What makes a Science Fiction film?

The Salty Vulcan

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Anarchemitis said:
It would be a science fiction if there was an alternate history in which the Apollo programs were extended so that we had a permanent Lunar base by 1985. Science Fiction does not mandate that it take place in the future.
Quoted for truth. One of the earliest examples of Science Fiction can actually be found in the One Thousand and One Nights, with stories such as Abdullah the Fisherman and Abdullah the Merman, The City of Brass and The Ebony Horse.
 

Ghengis John

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Many stories will incorporate some unusual element through a token of some sort to explore an uncommon situation, distance us from out normal stance of analysis or tell a fanciful tale. If we incorporate these elements as technology we have science fiction. IE: Fiction born mostly of science instead of mysticism. Even if that science seems downright magical to us. For example like it or not the ability to channel the force is reliant on metachlorine counts. Something theoretically (posit for story) measurable by some metric and a blood sample. I can think of so many European action trash movies that explored no profound philosophical quandaries but which could be classified as nothing else than science fiction. Like a bad sculpture that doesn't suddenly become anything other than a sculpture simply because the subject appears to be melting it doesn't have to conform to a snooty expectation of what it "should" be in terms of narrative themes, or any demands of quality for it to meet that classification. It can be a bad sculpture, or bad sci-fi, but that doesn't mean we can kick it out of the club just because it smells funny. It's father has a drinking problem.

I mean what's with Dune? The spice magically allows for space travel and gives people magical fightin' powers and future sight. But I still have to grudgingly accept it as sci-fi because they passingly say there's an alien retro virus or something in there.
 

Nouw

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Science Fiction is science made fictional.

Hence all the explosions and sound! Sure I learnt of no sound in space (FFFUUU) after watching movies but come on it's fiction!

Not that I do enjoy a bit of silence...
 

Nimcha

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Ugh, I hate these genre threads. It's always the same, 'Mass Effect is not an RPG!!', '[insert random band] is not metal!!'. And now 'Star Wars is not sci-fi!!'.

Can't you people just let it go and take genres as vague classifications rather than a strict set of rules?
 

Sonic Doctor

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RAKtheUndead said:
demoMDK said:
Explosions is space that somehow make A LOT of noise
That_Swedish_Guy said:
Explosions. In space.
I know the first guy's being facetious, and I hope the second one is as well, because explosions in space don't work the way you think they do [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/18.100198-Space-Warfare-Almost-Everything-You-Know-Is-Probably-Wrong].
That is one of the reasons I loved Firefly. There was plenty of things in its sadly short run that in any other show would have made sound in space. When Serenity jumped in the show, there was no sound. In the first episode they burst open a cargo hold in space and there was no sound.

Regular television had got me so use to sound in space that I had thought there was a problem with the audio. Then a friend pointed out what I already knew but looked over.
 

Nimcha

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Sonic Doctor said:
RAKtheUndead said:
demoMDK said:
Explosions is space that somehow make A LOT of noise
That_Swedish_Guy said:
Explosions. In space.
I know the first guy's being facetious, and I hope the second one is as well, because explosions in space don't work the way you think they do [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/18.100198-Space-Warfare-Almost-Everything-You-Know-Is-Probably-Wrong].
That is one of the reasons I loved Firefly. There was plenty of things in its sadly short run that in any other show would have made sound in space. When Serenity jumped in the show, there was no sound. In the first episode they burst open a cargo hold in space and there was no sound.

Regular television had got me so use to sound in space that I had thought there was a problem with the audio. Then a friend pointed out what I already knew but looked over.
Yeah that's the only thing I don't like about sci-fi in general, the sound in space. I mean sure, if it's appropriate for the scene like a massive space battle then it doesn't bother me as much because it enhances the spectactle. But a movie like Moon which is all about atmosphere, the Lunar rover's tyres making a sound plowing through the moondust just ruins it.
 

Manatee Slayer

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Having some form of unrealistic or distant scientific principles is all that it takes for something to be science fiction. It's pretty simple to be honest and like some other definition changes throughout the modern era is probably the reason why some people try to create some sort of new, "smarter" definition.

Not everything has to be the Twilight Zone and discuss the evils of humanity and other moral and philisophical problems. It could maybe be argued that these qualities are what makes an excellent science fiction movie, and i would be inclined to believe this. These qualities however create sub-genres, such as social science fiction.

Ask yourself this, what makes Star Trek SCIENCE FICTION, is it the struggle of the characters as they go through, what to them is a fairly normal life or is it the teleporters, lasers and ships that can travel light-years in weeks?
 

Sonic Doctor

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Nouw said:
Science Fiction is science made fictional.

Hence all the explosions!
That is why as a writer when I write science fiction I can't stand it when people point out, "Oh, that can't happen, the science isn't believable, such science doesn't exist and can't exist today or in the future."

The problem is:

A.) I'm writing fiction.

B.) In my fictional universe, such things are science and possible.

That is also why I was irked when some science fiction writer(I don't remember who) a few months back stated that Doctor Who wasn't science fiction, because its science wasn't based in real science. I don't care what kingly state this writer had in the field, fiction means make believe and not fact.

So as I see it, science fiction is: Science that isn't fact. Though, in fiction you can have factual things.

Its also one of the reasons I had a large disagreement with one of my creative writing professors(not that I actually confronted him about it). One thing that bothered me the most about what he was trying to teach was that he would criticize the fiction writers by saying, "Well this isn't good because it isn't believable."

That is the problem with me I guess, when I read or watch fiction I suspend the part of my brain that decides whether something is believable or not. Who knows, that might be why I like such a wide range of television shows and stories.

Though I did find out that my professor didn't actually like fantasy or science fiction in the first place. Though I did get him to like my writing on a fantasy book I am working on. He especially liked the language I was creating for it. He said it sounded like Gaelic. Though I have never studied or read Gaelic in my life, hmm, I guess it is the half Irish part of me getting out.

Okay, enough rambling for now.
 

Sonic Doctor

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Nimcha said:
Yeah that's the only thing I don't like about sci-fi in general, the sound in space. I mean sure, if it's appropriate for the scene like a massive space battle then it doesn't bother me as much because it enhances the spectactle. But a movie like Moon which is all about atmosphere, the Lunar rover's tyres making a sound plowing through the moondust just ruins it.
Yup, but not being able to here someone screaming in space isn't exciting for the audience that doesn't care about the science behind space.

So until everybody starts caring, I guess we will have to live with it.
 

Nouw

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Sonic Doctor said:
Snipped for Science...in fiction!
Strange how this didn't come as a notification...
EDIT:I beat the Escapist Messaging System!

About your post, I whole heartedly agree. It can build upon science that would be impossible (for now anyway) or just be insane! That's the beauty of it, the stories that 1900s era Sci-Fi writers would have been deemed impossible hence not Sci-Fi but they're classics of science for this very reason. Which I have to admit isn't what I usually think about in Science Fiction but nevertheless believe. (Not all of the books, the really good ones!)

Science Fiction is in the future, you're writing about what science might be in the future or in your world.
[sub]Note that it isn't necessarily in the future.[/sub]
 

Manatee Slayer

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Sonic Doctor said:
That is also why I was irked when some science fiction writer(I don't remember who) a few months back stated that Doctor Who wasn't science fiction, because its science wasn't based in real science. I don't care what kingly state this writer had in the field, fiction means make believe and not fact.
I remember reading a new article about a very similiar scientist, who wanted a limit placed on movies, allowing only one breach of scientific theory per film. It's people like those two who make me question the motives that some people have for becoming educated in a certian field of science. Many people have been inspired by science fiction over the years, using it to create dreams of their own, allowing for greater discoveries.

All in all...I know how you feel.

Sonic Doctor said:
Its also one of the reasons I had a large disagreement with one of my creative writing professors(not that I actually confronted him about it). One thing that bothered me the most about what he was trying to teach was that he would criticize the fiction writers by saying, "Well this isn't good because it isn't believable."
Such is the problem with a human that judges a subjective medium.
 

Sonic Doctor

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Drakmeire said:
science fiction is defined by a story with fantasy elements that can be possible in the future or through scientific theory
example-
incredible shrinking man-shrunk by a spell=Fantasy
incredible shrinking man-Shrunk by illness=science fiction
if by some explanation it could be possible, it's sci-fi. if it is not possible no matter what, than it's fantasy.
another example
technology in star wars= science fiction
the force=fantasy
but prequels explain that the force is caused by genetic abnormalities so then it become sci-fi
The problem is that you come off as that you believe that:

If I write a story that has technology that could never be possible in our world's science and scientific laws, then it is fantasy.

The problem is that that is wrong.

A science fiction story is a story that involves something that the story calls science, that in the world of the story, such science is possible. It doesn't matter if the science would never be possible in the real world.

You see, if science in a story is possible sometime in the future in the real world, then that part of the fictional story would be categorized as science nonfiction.

So if in my fictional world, eating rice will make people shrink, because of some natural chemical in the rice of my fictional world, even though it would never ever be possible in the real world, it is science fiction. The reaction the rice causes in my fictional world is science in my fictional world. That science is fiction, science fiction.
 

Sonic Doctor

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Nouw said:
Sonic Doctor said:
Snipped for Science...in fiction!
Strange how this didn't come as a notification...
EDIT:I beat the Escapist Messaging System!

About your post, I whole heartedly agree. It can build upon science that would be impossible (for now anyway) or just be insane! That's the beauty of it, the stories that 1900s era Sci-Fi writers would have been deemed impossible hence not Sci-Fi but they're classics of science for this very reason. Which I have to admit isn't what I usually think about in Science Fiction but nevertheless believe. (Not all of the books, the really good ones!)

Science Fiction is in the future, you're writing about what science might be in the future or in your world.
[sub]Note that it isn't necessarily in the future.[/sub]
Awesome awesome.

Going back to are agreement in the television thread many hours ago:

Before I saw and posted in this thread, I had just watch the steam-punk episode of Castle, with Castle's "time travel" theory about the murder. It is now my second favorite episode.
 

Eclectic Dreck

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Science fiction is a fantasy film where magic is replaced by technology and the work in question expends some amount of effort explaining how some of the pieces of technology work.
 

Smooth Operator

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Well it's no 100% definition because fiction does not have limits, so I say science fiction is defined with advanced tech that is for us still fiction.
Couple of examples:
- shooting a car with led and car explodes is sci-fi(extremely unlikely set of circumstances)
- shooting a car and car turns into a martian boyband is fiction(in no way connected to reality)
 

Eclectic Dreck

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RAKtheUndead said:
demoMDK said:
Explosions is space that somehow make A LOT of noise
That_Swedish_Guy said:
Explosions. In space.
I know the first guy's being facetious, and I hope the second one is as well, because explosions in space don't work the way you think they do [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/18.100198-Space-Warfare-Almost-Everything-You-Know-Is-Probably-Wrong].
That post is factually wrong in a number of areas, the most important of which is the assertion that explosives "won't to anything". This depends entirely upon the type of explosive. While a standard High Explosive charge would have greatly reduced effectiveness (they rely on the surrounding medium to carry damaging energy over longer distances), any armor piercing variant would be exactly as effective given that all of these rely on simply accelerating matter to very high speeds anyhow. A standard High Explosive Armor Piercing charge does not rely on the atmosphere for it's primary effect though it's secondary effect (it is still a high explosive charge) would be reduced.

Nuclear weapons still emit enormous quantities of energy at various points in the EM spectrum. Such that a single 1 megaton nuclear device has sufficient energy to heat an aluminum surface (for example) by hundreds of degrees in an instant. Secondary effects (fire, blast waves) are, obviously, mitigated by the lack of atmosphere. That one megaton device has a blast yield of 4.184x10^15 joules (4,184,000,000,000,000 joules). That energy is being released regardless of what surrounds the device. It's just that, in an atmosphere, plenty of that energy is converted directly to kinetic energy in various forms.

The real problems become simply hitting a target with a projectile at long range considering that, for interstellar space combat to be a thing, ships would need to be capable of traveling at relativistic speeds at least.