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timespace coordinates: 2036 civil war in Ukraine
Outside the Wire is a 2021 American-Hungarian science fiction film directed by Mikael Håfström. It stars Anthony Mackie (who also serves as a producer on the film) as an android officer who works with a drone pilot (Damson Idris) to stop a global catastrophe. Emily Beecham, Michael Kelly, and Pilou Asbæk also star. The film was released by Netflix on January 15, 2021. (wiki)
timespace coordinates: 2010’s Moscow
Attraction (Russian: Притяжение, romanized: Prityazhenie) is a 2017 Russian science fiction action film directed by Fyodor Bondarchuk. The plot tells about an extraterrestrial spaceship that crash-lands in the Chertanovo district of Moscow. The Russian government immediately introduces martial law, as the locals grow increasingly angry at the unwelcome guest. The film stars Irina Starshenbaum, Alexander Petrov, Rinal Mukhametov and Oleg Menshikov.
According to Bondarchuk, the movie is a social allegory. The script writers stated that it was inspired by the 2013 Biryulyovo riots. (wiki)
Invasion, also known as Attraction 2 (Russian: Вторжение, romanized: Vtorzhenie), is a 2020 Russian science fiction action film directed and produced by Fyodor Bondarchuk’s company by Art Pictures Studio and Vodorod. The action of the film unfolds three years after the events described in Attraction. The film stars Irina Starshenbaum, Rinal Mukhametov, Alexander Petrov, Yuri Borisov, Oleg Menshikov and Sergei Garmash. (wiki)
timespace coordinates: Oxford > London, parallel ~Edwardian era Britain (or Brytain) // “The Trout” inn, the Priory of St. Rosamund, Jordan College
The setting is a world dominated by the Magisterium (commonly called “the Church”) an international theocracy which actively suppresses heresy. In this world, humans’ souls naturally exist outside of their bodies in the form of sentient “dæmons” in animal form which accompany, aid, and comfort their humans.
La Belle Sauvage is a fantasy novel by Philip Pullman published in 2017. It is the first volume of a planned trilogy entitled The Book of Dust and is set twelve years before Pullman’s His Dark Materials. It presents events prior to the arrival of the six-month-old Lyra Belacqua at Jordan College, Oxford.
The story follows 11-year-old Malcolm Polstead and his dæmon Asta, and a village girl named Alice and her dæmon Ben, who become the protectors of the infant Lyra Belacqua and her dæmon, Pantalaimon, in Malcolm’s canoe, La Belle Sauvage, during a flood. Malcolm forms a friendship with alethiometer specialist Hannah Relf, allied with the secret freedom-seeking organisation Oakley Street, and is drawn into their fight against the growing strength of the Magisterium, which has learned of a prophecy concerning Lyra. Malcolm and Alice are pursued by the maniacal villain Gerard Bonneville, an ally of the Consistorial Court of Discipline (CCD), as they struggle to reach London and Lyra’s father Lord Asriel, in order to gain the protection of Jordan College for the baby. (wiki)
timespace coordinates: 2010’s sushi restaurant in a Korean fishing village
Swimming to Sea (Korean: 파닥파닥; RR: Padakpadak) is a 2012 South Korean computer-animated musical psychological thriller film written and directed by Dae-hee Lee; as of 2020, this is the only adult animated film released by CJ Entertainment to date. (wiki)
timespace coordinates: ~1975 Văcărești, Bucharest, Romania
The second part is one of the few video recordings of the Văcărești Monastery, built by Nicholas Mavrocordatos in 1716 and demolished in 1984 during the regime of Nicolae Ceaușescu to make room for a Palace of Justice that was never built. It was the largest 18th-century monastery in Southeastern Europe and it had a church in the style of Curtea de Argeș Cathedral. It was also designed to be used as a fortress, and was seized in May 1771 by the Imperial Russian army, under commander Nikolai Vasilyeich Repnin, in the context of the Russo-Turkish War and Pârvu Cantacuzino‘s rebellion. Part of the buildings of the monastery were used as a prison. Inmates that were incarcerated at Văcărești Prison include Richard Wurmbrand, Tudor Arghezi, Ioan Slavici, as well as Corneliu Zelea Codreanu and other members of the Iron Guard. (wiki)
timespace coordinates: 2019 (+) New Orleans
Synchronic is a 2019 American science fiction horror film directed and produced by Justin Benson and Aaron Moorhead and written by Benson. It stars Anthony Mackie and Jamie Dornan. (wiki)
Two New Orleans paramedics’ lives are ripped apart after they encounter a series of horrific deaths linked to a designer drug with bizarre, otherworldly effects.
timespace coordinates: Antarctica 1982
The Thing is a 1982 American science fiction horror film directed by John Carpenter and written by Bill Lancaster. Based on the 1938 John W. Campbell Jr. novella Who Goes There?, it tells the story of a group of American researchers in Antarctica who encounter the eponymous “Thing”, a parasitic extraterrestrial life-form that assimilates, then imitates other organisms. The group is overcome by paranoia and conflict as they learn that they can no longer trust each other and that any one of them could be the Thing. The film stars Kurt Russell as the team’s helicopter pilot, R.J. MacReady, and features A. Wilford Brimley, T. K. Carter, David Clennon, Keith David, Richard Dysart, Charles Hallahan, Peter Maloney, Richard Masur, Donald Moffat, Joel Polis, and Thomas G. Waites in supporting roles.
The Thing was released in 1982 to very negative reviews. It was described as “instant junk”, “a wretched excess”, and proposed as the most-hated film of all time by film magazine Cinefantastique. Reviews both praised the special effects achievements and criticized their visual repulsiveness, while others found the characterization poorly realised.
The film found an audience when released on home video and television. In the subsequent years it has been reappraised as one of the best science fiction and horror films ever made, and has gained a cult following.
Dark Horse Comics published four comic book sequels starring MacReady, beginning in December 1991 with the two-part The Thing from Another World by Chuck Pfarrer, which is set 24 hours after the film. This was followed by the four-part The Thing from Another World: Climate of Fear in July 1992, the four-part The Thing from Another World: Eternal Vows in December 1993, and The Thing from Another World: Questionable Research. In 1999, Carpenter said that no serious discussions had taken place for a sequel, but he would be interested in basing one on Pfarrer’s adaptation, calling the story a worthy sequel. A 2002 video game of the same name was released for Microsoft Windows, PlayStation 2, and Xbox to generally favorable reviews. The game’s plot follows a team of U.S. soldiers investigating the aftermath of the film’s events.
A prequel film, The Thing, was released in October 2011, directed by Matthijs van Heijningen Jr., written by Eric Heisserer, and starring Mary Elizabeth Winstead, Joel Edgerton, Ulrich Thomsen, Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje, and Eric Christian Olsen The story follows the events after the Norwegian team discovers the Thing.
In 2020, Universal Studios and Blumhouse Productions announced the development of a remake of Carpenter’s The Thing. The remake was described as incorporating elements of The Thing from Another World and The Thing, as well as the novella Who Goes There?, and its expanded version, Frozen Hell that features several additional chapters.
Although released years apart, and unrelated in terms of plot, characters, crew, or even production studios, Carpenter considers The Thing to be the first installment in his “Apocalypse Trilogy”, a series of films based around cosmic horror, entities unknown to man, that are threats to both human life and the sense of self. The Thing was followed by Prince of Darkness in 1987, and In the Mouth of Madness in 1994. All three films are heavily influenced by Carpenter’s appreciation for the works of Lovecraft. (wiki)
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