Czech movie poster: Alien (1979)
The 1970s produced an array of top-notch science fiction movies. Here are ten classic sci-films from the disco/Watergate era that no movie fan should ever miss. We begin in the year 2037…
Alien (20th Century-Fox, 1979)
Made for $ 11 million, Alien ranks as one of science fiction’s greatest horror films. The movie opens in the year 2037, where the seven-person crew of the Nostromo is awakened by “Mother,” the ship’s super computer. Captain Dallas (Tom Skerritt), Lambert (Veronica Cartwright) and Kane (John Hurt) shuttle down to the planet LV-426 from which an SOS signal was transmitted. The signal proves to be a warning, with an alien creature attaching itself to Kane’s helmet visor, where it later wreaks death and destruction aboard the Nostromo. Alien, which also features Sigourney Weaver, Harry Dean Stanton, Ian Holm and Yaphet Kotto, grossed $ 40.3 million at the American box office, earning the #5 slot on the list of the top moneymaking films of 1979. The famous “Gut Buster” scene is legendary in sci-fi circles, with the creature literally ripping its way out of Kane’s belly while the crew is seated at the dining table. Alien’s tagline says it all: “In space no one can hear you scream.”
Director: Ridley Scott
Great line: “It’s a robot. Ash is a goddamn robot.” – Yaphet Kotto as Parker after discovering that their science officer isn’t human
On DVD: Alien: 20th Anniversary Edition (20th Century-Fox, 1999)
Close Encounters of the Third Kind (Columbia, 1977)
UFOs and their alien occupants come to Earth in this revered science fiction entry which premiered in New York City on November 15, 1977. The signs of the extraterrestrials’ impending arrival manifest themselves in several ways, including the reappearance of missing World War II fighter planes from 1945 in the Mojave Desert and lineman Roy Neary’s (Richard Dreyfuss) close encounter with an alien spacecraft. Neary and several other “contacted” people journey to the remote site where the U.S. government has determined that the alien spacecraft will land. “Steven Spielberg’s giant, spectacular ‘Close Encounters of the Third Kind’…is the best – and most elaborate – 1950’s science fiction movie ever made, a work that borrows its narrative shape and its concerns from those earlier films, but enhances them with what looks like the latest developments in movie and space technology,” reported Vincent Canby of The New York Times. Close Encounters of the Third Kind, which also features Francois Truffaut, Teri Garr and Melinda Dillon, garnered nine Oscar nominations.
Director: Steven Spielberg
Great line: “I don’t think we could have asked for a more beautiful evening, do you? Okay, watch the skies please…We now show uncorrelated targets approaching from the north-northwest.” – J. Patrick McNamara as Project Leader on the approaching extraterrestrials
On DVD: Close Encounters of the Third Kind 30th Anniversary Ultimate Edition (Columbia, 2007)
Mini lobby card: Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1977)
Star Wars (20th Century-Fox, 1977)
A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away…So set the stage for Star Wars, the top-grossing film of 1977 that to date has earned over $ 460 million in the United States alone. Mark Hamill, Harrison Ford, Carrie Fisher and Alec Guinness star in this rousing sci-fi adventure story, pitting the fledgling Rebel Alliance against the tyrannical Empire and its new super weapon the Death Star. “’Star Wars’…is the most elaborate, most expensive, most beautiful movie serial ever made,” opined Vincent Canby of The New York Times. Star Wars copped 11 Academy Award nominations, winning for Best Visual Effects, Best Original Music Score, Best Film Editing, Best Art Direction-Set Decoration, Best Sound, Best Costume Design and a Special Achievement Award for Best Sound Effects. A landmark achievement in the fantastic cinema – despite Carrie Fisher as Princess Leia sporting one of the ugliest hairdos in Hollywood history.
Director: George Lucas
Great line: “Hey, Luke… may the Force be with you.” – Harrison Ford as Han Solo
On DVD: Star Wars Trilogy (20th Century-Fox, 2008)
Lobby card, L-r: Mark Hamill, Carrie Fisher, Harrison Ford in Star Wars (1977)
Soylent Green (MGM, 1973)
Based on the 1966 novel Make Room! Make Room! by Harry Harrison, Soylent Green – for your ultimate dining pleasure, heh, heh – premiered in New York City on April 19, 1973. Set in the year 2022, the film depicts the plight of the Earth’s inhabitatants as they struggle to survive on a planet marked by overpopulation and diminishing natural resources. Feeding much of the world is the massive conglomerate the Soylent Corporation, which produces rations in the form of Soylent Red, Soylent Yellow and their newest creation Soylent Green, the latter of which is purportedly derived from “high-energy plankton.” When industrialist William R. Simonson (Joseph Cotten) is murdered, NYPD detective Robert Thorn (Charlton Heston) and his partner Sol Roth (Edward G. Robinson) investigate, with the bloody trail leading back to the Soylent Corporation and the terrible secret they harbor regarding the actual contents of Soylent Green.
Director: Richard Fleischer
Great line: “It’s people. Soylent Green is made out of people. They’re making our food out of people. Next thing they’ll be breeding us like cattle for food. You’ve gotta tell them. You’ve gotta tell them!” – Charlton Heston as Detective Robert Thorn to his chief Brock Peters
On DVD: Soylent Green (Warner, 2008)
Six sheet movie poster: Charlton Heston in Soylent Green (1973)
Westworld (MGM, 1973)
Two Chicago businessmen, Peter Martin (Richard Benjamin) and John Blane (James Brolin), pay $ 1,000 a day to stay at Delios, a high-tech amusement park comprised of three fantasy venues: Westworld, Romanworld and Medievalworld. Martin and Blane have chosen the former for their adventure, where they battle a menacing robotic gunslinger (Yul Brynner), rob the local bank and bed the pretty, robotic saloon girls. Delios’ sophisticated robots, however, begin malfunctioning, terrorizing both staff and guests as they run amok in the park. After killing John Blane in a fast-draw contest, the high-tech gunslinger sets his sights on Blane’s fleeing buddy, tracking him with infrared vision. “…A science-fiction melodrama about Doomsday in Disneyland,” offered Vincent Canby of The New York Times. The movie’s memorable tagline: “…Where nothing can possibly go wrong!”
Director: Michael Crichton
Great line: “We aren’t dealing with ordinary machines here. These are highly complicated pieces of equipment. Almost as complicated as living organisms. In some cases, they have been designed by other computers. We don’t know exactly how they work.” – Orville Sherman as Chief Supervisor on Delios’ robots
On DVD: Westworld (Warner, 2000)
Three sheet movie poster: Westworld (1973)
The Andromeda Strain (Universal, 1971)
Based on the 1969 novel by Michael Crichton, The Andromeda Strain dropped into movie theaters on March 12, 1971. The storyline is wild, featuring the arrival of a deadly organism from outer space that produces fatal blood clotting in its victims. Trying to contain the deadly visitor are scientists Jeremy Stone (Arthur Hill), Charles Dutton (David Wayne), Mark Hill (James Olson) and Ruth Leavitt (Kate Reid). The Andromeda Strain is crackling good science fiction, as our scientist heroes attempt to isolate the organism and prevent its spread from beyond their high-tech underground facility in Nevada known as Wildfire. “On the level of fiction, ‘The Andromeda Strain’ is a splendid entertainment that will get you worried about whether they’ll be able to contain that strange blob of alien green crystal,” observed Roger Ebert of the Chicago Sun-Times.
Director: Robert Wise
Great line: “They already have Andromeda programmed! The purpose of Scoop was to find new biological weapons in outer space, and then use Wildfire to develop them!” – David Wayne as Dr. Charles Dutton on the American satellite Scoop VII and its true mission
On DVD: The Andromeda Strain (Universal, 2003)
British one sheet movie poster: The Andromeda Strain (1971)
The Omega Man (Warner Bros., 1971)
Richard Matheson’s classic 1954 novel I Am Legend serves as the inspiration for this doomsday thriller set in the mid-to-late 1970s. A biological war waged by China and the Soviet Union has released an apocalyptic plague, wiping out most of the world’s population. One of the few survivors is U.S. Army Colonel Robert Neville, M.D. (Charlton Heston), who had self-administered an experimental vaccine just in time, rendering him immune to the sickness. Perched from his high-rise apartment, the well-armed Neville battles the plague’s night-loving homicidal mutants known as “The Family,” headed by the sinister Brother Jonathan Matthias (Anthony Zerbe). “An extremely literate science-fiction drama…” reported Variety.
Director: Boris Sagal
Great line: “Is there anything you can do, Doctor, I mean, seeing as how you’ve lost over 200 million patients? – Rosalind Cash as Lisa to Charlton Heston
On DVD: The Omega Man (Warner, 2000)
Lobby card: Charlton Heston in The Omega Man (1971)
Slaughterhouse-Five (Universal, 1972)
Kurt Vonnegut Jr.’s 1969 novel serves as the basis for this slick science fiction film which debuted on March 15, 1972. The episodic Slaughterhouse-Five stars Michael Sacks as Billy Pilgrim, a man who becomes “unstuck in time,” experiencing life simultaneously in three different eras: in the past as an American prisoner of war in Nazi Germany, in the present as an optometrist in New York and in the future as a zoo inhabitant on the planet Tralfamadore. The best sequence may well belong to the past, with Pilgrim witnessing the 1945 Allied fire bombing of Dresden, an event which Kurt Vonnegut Jr. had experienced personally as a young POW.
Director: George Roy Hill
Great line: “You see it’s time for you to go home – to your lives and your children. It’s time for me to be dead for a little while. And then live again. I give you the Tralfamadorian greeting: Hello. Farewell. Hello. Farewell. Eternally connected, eternally embracing. Hello. Farewell.” – Michael Sacks as Billy Pilgrim just before Ron Leibman shoots him
On DVD: Slaugherhouse-Five (Universal, 2004)
One sheet movie poster: Slaughterhouse-Five (1972)
A Clockwork Orange (Warner Bros., 1971)
Based on the 1962 novel by Anthony Burgess, A Clockwork Orange nabs the title of most disturbing science fiction/fantasy film of the decade. Set in a futuristic London, A Clockwork Orange stars Malcolm McDowell as Alex, the ruthless leader of a small gang of thugs known as the droogs. Murder, rape, home invasion and other violence permeate this picture, including the infamous scene where the ghastly droogs beat a writer (Patrick Magee), with Alex savagely kicking the man while he joyfully croons “Singin’ in the Rain.” A Clockwork Orange garnered four Oscar nominations: Best Picture, Best Director, Best Screenplay and Best Film Editing. A movie definitely not to everyone’s liking.
Director: Stanley Kubrick
Great line: “There was me, that is Alex, and my three droogs, that is Pete, Georgie, and Dim, and we sat in the Korova Milkbar trying to make up our rassoodocks what to do with the evening. The Korova milkbar sold milk-plus, milk plus vellocet or synthemesc or drencrom, which is what we were drinking. This would sharpen you up and make you ready for a bit of the old ultra-violence.” Malcolm McDowell as Alex
On DVD: A Clockwork Orange Two-Disc Special Edition (Warner, 2007)
Lobby card: Malcolm McDowell in A Clockwork Orange (1971)
Rollerball (United Artists, 1975)
William Harrison’s short story “Roller Ball Murder,” first published in the September 1973 edition of Esquire, inspired this sports-gone-mad sci-fi entry. James Caan stars as Jonathan E., the mega superstar of his era who excels in the ultra-violent sport of rollerball. Set in the year 2018, society is now ruled by the multinational corporations, who have replaced war with rollerball as a suitable outlet for the citizenry’s anti-social leanings. Decked out in padded uniforms, helmets and spiked gloves, Jonathan E., leader of the Houston club, along with other participants circle an oval track on roller skates and motorcycles, trying to place an iron ball into a magnetic goal. John Houseman, Maud Adams, John Beck and Moses Gunn are along for the rocky ride into the future wide world of sports – ah, the thrill of victory and the agony of defeat! Now, will you please stand for the playing of our Corporate Hymn?
Director: Norman Jewison
Great line: “The game was created to demonstrate the futility of individual effort.” – John Houseman as Mr. Bartholomew on rollerball
On DVD:Rollerball (MGM, 1998)
Italian movie poster: Rollerball (1975)
Ten More 1970s Science Fiction Movie Favorites
Star Trek: The Motion Picture (1979)The Man Who Fell to Earth (1976)Beneath the Planet of the Apes (1970)Logan’s Run (1976)Colossus: The Forbin Project (1970)Solaris (1972)Sleeper (1973)At the Earth’s Core (1976)Superman (1978)The Terminal Man (1974)
Italian 4 folio movie poster: Solaris (1972)
Images Credit
All images courtesy Heritage Auction Galleries, Dallas, Texas
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