Coming Soon To Speed Dating Near You! |
|
Science and scientists are the topic du jour- movie scientists to be precise. While your average nerd out on the street may be nothing more than a walking wedgie target, when they get on screen, it's a very different kettle of fish. Freed from the bounds of reality, the kings and queens of Geektown are a force to be reckoned with. And this is for one very simple reason.
Knowledge is power.
Apparently.
I'd go as far as to say that applied knowledge is power- in the movies, anyway. After all, what good is a scientist who doesn't go out and build himself a time machine, or a robot, or a giant laser, or stitch together a zombie from the corpses of those villagers who died so conveniently? That's right- not much freaking good at all.
When you really break it down, science is all about progress. It's about progressing from point A to point B where it wasn't possible before, and the scientist is the man or woman that holds the ignition keys to that particular rocket ship. Sure, point B might be ‘enslaving the earth with killer robots' and point A might be ‘NOT enslaving the earth with killer robots,' but that's still progress, of a sort.
Sci-fi and scientists have been at the base of a lot of horror movies. And that's fair enough- science, pure science, is a force of boundless potential for discovery and change, and horror is all about the different, the strange. Add a few cranky nerds and an evil genius into the mix and you've got yourself one smoking vat of bubbling green box-office liquid.
Horror movies, for the most part, are a good social barometer of what is sending a chill down people's spines, the issues of the day. Back in the days of massive nuclear proliferation, when people were scared that the nukes would soon be flying, sci-fi horror gave us THEM, a tale of giant, mutated ants that started messing up the joint (as an aside, Hollywood, please. Before another re-make along the lines of BEWITCHED gets green-lit, remake THEM. Marauding giant ants, eating people and generally messing up the town? Now there's a concept that I just cannot get enough of).
The novel of Frankenstein is generally regarded as the first science fiction story ever to be published. Frankenstein's monster himself is one of the classic movie figures, instantly recognisable as soon as he lurches into vision with his arms held outstretched in front of him, his head flat and almost squared-off at the edges, his skin green and bolts through his neck. This wasn't the way that Mary Shelley originally described her creation in her book, but the power and popularity of Boris Karloff's famous portrayal was such that it froze the image of the monster forever. Somewhat more true to the book was MARY SHELLEY'S FRANKENSTEIN, directed by and starring Kenneth Branagh, with Robert De Niro (De Niro seems to be creeping into just about every single column I've written so far) as the Monster and Helena Bonham Carter as Dr. Frankenstein's love interest.
MARY SHELLEY'S FRANKENSTEIN is a great example of the trouble you have with scientists when they get 
Shoo, Fly. |
|
over-excited. They're so blinded by the vision that they have of the future that they never stop to consider what the consequences could be to the present. When Frankenstein harnesses the forces of nature he unleashes a creature that is condemned to forever exist on the fringes of humanity, a creature who, what's more, doesn't much care for such a turn of events. At the heart of idea of science as catalyst to a story is the old SPIDERMAN saying- with great power comes great responsibility. Forget that, and you're in for it, and before you know it a monster made from parts of dead people is knocking on your door and asking for an explanation.
Every now and then you'll get yourself a scientist who starts out good, but as obsession and experimentation take control, loses his humanity and goes bad. David Cronenberg, disturbingly weird art-film nut that he is, used this terrain as his setting for sci-fi horror classic THE FLY (a very loose re-make of the 1958 film and itself a subject for a 2008 re-make).
For those of you who haven't seen it, THE FLY is simply a re-telling of the oldest story in the book. Boy meets girl, boy gets girl, boy accidentally turns himself into human/fly hybrid. Human/fly hybrid has a good time, at first, having insatiable sex with Geena Davis, but, before too long, human/fly hybrid starts to flip out. Girl decides that it may just be time to break up.
Jeff Goldblum as the brilliant loner Seth Brundle is all movie scientist. Driven, highly intelligent and not the coolest guy in town, his damnation stems from his tampering with the laws of nature. While invention and creation are among the highest principles of humanity, they must be tempered with caution and care. There are lines, and once those lines are crossed, you may well turn into a half man/half fly type creature. You have been warned.
When a scientist isn't making life more difficult for everyone, they're more often than not helping out in the wings. As far as sidekicks go, you can do a lot worse than getting a man with a pocket protector and thick glasses to join the team. For a start, they're almost guaranteed to bumble around in a hilarious fashion, making you look incomparably dashing by comparison. And generally, they also use their brilliance to help you achieve things that were previously unachievable. Case in point, MYSTERY MEN. Tom Waits had a cameo as eccentric inventor Doc Heller, specialist in non-lethal weaponry and chicken rental. With inventions such as Canned Tornadoes and clothes-shrinking rifles (based on dry-cleaning technology and with a clam-shell holster) he was the epitome of what a scientist brings to the table, and that's a damn fine way to mess up anybody that stands in your way.
Frankly, it's a little disappointing that you can't be a movie scientist in real life, retreating into a shed or a lab for the night, accompanied by bangs and clangs and welding and then emerge in the morning bearing a brand new machine that's the answer to all of your problems.
And, as often as scientists toy with forces that they shouldn't (think 
Nerds. Awesome, Awesome, Nerds. |
|
EVENT HORIZON, JURASSIC PARK, I ROBOT), there are as many times when scientists are the only hope that we have. After all, sometimes, shit happens, you don't want to deal with it, who you gonna call? As often as science accidentally unleashes some kind of monster, a little bit of know-how is just the thing needed to bitch-slap the bad guys into submission. Enter the Ghostbusters, scientists extraordinaire.
GHOSTBUSTERS is a great example of how, when you add a little science to the mix, you can create a whole new world of possibilities to explore, story-wise. One of the movies that have a special place in the hearts of most of the world's movie-going population, GHOSTBUSTERS was just plain fun. The unbelievable on-screen chemistry of the four male leads and Bill Murray's sarcasm-loaded, deadpan delivery served to elevate the film into the realm of the classic and the timeless. The actual science of the proton packs and the traps and the containment system isn't important, and a lengthy explanation would most likely sap the energy of the film. Instead, all we need to know is that these guys are smart enough to put together a system that busts ghosts, and the movie can take it from there.
The same applies to BACK TO THE FUTURE trilogy. Who the hell knows what a flux capacitor is? Who knows how it works? And furthermore, who cares? We know that the flux capacitor is what makes time travel possible, because that's what Doc Emmet Brown tells Marty in BACK TO THE FUTURE. He ought to know- he's a scientist, after all. And he's got the long white coat, the wild eyes and the crazy manner to prove it. Just like Seth Brundle from THE FLY, Doc Brown creates something that he can't fully control, something that he wishes he had never invented. But in this scenario it doesn't have to be a bad thing- the power of science can take us to good places just as easily as to bad.
In the movies, science is an enabling device; it allows the plot to develop and strange new possibilities to unfold that never would have done so otherwise. In the movies, just as everything is, science is bigger than life, it's slicker, it's faster, it's not bound down to the laws of physics, or biology, or chemistry. But, as in real life, it's still a tool. Whether it's in the hands of an amiable charmer (David Duchovny in EVOLUTION, displaying his considerable comic talent), a guitar-playing genius (Pete Weller in THE ADVENTURES OF BUCKEROO BANZAI ACROSS THE EIGHTH DIMENSION) or a murderous megalomaniac (THE FANTASTIC FOUR's Dr. Doom), the power of science is at the whim of its creator. While events may unfold on a bigger, more atomic-fuelled level than in day to day life, they are still representations of what we might do, if we only had the power.
(Note: the terms ‘wedgie target', ‘Geektown', ‘cranky nerds' and ‘poindexters' are meant in an affectionate manner only, as I have no wish to annoy any of the dateless eggheads who may be even now be putting the final touches on their Doomsday devices.)
 email this column to a friend
Comment on this Column:
Sorry, you must be a member to add comments to columns.
Join or Login. |
 Subscribe to MatchFlick Movie Reviews through RSS
|
| Heroes, Villains, And Wise-Cracking Sidekicks |
Every other Monday
An in-depth look at the different kinds of characters that make the movies, how they've changed over time, and how they reflect the best and worst of us.
|
| Simon Smithson |
Simon was crushed when he found out that 'Ghostbuster' was not an actual vocation, and so went with the next best thing - writing columns for Internet movie sites. He's working on a proton pack of his own, but it's going to take some time.
|
| Contact |
If you have a comment, question, or suggestion, you can send a message to Simon Smithson by clicking here.
|
|
