movies

1122 – Real Steel (2011)

timespace coordinates: 2020, Detroit / Georgia / New York City / Texas

real-steel-uk-poster

Real Steel is a 2011 American science fiction sports film starring Hugh Jackman and Dakota Goyo and co-produced and directed by Shawn Levy for DreamWorks Pictures. The film is based on the short story “Steel”, written by Richard Matheson, which was originally published in the May 1956 edition of The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, and later adapted into a 1963 Twilight Zone episodeReal Steel was in development for several years before production began on June 24, 2010. Filming took place primarily in the U.S. state of MichiganAnimatronic robots were built for the film, and motion capture technology was used to depict the brawling of computer-generated robots and animatronics. (wiki)

imdb

movies

1118 – Hardware (1990)

timespace coordinates: Christmastime in New York City  (21st century, a nuclear war has transformed the Earth into a radioactive wasteland where the sea has dried up leaving it as a post-apocalyptic desert.)

See these mighty buildings. It all shall
be thrown down and shattered to splinters.
The earth will shake, rattle and roll. The
masses will go hungry, their bellies bloat.
These are the birth pains.
No flesh shall be spared. MARK-13 (Read more)

Hardware is a 1990 British science fiction horror film starring Dylan McDermott and Stacey Travis. The film, which was written and directed by Richard Stanley, also features cameos from Iggy Pop and Lemmy. Since its release, it has become a cult film. The film is about a self-repairing robot that goes on a rampage in a post-apocalyptic slum. Fleetway Comics sued the film-makers over the screenplay because it plagiarised a short story entitled “SHOK!” that appeared in 1980 in the Judge Dredd Annual 1981, a spin-off publication of the popular British weekly anthology comic 2000 AD. (wiki)

imdb

movies

1113 – Cyborg (1989)

timespace coordinates: 21st Century (2010’s ?) New York City >  Atlanta, Georgia

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Cyborg also known as Slinger is a 1989 American martial-arts cyberpunk film directed by Albert PyunJean-Claude Van Damme stars as Gibson Rickenbacker, a mercenary who battles a group of murderous marauders led by Fender Tremolo (Vincent Klyn) along the East coast of the United States in a post-apocalyptic future. The film is the first in Pyun’s Cyborg Trilogy. It was followed by 1993’s Knights (originally entitled The Kingdom of Metal: Cyborg Killer) and Omega Doom in 1997.  Cyborg was followed by sequels Cyborg 2 and Cyborg 3: The Recycler. (wiki)

The film was shot for less than $500,000 and was filmed in 23 days. Jean-Claude Van Damme re-edited the film, much as he did with Bloodsport (1988), to make the fight scenes more exciting and trim down the drama. Van Damme spent two months editing the film. He would do the same on Hard Target (1993) (imdb)


Cyborg Nemesis: The Dark Rift

documentary

869 – Cruickshank on Kew: The Garden That Changed the World (2009 Documentary)

As the Royal Botanic Gardens in Kew prepare to celebrate their 250th anniversary, Dan Cruickshank unearths some of the surprising stories that shaped the famous gardens. His travels take him from the royal gardens to the corridors of power and the outposts of the Empire as he pieces together Kew’s story, uncovering tales of bravery, high adventure, passion and drama. (docuwiki)

imdb

animation, movies

0860 – Searching (2018)

timespace coordinates: 2015 – 2017 San Jose, California

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Searching is a 2018 American thriller film directed by Aneesh Chaganty and written by Chaganty and Sev Ohanian. Set almost entirely on smartphones and computer screens, the film follows a father (John Cho) trying to find his missing 16-year-old daughter (Michelle La) with the help of a police detective (Debra Messing). It was the first mainstream Hollywood thriller headlined by an Asian-American actor. (wiki)

While the film features computer operating systems, programs and (mostly) websites, they were re-created from scratch and animated on computers. (trivia)

imdb

documentary

858 – Roger & Me (1989 documentary)

timespace coordinates: 1980’s Flint, Michigan

Roger & Me is a 1989 American film written, produced, directed by and starring Michael Moore. Moore portrays the regional economic impact of General Motors CEO Roger Smith‘s action of closing several auto plants in his hometown of Flint, Michigan, reducing GM’s employees in that area from 80,000 in 1978 to about 50,000 in 1992. As of August 2015, GM employs approximately 7,200 workers in the Flint area, according to The Detroit News, and 5,000 workers according to MSNBC.  In 2013, the film was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry by the Library of Congress as being “culturally, historically or aesthetically significant.” (wiki)

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imdb


Pets or Meat: The Return to Flint (1992)