A welcomed relief from the fashionable, yet irritating, explosive computer-generated images (CGI) of alien showdowns, this year featured some of the most complex and intriguing science fiction films in recent history

Graphic By Don Wilkinson

For the last few years, the film industry has been plagued with mindless science fiction films like Transformers, Aliens vs. Predator: Requiem and Cloverfield, uninspired remakes like    The Day the Earth Stood Still or re-imagined franchises like the latest Star Trek flick.
    Science fiction films, in essence, are conceptual-based stories, stories that are driven by ideas rather than character interactions, although the interaction between characters can flourish the film’s main plot.
    Star Trek, for example, was an entertaining action-packed film but lacked a thought-provoking message or idea that explores problems affecting humanity. It, therefore, fell short of hitting the true science fiction mark.
    However, this year was not a complete disappointment: films like District 9, Surrogates and Moon have revived the science fiction genre with complex characters, deep stories and intriguing concepts.
   District 9, directed by Neill Blomkamp and produced by Peter Jackson, takes place in an alternative version of South Africa where aliens from an unknown origin, referred to by humans as “prawns,” are forced to hover their ship above Johannesburg.
  These unwanted aliens are segregated into a community called District 9 and are regulated under the supervision of MNU (Multinational United), a private military company that has strong connections with military weapon research factories and various militaristic nations.
   Its underlying theme of xenophobia doubles as an analogy for the oppression and segregation that took place during the South African apartheid. It was filmed in South Africa by a South African director, cast and crew; the aftermath of the apartheid is a reality these people are living through and the film is an indirect reflection upon what happened to the last generation of South Africans.
   What is interesting about District 9 is that, instead of the advanced alien race oppressing humanity, we are the oppressors. Whether we oppress the “prawns” out of fear, intimation or apathy, District 9 investigates the construction and dissembling of oppressive regimes.
   Adapted from a comic book, director Jonathan Mostow’s Surrogates takes place 10 years into the future in an artificial American utopia consumed by the mass use of surrogates
– androids that are remotely controlled by human occupants and used to safely walk around town without fear of judgment, discrimination or death.
    FBI agent Tom Greer (Bruce Willis) investigates the first murder in years, caused by a disruption between a surrogate and its human counterpart. The film plays as a detective
story but touches upon the fundamental difference between human presence and human isolation.
   Without the fear of death or discrimination, people navigate their surrogates through life feeling disconnected from the environment; their real bodies live in their cave-like homes, shutting off from the world.
   The film reflects on our need to cosmetically and socially mask ourselves to feel accepted within society: we hide our true selves from others because we are afraid.
   Although District 9 and Surrogates were great science fiction films, Moon, directed by Duncan Jones, was an exceptional piece of sci-fi mastery.
   Moon returns back to the basics in a psychological narrative about commercial astronaut Sam Bell (Sam Rockwell).
  In the not-so-distant future, when humanity has used up most of Earth’s natural resources, the moon is harvested for helium-3 by Lunar Industries, a typical faceless corporate entity that invokes amoral connotation with its employee policy.
   Bell is contracted to live and work on the dark side of the Moon for three years to mine helium-3. Helium-3 is a non-radioactive isotope of helium that, if harvested in abundance, could be used as a fuel source for nuclear fusion, a cleaner process of harnessing nuclear power than nuclear fission, the method that is used today.
   With two weeks left to go, Bell is anticipating his return home to earth to see his wife and daughter. For the past three years, this anticipation has been his only leverage from succumbing to insanity. However, on a routine mining excursion, Bell runs into a little bit of a snag and crashes into an automated helium-3 harvester.
Now this is where things get a bit interesting. Despite what the film’s trailer may imply – a 2001: A Space Odyssey homage about the solitude of living alone and how it deteriorates the psyche – the film broaches the disposability of human beings, exploring the concept of people as resources.
   While Moon does share some aesthetic similarities with 2001: A Space Odyssey, such as the white-clean infrastructure and a robotic companion with its own hidden protocols,
for the most part, its plot detours away from 2001’s alien artifacts and menacing AIs.

[‘Surrogates’] reflects on our need to cosmetically and socially mask ourselves to feel accepted

    Without giving too much away or spoiling the surprise, I’ll tell you that the film investigates, as all good science fiction films do, what it means to be human, what makes us unique from other organisms or machines and whether there is such a thing as a soul.
   What makes Moon so great is that it’s subtle, methodical and lethargic. While this is not usually a good thing, it concretely contextualizes the mood of the film’s atmosphere. Remember, it takes place on the moon.
   For the most part, the film is a one-man show, with Rockwell having to deal with the challenge of acting with himself.
   Although there are some insincere moments in Rockwell’s performance, overall he delivers an emotionally charged rendition of a man longing to go home.
   The film’s score, composed by Clint Mansell, is another masterpiece to add to his collection (Mansell did the scores for Requiem for a Dream and The Fountain), and it is by far his best to date. There were even times when the music almost made me cry – something that very rarely happens to me.
   To my surprise, GERTY (Kevin Spacey), Bell’s creepy but endearing robot companion, made a very poignant statement when he suggested that Bell is another program, just like him, and this connection allows GERTY to empathize with Bell throughout the film. Denying their similarities, Bell responds by saying, “We’re not programs, GERTY; we’re people.”
   There are those who believe that science fiction, as a genre, has little or no significant artistic insight, and to those people I say bollocks. While I’m not expecting any of these films to change your opinion, they are worth a view just in case.
   Science fiction is able to reflect on contemporary issues in a way that modern fiction fails to.