NEWS: Wil Wheaton's Geek In Review: Sci-Fi Guilty Pleasures

GEEK: Wil Wheaton's Geek In Review: Sci-Fi Guilty Pleasures

Sci-Fi geeks are rather critical of the things we profess to love so much, and we will set our phasers from "mock" to "kill" pretty quickly if a director or studio makes us unhappy. We want to see our favorite novels adapted into films, but if the filmmakers deviate even the slightest bit from some minute detail that occupied one paragraph in the original work, you can bet we'll be unleashing a 15,000 word polemic on the Internet faster than you can say "Han shoots first." However, we reserve our deepest scorn for each other. As a group of people who were picked on mercilessly throughout our school years, you'd think that we would take it easy on each other . . . but you'd be wrong. If you think I'm kidding, ask yourself if you'd be willing to admit to your friends that, when you were 10 years old, the Ewoks were pretty cool.

Go ahead, you're only admitting it to yourself, and nobody is going to laugh at you.

Anyway, I know that I'm opening myself up to ridicule from my peers, but I'm going to take it like a man, and admit to really liking a few movies from the 1970s that some may call cult classics, but I call guilty pleasures.

After the atomic horror B-movie onslaught of the 1950s, the 1960s were a relatively dry decade for Sci-Fi, with notable exceptions like 2001 and Planet of the Apes. As the 1970s got underway, though, there was an explosion of Sci-Fi flicks, giving audiences a cautionary look at an ultramodern, dystopian future that was as much influenced by the Vietnam war and Watergate as it was by classic Sci-Fi themes.

Though the '70s were a prolific decade for big studio Sci-Fi films -- particularly the "pre-Star Wars" half of the decade -- quantity clearly outpaced quality, and this is where I'll focus my attention this week. These movies don't age particularly well, which is a big part of their charm, and I share them today in the hopes that they may just become guilty pleasures of yours, too, if you can accept a future world where the sideburns are huge, the furniture is made of molded white plastic, and almost everyone wears a tunic.

These are presented in chronological order, to save me the pain of ranking them, and enduring even more scorn and ridicule.


Silent Running (1971)
In the distant future, Earth has been heated to a uniform 75 degrees, and all the plant life that once flourished on her has been entirely wiped out, except for a few specimens that have been placed in forests on space ships which hang out around Saturn.

Bruce Dern plays Freeman Lowell, a slightly looney botanist who cares for the forests on a ship called the Valley Forge. For reasons that are never fully explained, orders come from Earth to release the domes which house the forests, and blow them up with nuclear bombs. This is rather unsettling news to Lowell, who has spent eight years gardening in deep space in the hopes that Earth can be reforested, and isn't too keen on blowing up his work.

Just like any gardener whose plants are threatened, he isolates the threat (in this case his shipmates) and kills it. Then he drives the ship through the rings of Saturn, fakes its destruction, and charts a course for even deeper space, where, accompanied by his robot friends, he slowly loses his mind. Anyone who knows a serious gardener will tell you that this is also entirely normal gardener behavior.

Guilty pleasure because: It's dark, it's sad, and the science is so bad, you could drive a starship through it, but the art direction and visual effects are magnificent, and the robot drones are really, really cool. If you're one of those people who occasionally listens to The Queen is Dead just to feel gloomy, you'll understand why I occasionally watch Silent Running.

Lesson about the future: Humanity was stupid enough to wipe out all the plant life on Earth, but smart enough to preserve some specimens in space ships. They were stupid enough to put those space ships nearly 1.5 billion kilometers from the sun, but they were smart enough to leave a man in charge of keeping them alive. Sadly, the man humanity chose was sort of batshit crazy. Oh well. Better luck next time.

Drinking game: Whenever Bruce Dern makes the crazy eyes, take a drink, but if you're one of those weepy drunks, you may want to sit this one out; it's a really sad movie.


The Omega Man (1972)
Charlton Heston plays scientist Robert Neville, one of the last survivors of a global bacteriological war, fighting for survival against a crazy cult of albino mutants who want to destroy him because . . . well, if they don't, there's not a whole lot of movie.

The world ended in March of 1975, (possibly related to the release of Olivia Newton John's Have You Never Been Mellow) and the film picks up in 1977 Los Angeles, which is deserted, but still covered in a blanket of smog. Heston goes shopping, watches Woodstock, runs from the mutants, and hides out in an apartment that's a survivalist's wet dream -- filled from floor to ceiling with guns and oil paintings. In the second half of the film, he makes contact with a small band of non-mutant human survivors, falls in love with a woman half his age whose afro is twice his height, and tries to save the future of humanity.

Guilty pleasure because: It is as dated as it takes itself seriously, and it is as poorly-paced as it is heavy-handed. From the outrageous costumes and mirrorshades the freaky cultist mutants wear, to Rosalind Cash's leather outfit and "Shut yo jive mouth, honky" dialogue; from Heston's messianic efforts to use his blood to cleanse the plague from human survivors before dying in a Christ-on-a-stick pose, The Omega Man eventually enters "so bad it's good" territory, but you have to go through "I can't believe I am watching this" land to get there. If I had a list of movies that desperately needed the MST3K treatment, this would be on it for sure.

Lesson about the future: Most people didn't survive the plague, but newspapers (which blow across nearly every scene) and Cutty Sark whiskey (which Heston drinks every time he sees a newspaper) did.

Drinking game: Whenever Heston takes a drink, you take a drink. Good luck making it to the third act.


Westworld (1973)
Long before he was a global warming denier, and named child rapists in his novels after critics of his global warming-denial, Michael Crichton had a successful novel turned into a film (1971's The Andromeda Strain, a movie so bad it didn't make this list.) It was also successful, so he tried his hand at writing and directing a movie of his own.

The Delos amusement park is split up into three themed lands: MedievalWorld, RomanWorld, and WestWorld. Visitors kick down $1000 a day to visit the world of their choice, and enjoy the immersive experience it offers. Each world's experience is made complete by life-like androids who interact with the guests, usually by fighting or fucking them. The guests (and the audience) are reminded several times that nothing can possibly go wrong, ensuring, of course, that that is precisely what will happen.

Much of the film takes place in Westworld, where tourists Benjamin and Blane spend a couple of days drinking, fighting, and screwing, before having their suspicions raised that something's gone all wonky when Blane gets bitten by a robot rattlesnake. Their suspicions are then confirmed when Blane is killed by a robot gunslinger. Benjamin then spends the rest of the movie running away from the deadly Termin-- uh, Gunslinger.

Guilty pleasure because: Yul Brynner is sofa king cool in this movie. He is the original Terminator, and in fact one could make the case that certain elements of that film were, uh . . . inspired . . . by this one. And let's be honest with each other, mmmkay? If you could take a vacation to a place where every person you tried to seduce would take the skin boat to tuna town with you, and you could start and win fights pretty much whenever you wanted, I don't know a lot of people who would refuse the trip. In fact, isn't Second Life built entirely around this concept, including the whole "nothing really works the way it should" element?

Lesson about the future: People of the future will still spend $1000 a day for a vacation spent drinking, fighting and fucking.

Drinking game: Whenever you see the crazy shiny android eyes, take a drink, but pace yourself. Trust me. Advanced drunks can take two drinks whenever Dick Van Patten provides some comic relief.


Soylent Green (1973)
It's the far off future of 2022, and global warming, pollution, and overpopulation are all serious problems. In New York City alone there are over 40 million people, a yucky yellow haze of smog covers everything, and the gulf between rich and poor is as wide as its ever been. The working class struggles just to survive, and it's been at least a full generation since everyone but the ultra-rich could afford real food. Instead, the masses eat (and riot for) processed food biscuits from the Soylent corporation. There's Soylent Red, Soylent Yellow, and the most popular of them all, Soylent Green.

The film is actually a well-paced detective story that is quite watchable and well-made. In fact, it's almost solid enough to not qualify as a guilty pleasure, but Heston saves that distinction with his trademark overacting during the film's final (and most famous) line, "Soylent Green is people! It's people! Bwaaahaaa!!!1 It's peeeeeepooollleeeee!!11"

Guilty pleasure because: In addition to the aforementioned overacting, the ultra-modern art direction and set design in the wealthy apartments is just awesome. There's even a Computer Space video game in one scene. It's not nearly as cheesy as The Omega Man, and even though everyone knows the "Secret of Soylent Green," it doesn't matter. Edward G. Robinson is wonderful to watch, Leigh Taylor-Young is outrageously hot, and the contrast between the comfortable living of the upper class and the squalid overcrowding of the rest of us is striking without ever being preachy.

Lesson about the future: It's sweaty, smoggy, and hairy, just like 1974.

Drinking game: Whenever someone looks sweaty and stinky, take a drink. If you're still vertical when Heston delivers his famous ending line, you have to shotgun a beer, and declare that the beer is made of people when you're done. Bonus points if your friends film it and put it on YouTube.


Logan's Run (1976)
If you were to put all these movies on a timeline, Logan's Run could logically fall near the end. It takes place long after the devastating effects of a global plague, a massive war, overpopulation and deforestation, or any other of the standard Sci-Fi catastrophes, and the last remains of humanity live in giant domed cities.

Things are pretty good, though, and everyone spends their entire lives in pursuit of pleasure, whether its shopping, playing sports, or gettin' it on. But there's a catch: when you turn 30, you sort of die. I say "sort of" because what you actually do it put on a body suit and a hockey mask, and participate in this weird ritual called "carousel," where you float up to the ceiling and explode in a fiery ball of "renewal," which returns your soul or spirit or sideburns or blue eyeshadow into a brand new baby's body, and the whole thing starts again.

It sounds great, but not everyone believes in renewal, so they occasionally run away on the day they're supposed to put on the hockey mask. The title character, Logan, is a Sandman -- a guy whose job is to track down these Runners and melt them into goop -- who discovers that carousel is really a myth, and the fiery ball of renewal is actually a fiery ball of death. Logan takes this information, joins up with a beautiful girl, and becomes a Runner, seeking a place called sanctuary, where everyone gets to live past the ancient age of 30.

Guilty pleasure because: I absolutely love everything about this movie, in all of its ultramodern, free lovin' glory. The music is perfect, the art direction and costume design is perfect, and the story . . . well, the story is far from perfect, which is why it's a guilty pleasure. The effects won a special achievement Oscar in 1976, and they really are too earnest to be called cheesy, but the only other film with such obvious miniatures that comes to mind is the original Superman (another questionable film I'm crazy about, dammit.)

Lesson about the future: In the future, nobody wears underwear, and we all live in the mall, which is located inside Epcot Center. This is actually as much fun as it sounds.

Drinking game: Whenever someone says "runner," take a drink. Whenever Logan tries to get himself or someone else naked, take two drinks.


Honorable Mentions which will may featured in future Guilty Pleasures: Zardoz (1974), Rollerball (1975), Capricorn One (1978), The Black Hole (1979), Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1979), Star Trek: The Motion Picture (1979).

Wil Wheaton has been a Runner for four years, suckers.

buckaroo banzai really should be on this list!

Buckaroo, while definitely a guilty pleasure of mine, was released in 1984.

Actually, no, for two reasons: 1) it doesn't fall within the time frame (it came out in 1984), and 2) it is not a 'guilty' pleasure.

EDIT: Damn, burtlo beat me to it.

I had no idea Michael Crichton's been writing for that long...

Great article, Wil.

Excellent list. Truth be told I've only ever seen the last two movies, but your descriptions are dead-on. My girlfriend even sat through Soylent Green, and she's much more the "accept my boyfriend is a geek, and move on" type.

Has anyone seen "The Last Man on Earth"? It stars Vincent Price and is a 1964 movie based on the same Richard Matheson novel, I Am Legend, as "The Omega Man". I actually quite liked it. I wonder how the two compare, I'll have to check Heston out in it. Does he at any point scream: "The Mutants ARE PEOPLE! THEY'RE PEEOOOPPPLLEEEE!!1!!1one!"

I remember Logan's run for featuring one of the most casual offers for sex in cinema.

"Come on, let's have sex."

And they didn't. No Jenny Agutter nudity. We had to wait until American Werewolf for that.

God bless American Werewolf.

These films were all better than I imagined what would be listed. My first thought was "Ice Pirates?"

I am admittedly a fan of all these flicks as well, especially Silent Running, in all its eco-earnest goodness. Also notable for being directed by SFX guru Douglas Trumbull (2001, Close Encounters, etc).
Thanks for this most excellent list, Wil....time to get my drinkin' face on!

that's what I hate most

Actually, there's some rather swell Jenny Agutter nudity in the DVD version I have. God. DAMN.

I actually saw Silent Running a long time ago. It is really sad, damnit.

I dunno. I'm fairly forgiving as long as the film captures the spirit of the work and all of the cool bits that are filmable. It's just that way too fucking many movies don't, at most taking a one-sentence plot summary of the book and doing their own extrapolation based on that. Though admittedly, every so often you get something pretty neat that way. Blade Runner, for example...not super-related to the original Philip K. Dick (Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?), but a fine movie nonetheless.

I the Omega Man, mostly because I find stories about surviving amongst the ruins of civilization to be really compelling. Even if they're silly cheesy stories.

Admittedly, it's been a long time since I saw the film, but considering it's the ONLY thing I remember, there must have been some nudity.

(Nice list, but Zardoz should have got the full treatment - that film is fucking nuts).

1971's The Andromeda Strain, a movie so bad it didn't make this list.

You're a hard man, Wil.

Maybe because it's one of the first Sci-Fi movies I ever saw, but I'm still haunted by this movie. Especially by the "Laser." And the monkey. Oh, and the drunk...

This is true. Also The Final Programme - though that should have been humanely destroyed before release.

Also, I think it's a mistake to try filming SF books. Too much stuff to put in. Better off with short stories.

A Boy and his Dog (1974) ought to be included in any part 2 of this. It's basically The Omega Man with Don Johnson and a telepathic dog instead of Chuck Heston

Well, to be perfectly honest, this is true of most books, not just SF books. Although the better breed of SF (and fantasy) arguably have more underlying assumptions that have to be explained, which would make them less film-friendly than your run-of-the-mill fiction.

I also heard The Andromeda strain wasn't too bad, if only because it presented science fiction at its most 'scientific'.

I suppose it takes allsorts.

Oh, and Jenny Agutter nudity is a good thing. If somebody has any, do send it to me.

She's nude on the DVD and HBO versions in the ice cave. You must have seen the clean for TV version

Drinking Game: Whenever you don't understand where the plot just went, take a shot.

A Boy And His Dog

`nuff said

I saw Logan's Run soo long ago!
I spent my entire pre-pubecent life after that looking for a black sweater with a gray stripe across the chest. Blissfully ignorant of the fact that Logan was a sex-crazed asshole.

I've still got the VHS somewhere in the 'larger than a disney movie' box. But I don't think the DVD version we have has the nudity. I'll have to go back and check. Frame by frame if I need be.

There was also Jenny Agutter nudity in Equus.