0588 – The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy (2005)

The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy is a 2005 British-American science fiction comedy film directed by Garth Jennings, based upon previous works in the media franchise of the same name, created by Douglas Adams. It stars Martin Freeman, Sam Rockwell, Mos Def, Zooey Deschanel and the voices of Stephen Fry and Alan Rickman. This is the ninth version of the “Hitchhiker’s Guide”. It has previously appeared as a radio series, two record albums, novels, a television series (The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy (1981)), a computer game, a stage show, a comic book, a video game (The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy (1984)) and a towel. (The game version is not, in fact, a video game, but was an Infocom “interactive fiction” {text only} game, plotted/scripted by Douglas Adams, programmed by Steve Meretzky, which has been available to play free on the BBC Radio 4 website since 2005.)

Flyer for the 1979 stage production at the ICA of The Hitchhiker’s Guide To The Galaxy.

The producers have stated that this film is not a literal translation of the books (just as the books were not a literal translation of the original radio show), but all of the new ideas and characters came from Douglas Adams himself. The hired writer simply came aboard to improve structure and make the screenplay more coherent.

Easter Egg: The DVD includes an “Improbability Drive” item on every menu. Clicking this leads to a random point in one of the bonus features. Used several times leads to a strange cartoon, which is the same one Deep Thought watches.

The Hitchiker’s Guide is a parody of “The Encyclopedia Galactica” from Isaac Asimov‘s Foundation novels.

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0570 – Lost in Space (1998)

spacetime coordinates: 2058 Earth > Alpha Prime

Major West [Launching the Jupiter-1]: And the monkey flips the switch.

Lost in Space is a 1998 American science-fiction adventure / comedy film directed by Stephen Hopkins, and starring William Hurt, Matt LeBlanc, and Gary Oldman.  The plot is adapted from the 1965–1968 CBS television series Lost in Space. The film focuses on the Robinson family, who undertake a voyage to a nearby star system to begin large-scale emigration from a soon-to-be uninhabitable Earth (due to the irreversible effects of pollution and Ozone depletion), but are thrown off course by a saboteur and must try to find their way home.

Several of the actors from the original TV series had cameos in the film. The television series Lost in Space (1965) was set in the future of 1997 – the year the film began production.

Major West: OK, last one to kill a bad guy buys the beer!

Lost In Space – Apollo 440

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551 – John Carter (2012)

spacetime coordinates: 1868 > 1881  Arizona Territory / dying planet of Barsoom – Red Martian city of Helium, predator Walking City of Zodanga

John Carter is a 2012 American science fiction action film directed by Andrew Stanton from a screenplay written by Stanton, Mark Andrews, and Michael Chabon.

The film is largely based on A Princess of Mars (1917), the first in a series of 11 novels by Edgar Rice Burroughs to feature the interplanetary hero John Carter (and in later volumes the adventures of his children with Dejah Thoris). The story was originally serialized in six monthly installments (from February through to July 1912) in the pulp magazine The All-Story; those chapters, originally titled “Under the Moons of Mars,” were then collected in hardcover five years later from publisher A. C. McClurg.

kinopoisk.ru

John Carter stars Taylor Kitsch in the title role, Lynn Collins, Samantha Morton, Mark Strong, Ciarán Hinds, Dominic West, James Purefoy, and Willem Dafoe. The film chronicles the first interplanetary adventure of John Carter and his attempts to mediate civil unrest amongst the warring kingdoms of Barsoom.

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Conceptual Art of the moving City of Zodanga

“JOHN CARTER” In Burroughs’ books, massive airships sail on rays of light on Mars. ©Disney Enterprises, Inc. All rights reserved.

“JOHN CARTER” Airship ©2011 Disney. JOHN CARTER™ ERB, Inc.

“JOHN CARTER” ©2011 Disney. JOHN CARTER™ ERB, Inc.

Several developments on a theatrical film adaptation of the Barsoom series emerged throughout the 20th century from various major studios and producers, with the earliest attempt dating back to the 1930s. Most of these efforts, however, ultimately stalled in development hell. In the late-2000s, Walt Disney Pictures began a concerted effort to develop a film adaptation of Burroughs’ works, after a previously-abandoned venture by the studio in the 1980s. The project was driven by Stanton, who had pressed Disney to renew the screen rights from the Burroughs estate. Stanton became director in 2009; this was his live-action debut, as his previous directorial work for Disney included the Pixar animated films, Finding Nemo (2003) and WALL-E (2008).

Due to the film’s poor box office performance, Disney cancelled any plans for a sequel (titled John Carter: The Gods of Mars) and trilogy Stanton had planned.

Cancelled sequel   

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Beyond The Spectrum (2017)

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Bob Lazar: Area 51 & Flying Saucers (2018)

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Beyond Skyline (2017)

spacetime coordinates: 2010 Los Angeles //  rural Laos in Southeast Asia

Beyond Skyline is an 2017 American science fiction action thriller film directed by Liam O’Donnell and stars Frank Grillo, Bojana Novakovic, Iko Uwais, Callan Mulvey, Yayan Ruhian, Betty Gabriel and Antonio Fargas. It is the direct sequel to the 2010’s Skyline.

“A tough-as-nails detective embarks on a relentless pursuit to free his son from a nightmarish alien warship.”

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BEYOND SKYLINE Movie Teaser 

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Skylines (2020)

spacetime coordinates: mission to an extraterrestrial world to save what’s left of mankind. five years after the war against the aliens

Skylines (also known as Skyline 3 and stylized as SKYLIN3S) is a 2020 American science fiction action film written and directed by Liam O’Donnell. It is a sequel to Beyond Skyline (2017) and the final entry in the Skyline trilogy. (wiki)

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0330 – Arrival (2016)

spacetime coordinates: 2010s  Montana

Arrival is a 2016 American science fiction drama film directed by Denis Villeneuve and written by Eric Heisserer, based on the 1998 short story “Story of Your Life” by Ted Chiang. It stars Amy Adams, Jeremy Renner, and Forest Whitaker, and follows linguist Louise Banks, who is enlisted by the U.S. Army to help translate communications from one of several extraterrestrial craft that have appeared across the world. She must find out why they have arrived on Earth before tensions lead into war.

The film received widespread critical acclaim, including praise for Adams’s performance, Villeneuve’s direction, and its exploration of communicating with extraterrestrial intelligence.

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2543164/