My Favorite Science Fiction Films

Wade’s Ranking	SF Film	Wade’s Ranking	SF Film	Wade’s Ranking	SF Film	Wade’s Ranking	SF Film
#1	Star Wars Series	#16	The Fly (1986)	#31	The Last Starfighter	#46	Blade Runner
#2	Star Trek Series	#17	Logan’s Run	#32	Escape from New York	#47	Escape to Witch Mountain
#3	ET the Extra-Terrestrial	#18	Planet of the Apes (1968)	#33	Judge Dredd	#48	The Abyss
#4	Ghostbusters	#19	2001: A Space Odyssey	#34	Buckaroo Banzai	#49	Sssssss
#5	The Terminator	#20	The Butterfly Effect	#35	The Day the Earth Stood Still (1951)	#50	War of the Worlds (2005)
#6	Back to the Future Series	#21	The Black Hole	#36	Soylent Green	#51	Zardoz
#7	Time after Time	#22	Paycheck	#37	War of the Worlds (1953)	#52	King Kong (2005)
#8	The Matrix Series	#23	Runaway	#38	Rollerball (1975)	#53	Unidentified Flying Oddball
#9	Starman	#24	Hollow Man	#39	Godzilla Series	#54	Lost in Space (1998)
#10	Cocoon	#25	Westworld	#40	Wild, Wild West	#55	Dune (1984)
#11	Somewhere in Time	#26	Phenomenon	#41	Gamera Series	#56	The Dexter Riley Series
#12	Alien Series	#27	Saturn 3	#42	Forbidden Planet	#57	I, Robot (2002)
#13	The Thing (1982)	#28	Innerspace	#43	The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen	#58	Flash Gordon (1980)
#14	Frequency	#29	20,000 Leagues under the Sea	#44	Independence Day	#59	Inception
#15	Jurassic Park Series	#30	Coneheads	#45	Starship Troopers	#60	Demolition Man

#1

Star Wars Series

#2

Star Trek Series

#3

ET the Extra-Terrestrial

Released in 1982 & directed by Steven Spielberg, ET the Extra-Terrestrial stars Dee Wallace (The Howling, “10”), Peter Coyote (Die Laughing), Henry Thomas, & Drew Barrymore (Batman Forever, The Wedding Singer). The screenplay for ET the Extra-Terrestrial was written by Melissa Mathison, then-wife of Harrison Ford. ET the Extra-Terrestrial was, at the time of its release, the highest-grossing film ever. ET the Extra-Terrestrial was nominated for nine Academy Awards, including Best Picture (which it lost to Gandhi), winning four—Best Original Score, Best Sound, Best Sound Effects Editing, & Best Visual Effects.
ET the Extra-Terrestrial features Erika Eleniak [Baywatch, The Beverly Hillbillies (1993)] in her first screen acting role as the young girl Elliott kisses at school.

ET’s face was purportedly based on those of Sandburg, Einstein, & Hemingway.
In 2002, Universal released the 20th Anniversary version of ET the Extra-Terrestrial, which features some digitally revised special effects & includes some footage omitted from the original theatrically released version. These scenes include ET taking a bath & Gertie telling her mother that Elliott did not go to the forest (when, in fact, he did).

Mars, Inc refused to allow M&M’s candy to be used in ET the Extra-Terrestrial paving the way for the use of Reese’s Pieces instead, a circumstance which reportedly resulted in a 65% profit increase for Hershey.
ET the Extra-Terrestrial has several obvious similarities to the story of Peter Pan.

#4

Ghostbusters

Released in the summer of 1984, Ghostbusters grossed $229 million at the box office,was the second-most successful film of 1984, & was the highest grossing comedy of the 1980s. Dan Aykroyd & Harold Ramis wrote the screenplay, while Ivan Reitman (director of Stripes, Meatballs, Legal Eagles, Twins, Six Days Seven Nights, & My Super Ex-Girlfriend) directed. Columbia Pictures distributed Ghostbusters, which was their biggest hit ever at the time. The cast teamed SNL alumni Bill Murray & Aykroyd with SCTV stars Ramis & Rick Moranis, as well as Alien star Sigourney Weaver & a virtually unknown Annie Potts. In 1989, the original cast reunited for the thoroughly unwatchable sequel Ghostbusters 2. In addition, a Saturday morning, animated spin-off called The Real Ghostbusters aired from 1986 to 1991. This series showcased about every literary ghoul ever created from Cthulhu to the Headless Horseman. In the first two seasons, Peter Venkman was voiced by Lorenzo Music, who also provided the voice of the animated Garfield. Purportedly, Bill Murray did not like his character sounding like Garfield. Whatever the case, Music was replaced in the third to seventh seasons by Dave Coulier. Ironically, Bill Murray provided the voice of the CGI-animated Garfield in the 2004 & 2006 live-action films.

Ghostbusters is Lovecraftian in its strange mythology of unknown gods like Gozer & Zuul, its preoccupation with slime, & its citing references, such as Tobin’s Spirit Guide, Spate’s Catalog, & Roylance Guide of Secret Societies & Sects. On the other hand, with its technical jargon (“free-floating, full-torso, vaporous apparition,” “focused, non-terminal repeating phantasm,” & “class five full-roaming vapor”) & high-tech ghost-busting equipment, Ghostbusters is also very hip science fiction. The backpacks carried by the Ghostbusters are evidently properly called proton packs, although I am relatively sure this name never occurred in the first movie. Venkman calls them nuclear accelerators. Whatever their nomenclature & despite their status as the largest, flashiest, & most often used ghost-busting tool, their function is unclear. The Ghostbusters use them to trap Slimer, the first ghost they capture in the film, only to put the creature in a trap. Why didn’t they just put it in the trap in the first place?

The Ray Parker Jr theme song took on a life of its own in the summer of 1984, coasting to #1 on the pop charts for three weeks & earning Parker an Academy Award nomination for Best Song.

In order to use the title Ghostbusters, Columbia Pictures had to obtain the rights from Filmation, because of the 1975-1976 Saturday morning live-action series The Ghost Busters, which starred Forrest Tucker & Larry Storch, who had previously appeared together in F Troop.

#5

The Terminator

Released in 1984 & directed & co-written by James Cameron (Aliens, Terminator 2, The Abyss, Titanic, Avatar), The Terminator stars Arnold Schwarzenegger (Batman & Robin, True Lies, Jingle All the Way, Conan the Barbarian), Linda Hamilton [Beauty & the Beast (television series)], Michael Biehn (Tombstone, Aliens, The Abyss, The Rock), & Paul Winfield (Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan). The Terminator was the 21st-highest-grossing film of 1984. The Terminator reeled in a domestic gross of $38 million against a production budget of $6 million.

Reese’s dialogue concerning the nomenclature of the Terminator is somewhat contradictory. First, he claims that the Terminator is a Cyberdyne Systems Model 101. Later, Reese states that the 600-series had rubber skin & that the Schwarzenegger Terminator is “new” & has living, human skin. Later installments of the franchise, statements by Cameron, & labels on merchandising indicate that the first Terminator in the original film is model 101, series 800 & that all model 101 Terminators have the appearance of Arnold Schwarzenegger. Presumably, the Terminator portrayed by Franco Columbu in Reese’s flashback to the future is an 800 series also, but not a model 101.

The Terminator features several nuances indicating that detailed planning went into its plot & production. For example, Reese tears out the phone book page with Sarah Connor’s name, while the Terminator simply looks at it. This makes sense as Reese is a human with a fallible memory, whereas the Terminator is a computer. Later, the audience sees that Reese went directly to the correct Sarah Connor, while the Terminator methodically plans to kill all three listed in the phone book. Presumably, Reese knows the correct middle name of the appropriate Sarah & definitely knows what she looks like.
None of the several sequels which followed The Terminator is of comparable quality, despite bloated budgets & box office returns, & they actually subvert the elegance of the original.

#51

Zardoz

Released in 1974, Zardoz was directed, produced, & written by John Boorman, who also wrote, produced, & directed Excalibur & was director/producer of Deliverance. Zardoz stars Sean Connery as Zed.
Zardoz was Connery’s second film role after departing the James Bond franchise & was, in fact, released the same year as Moore’s second Bond film, The Man with the Golden Gun.

In Superman #281 (November, 1974) writer Cary Bates and artist Curt Swan introduced the alien super-hero Vartox. Vartox’ bare-chested, bare-legged, balding appearance were in fact based on Sean Connery’s appearance in Zardoz, while the hero’s name derived from the title of the film.
The name “Zardoz” itself comes from The Wizard of Oz.

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