Here come the Men in Black (again)

Men in Black was a fun family sci-fi film. Correct. But for me it was the film that started my love of sci-fi and shaped my decision for what to study at university.  Highlighting the fact that the ‘Government’ could have the technology used in the film to wipe our memories, therefore making us oblivious to aliens living amongst us may seem far stretched, but who knows, considering this technology ‘wipes’ the memories of the public we would never know if this is happening or not.

This film made me realise that a popular entertainment film can deliver messages about the world, politics, science and more. From this I went on to study media studies specialising in digital media and science fiction.

Now Men in Black 3 is set to be released in 2012, a full ten years after the first instalment and news released last week highlighted that Emma Thompson is in talks to star in the next film in the trilogy.
And ten years on I might not be working in film or sci-fi specific for that matter, but here I am blogging about it and my passion for the subject is stronger than ever.


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Deep thinking Sci-Fi

As the sci-fi geek in my group of friends I expected that I would have plenty of people to choose from who would want to see Inception with me. Sadly they had made plans to see it with other people, but the lovely Ellie A (there is more than one Ellie in my group of gal pals) stepped in to watch it with me, although not really the sort of film she would want to see I promised her it would be something that she would enjoy.

The film was amazing, as always with Christopher Nolan (so can't wait to see what he is doing for the next Superman & Batman films), and although confusing like the Matrix there are more similarities than just the gravity defying fight scenes.

I was not one of these people that found the film confusing, but I this may be down to my past experience of this genre. Back in 2004 I wrote my dissertation on the Matrix: Reality & Simulation, referencing Jean Baudrillard, religion, etc and looking deep into the film that changed science fiction at the end of the last century.

Although Inception is not a film that has changed science fiction, it addresses similar theories to the Matrix, and in my opinion is exactly what the genre has needed after a decade of sequels and remakes.

For those of you that are yet to see this film, I urge you to see it, if the theory confuses you, I Heart Huckabees is a great quirky film which actually discusses them in a way that is easy to understand. It's also a great comparison to see a film that looks at the same theory but in a completely different way, there's certainly no white rabbit in it... just a white sheet!

What other films have got you confused?




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