The movie Gravity recently came out in theatres. It’s been
getting a lot of great reviews and garnering attention to space travel that
hasn’t been seen since the movie Apollo 13. And yet there seems to be a point
of contention about this particular film. Is Gravity a Science Fiction movie?
And that of course has me asking the much bigger question; What is Science
Fiction? And I have to admit when I really think about it, I’m not completely
sure I have an easy answer
Now such a question shouldn’t be this hard to answer.
Science fiction is fiction about science. There. That was easy. But hold on
there. Does that mean any fictional story with a scientific element is science
fiction? That seems wrong. That would mean that Dan Brown’s book Angels &
Demons is a sci-fi movie because one of the major plot points revolves around
anti-matter. But it’s not. Angels & Demons is clearly a mystery thriller.
Or perhaps you could call it a religious drama. But Sci-Fi? Not really.
Okay, so it can’t just be a story that contains scientific
elements. The bulk of the story must revolve around a scientific element in
order for it to qualify the science part of Science Fiction. Okay, so any
fictional story with a scientific element shall be classified as sci-fi. And
again I say, hold on. The movie Fire in the Sky is classified as Science
Fiction. Yet it is based on a true story. Which means it isn’t fiction. It is
fact. (True some of the elements of being abducted by aliens might be made up,
but these are the events as told by the person who it occurred to so
technically they can be classified as fact). So now we run into another
roadblock over what is sci-fi. True stories can’t be fiction. We would not
classify Apollo 13 as a Science Fiction movie. That was a national event and
while I am sure some of the cinematic elements might have been altered for the
silver screen (it happens with every adaptation), the main story is true. So
why is Apollo 13 less Science Fiction than Fire in the Sky?
Perhaps I am looking at the wrong area. Space is rather grey
(actually it’s a black void) that causes a lot of confusion when it comes to
identifying real Science and Science Fiction. Heck, it is a known fact most
NASA guys were inspired to their careers from watching Star Trek. So Space is
always going to be something that people will associate with Science Fiction
whether it is real science or not. For the moment I am going to put a pin in it
and say space with humans, real, space with aliens, fiction.
What about computers? Computers have long been a staple of
science fiction. Robots, artificial intelligence, advanced technologies,
Science Fiction has always been able to envision technology that is always just
a little bit better than what we can create ourselves. So movies that have
portrayals of computers can be labeled as Sci-Fi. Again I find this is not
always the case. Even though computers have become such an everyday item for
people, not so long ago they were not, and even today many times computers are
used as deus ex machina type fixes for problems in any story. Need the secret
agent to open a locked door? Oh well a hacker can do that no problem with just
a few keystrokes according to most film logic. The movie Hackers is in fact an
excellent example of the absurd things computers can be used for. But while
none of these things seems possible in real life, Hackers is not Sci-Fi. At
best it is a goofy crime film. And yet take some of the premises in Hackers and
apply it to characters in a film like Eagle Eye and you have a film that can be
classified as Sci-Fi. Even the film Real Genius (a classic comedy starring Val
Kilmer in his younger years) is classified as Sci-Fi sometimes and it has much
fewer outrageous computer elements as Hackers does.
What seems to really classify something as Sci-Fi is when it
goes completely outside the realm of what science can currently do and prove.
Some small scientific absurdity that, while believable in a fictitious film or
story, does not fit in with the typical scientific narrative. Aliens are
science fiction because even though many people believe in the concept of
extraterrestrial life, it cannot be immediately proven. So we need to make
stuff up about what life out there might be like. The best sci-fi though is the
science fiction that honors what scientific belief states at the time of its
creation. Michael Crichton, a doctor before he became an author, would always
honor what science said was possible and then took it one step further.
The movie Gravity recently came out in theatres. It’s been
getting a lot of great reviews and garnering attention to space travel that
hasn’t been seen since the movie Apollo 13. And yet there seems to be a point
of contention about this particular film. Is Gravity a Science Fiction movie?
And that of course has me asking the much bigger question; What is Science
Fiction? And I have to admit when I really think about it, I’m not completely
sure I have an easy answer
Now such a question shouldn’t be this hard to answer.
Science fiction is fiction about science. There. That was easy. But hold on
there. Does that mean any fictional story with a scientific element is science
fiction? That seems wrong. That would mean that Dan Brown’s book Angels &
Demons is a sci-fi movie because one of the major plot points revolves around
anti-matter. But it’s not. Angels & Demons is clearly a mystery thriller.
Or perhaps you could call it a religious drama. But Sci-Fi? Not really. 
Okay, so it can’t just be a story that contains scientific
elements. The bulk of the story must revolve around a scientific element in
order for it to qualify the science part of Science Fiction. Okay, so any
fictional story with a scientific element shall be classified as sci-fi. And
again I say, hold on. The movie Fire in the Sky is classified as Science
Fiction. Yet it is based on a true story. Which means it isn’t fiction. It is
fact. (True some of the elements of being abducted by aliens might be made up,
but these are the events as told by the person who it occurred to so
technically they can be classified as fact). So now we run into another
roadblock over what is sci-fi. True stories can’t be fiction. We would not
classify Apollo 13 as a Science Fiction movie. That was a national event and
while I am sure some of the cinematic elements might have been altered for the
silver screen (it happens with every adaptation), the main story is true. So
why is Apollo 13 less Science Fiction than Fire in the Sky?
Perhaps I am looking at the wrong area. Space is rather grey
(actually it’s a black void) that causes a lot of confusion when it comes to
identifying real Science and Science Fiction. Heck, it is a known fact most
NASA guys were inspired to their careers from watching Star Trek. So Space is
always going to be something that people will associate with Science Fiction
whether it is real science or not. For the moment I am going to put a pin in it
and say space with humans, real, space with aliens, fiction. 
What about computers? Computers have long been a staple of
science fiction. Robots, artificial intelligence, advanced technologies,
Science Fiction has always been able to envision technology that is always just
a little bit better than what we can create ourselves. So movies that have
portrayals of computers can be labeled as Sci-Fi. Again I find this is not
always the case. Even though computers have become such an everyday item for
people, not so long ago they were not, and even today many times computers are
used as deus ex machina type fixes for problems in any story. Need the secret
agent to open a locked door? Oh well a hacker can do that no problem with just
a few keystrokes according to most film logic. The movie Hackers is in fact an
excellent example of the absurd things computers can be used for. But while
none of these things seems possible in real life, Hackers is not Sci-Fi. At
best it is a goofy crime film. And yet take some of the premises in Hackers and
apply it to characters in a film like Eagle Eye and you have a film that can be
classified as Sci-Fi. Even the film Real Genius (a classic comedy starring Val
Kilmer in his younger years) is classified as Sci-Fi sometimes and it has much
fewer outrageous computer elements as Hackers does.
What seems to really classify something as Sci-Fi is when it
goes completely outside the realm of what science can currently do and prove.
Some small scientific absurdity that, while believable in a fictitious film or
story, does not fit in with the typical scientific narrative. Aliens are
science fiction because even though many people believe in the concept of
extraterrestrial life, it cannot be immediately proven. So we need to make
stuff up about what life out there might be like. The best sci-fi though is the
science fiction that honors what scientific belief states at the time of its
creation. Michael Crichton, a doctor before he became an author, would always
honor what science said was possible and then took it one step further. 
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