York as an actor,
he doesn't do much to make Logan an interesting or engaging character.
It's not all his fault, either, because the plot doesn't give him a lot of room to
make his inevitable turn believable. I also hate the ending, which doesn't make
a lot of sense or really pay off any of the central thematic conflicts. It also
doesn't help that, before making my video, I read the novel first, which is a
significantly better version of the story. The only reason this is my second
least favorite and not my first, though, is a purely hormonal one: Jenny Agutter
in that translucent, green dress is one of the sexiest women ever put on film.
This is one of the few movies I'd actually never seen before setting
out to review it. I knew it had nothing on the television show and that I
shouldn't try to compare them, but I was actually a little surprised by how many
elements the show got from the movie. Still, the movie is just a random
pastiche of scenes that don't really come together into a coherent story
until the final act, which somehow, against all logic, makes a killer robot
chase feel boring. You can kinda see the actors and Crichton having fun with it,
but that doesn't make up for the fact that this is just a mess of a movie.
Okay, so now I've said my piece about the movies I like the least. Let's move on to the
ones I like the most. Those of you who've followed me long enough should know
by now I prefer to be positive. Picking just five favorites is surprisingly hard
for me, because I make these videos because I friggin' love classic
science-fiction, from the silent era all the way up to thirty years ago.
Truth be told, I like current science-fiction, too, but, you know, I need a niche.
Right when I started doing this, a part of me wanted to burn through all of
George Pal's filmography. I've already covered three of his
movies--with a few more waiting in the wings--but my
favorite would either be War of the Worlds, which I plan
to get to someday--don't worry--or The Time Machine, which was only the
second movie I ever covered on this channel. Though it's not a perfect movie--
I really don't like the "rings that talk" nonsense--
it's actually better constructed than H.G. Wells' novel. It's one of those rare
cases where the movie's actually better than the book. I love Rod Taylor; I love
Yvette Mimieux; and of course, I love Scrooge McDuck--I mean, Alan Young.
"I saw a toy machine vanish!" The Morlocks are great, and the
stop-motion time-lapse effects are really--I don't know--charming. I'm also
surprised by how much love my video review keeps getting. I can't watch it
anymore myself--I'm too embarrassed by it--but a few people have told me they
subscribed to my channel after seeing it, and according to my analytics, it gets a
steadier amount of views than most.
I'm a sucker for the 1930's' monster flicks, and The Invisible Man might just
be my favorite of the whole bunch, even beating out Frankenstein and Dracula.
It's got a sense of fun to it that most of the others lack, but it's still
terrifying in its own right, to watch this man descend into megalomaniacal
violence. About 90% of the credit goes to Claude Rains, of course, who
absolutely steals the movie, with the other 10% going to H.G. Wells and
James Whale. I also really enjoyed studying up on this one, learning about
old-school special effects techniques and getting back into the quirks of the old
studio system that I haven't thought much about since my film school days. I was
genuinely surprised to discover that, before this movie, Claude Rains was
something of a Hollywood joke, a man nobody thought would make it on the
silver screen. That's just mind-boggling in hindsight. It's also always fun to talk
about the great and ultimately tragic James Whale, but a lot of that discussion
I've had to save for Frankenstein, which I promise is also coming.
How can you not love this movie? It's the best Charlton Heston
sci-fi flick from the 60's and 70's, and that's saying something. But of course, it
doesn't need me to defend it as everybody pretty much already knows
about it. The acting, the memorable dialogue, the ape make-up, the social
commentary, and the Rod Serling twist at the end all conspire to make a cultural
cash cow that is still being milked today. The video review proved to be one
of my most difficult, though. I had some of my worst technical issues putting it
together, and I also had a really hard time getting information that wasn't
already covered in the extensive behind-the-scenes documentary.
A little peek behind the curtain: I don't like covering movies that have
already been exhaustively covered by full-length documentaries. It's one of
the main reasons I haven't gotten around to Alien, because of Memory. Still, you
just can't talk about sci-fi classics without talking about Planet of the Apes.
Let me know in the comments if you want me to cover the sequels, because I totally
will. Conquest is criminally underrated, and it's still resonant these days.
Speaking of sequels, here is one of the best ever made, which I turned into my
longest video. I friggin' love Wrath of Khan. I just love it, everything about it:
the space battles, the fully-realized characters, the fact that it respects
the canon enough to throw half of it out the window, Ricardo bleeping Montalban,
the James Horner score, the intelligent subtext, the special effects,
the resurrection of a franchise that, believe it or not, was in its death throes...
I mean, come on! All due respect to my parents and teachers, but this movie
practically raised me. I can't possibly gush about it enough.
But one of my other true loves has always been horror, so naturally, the movie that
seals the top spot has got to be a science- fiction/horror film. Enter John Carpenter's
remake of The Thing from Another World, a wonderful Golden Age classic that could
have easily made this list as well, alongside both versions of The Fly.
John Carpenter's The Thing is a paranoid masterpiece that was underappreciated in
its day but has gone on to be a seminal classic of the genre. It also happens to
hit me in all my weak spots: an ambiguous theme that can be
read into in multiple ways? Check. An ambiguous plot that leaves just
enough unanswered questions to make you want to theorize about it
all the live-long day? Check. Fantastic practical special effects
without a hint of CGI? Check. Characters who feel real without being
over-explained? Check. A haunting atmosphere that clings to you
long after you finish the movie? Check. No shoehorned romantic subplot? Check.
Amazing actors at the top of their game? Check! This is a movie I straight-up
obsess over, to the point that, when I find other videos on YouTube talking
about it, I get all defensive and jealous, like they're talking about something
only I should be allowed to discuss.
So there you have it, my fellow Earthlings.
Since this has been more opinion-heavy than my usual fare, I'm sure you probably
disagree with my lists, so go ahead and tell me which of my covered
sci-fi classics are your most and least favorites in the comments.
Don't forget to like this video--I am constitutionally obligated to say that--
and thank you once again for helping me get to 1,000 subscribers.
This is totally awesome. Until next time, this is The Unapologetic Geek, telling you
to never be ashamed of what you love, ...as long as, well, you know.
"I hate outside, I hate it! I hate it!"