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.

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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   

concept art   imdb

0344 – Monsters (2010)

Monsters (IMDB) is a 2010 British science fiction monster film written and directed by Gareth Edwards in his feature film directorial debut. Edwards also served as the cinematographer, production designer, and visual effects artist. Monsters takes place years after a NASA probe crash in Mexico which led to the sudden appearance of giant tentacled monsters. It follows Andrew Kaulder (Scoot McNairy), an American photojournalist tasked with escorting his employer’s daughter Samantha Wynden (Whitney Able) back to the US by crossing through Mexico’s “Infected Zone” where the creatures reside.

 Monsters: Dark Continent, a sequel, was released in the UK on 1 May 2015.

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1935302/

294 – Maximum Overdrive (1986)

spacetime coordinates: June 1987. at the Dixie Boy Truck Stop just outside Wilmington, North Carolina. as the Earth crosses the tail of a comet, previously inanimate machines suddenly spring to life.

Maximum Overdrive is a 1986 American comedy horror film written and directed by Stephen King. The film stars Emilio Estevez, Pat Hingle, Laura Harrington, and Yeardley Smith. The screenplay was inspired by and loosely based on King’s short story “Trucks“, which was included in the author’s first collection of short stories, Night Shift.

Maximum Overdrive is King’s only directorial effort, though dozens of films have been based on his novels or short stories. The film contained black humor elements and a generally campy tone, which contrasts with King’s sombre subject matter in books. The film has a mid-1980s hard rock soundtrack composed entirely by the group AC/DC, King’s favorite band. AC/DC’s album Who Made Who was released as the Maximum Overdrive soundtrack. (wiki)

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1922 (2017)

spacetime coordinates:  1922  Hemingford Home, Nebraska

1922 is a 2017 American horror-drama film written and directed by Zak Hilditch and based on Stephen King‘s novella of the same name.

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Cell (2016)

spacetime coordinates: 2010s New England 

Cell is a 2016 American science fiction horror film based on the 2006 novel of the same name by Stephen King. The film is directed by Tod Williams, produced by John Cusack, with a screenplay by King and Adam Alleca. The film stars Cusack, Samuel L. Jackson, and Isabelle Fuhrman.

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*ALL SK’s BOOKS TIE TOGETHER AND JOIN ANOTHER UNIVERSE, RUN BY AN ARCH ENEMY, NAMED Randall Flagg. Or other names

0139 – Outlander (2008)

spacetime coordinates: Viking kingdom of Herot 709 AD (Vendel-era Scandinavia)

Outlander is a 2008 American science fiction action film directed by Howard McCain and starring James Caviezel. The plot is loosely based on Beowulf, adapted to a science-fiction backstory involving a spaceship crashing in Iron Age Norway.

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0138 – The Time Machine (2002)

spacetime coordinates: New York City 1899 – 2030 – 2037 – 802,701 – 635,427,810

The Time Machine is a 2002 American science fiction film loosely adapted from the 1895 novel of the same name by H. G. Wells and the screenplay of the 1960 film of the same name by David Duncan. Arnold Leibovit served as executive producer and Simon Wells served as director, the great-grandson of the original author. The film stars Guy Pearce, Jeremy Irons, Orlando Jones, Samantha Mumba, Mark Addy, Sienna Guillory and Phyllida Law, and includes a cameo by Alan Young, who also appeared in the 1960 film adaptation. The film is set in New York City instead of London, and contains new story elements not present in the original novel, including a romantic backstory, a new scenario about how civilization was destroyed, and several new characters, such as an artificially intelligent hologram played by Orlando Jones, and a Morlock leader played by Jeremy Irons. The film’s recreation of New York at the turn of the century won it some praise.

Many of the time traveling scenes were entirely computer generated, including a 33-second shot in the workshop where the time machine is located. The camera pulls out, traveling through New York City and then into space, past the ISS, and ends with a space plane landing at the moon to reveal earth’s future lunar colonies. Plants and buildings are shown springing up and then being replaced by new growth in a constant cycle. In later shots, the effects team used an erosion algorithm to digitally simulate the Earth’s landscape changing through the centuries.

imdb   wikipedia

0111 – Season of the Witch (2011)

spacetime coordinates:  Villach in the year 1235 // 14th-century Holy Roman Empire// Styria // Wormwood forest

Season of the Witch is a 2011 American fantasy adventure film directed by Dominic Sena. starring Nicolas Cage, Ron Perlman and Claire Foy. The film draws inspiration from the 1957 film The Seventh Seal.

In the 14th century, Teutonic Knights Behmen von Bleibruck (Cage) and Felson (Perlman) are engaged on a crusade, taking part in several different battles throughout the 1330’s (1332 Gulf of Edremit, 1334 Siege of Tripoli, 1337 Imbros & 1339 Artah) and eventually in the Smyrniote crusades. After witnessing the massacre of civilians during the 1344 capture of Smyrna, the two knights desert the Order and the crusade and return to Austria.

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Wormwood, the name of the forest where blood is shed, is also the name of a destructive entity in the Bible. This entity, a star whose name also translates as Bitterness, appears to cause widespread illness. According to Revelation 8:10-11, “The third angel sounded his trumpet, and a great star, blazing like a torch, fell from the sky on a third of the rivers and on the springs of water–the name of the star is Wormwood. A third of the waters turned bitter, and many people died from the waters that had become bitter.”

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‘Season of the Witch’ Trailer HD

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0098 – Elysium (2013)

spacetime coordinates: 2154. the ruins of Los Angeles / Elysium

Elysium is a 2013 American science fiction film produced, written and directed by Neill Blomkamp. It stars Matt Damon, Jodie Foster, Alice Braga, and Sharlto Copley. The film takes place on both a ravaged Earth, and a luxurious space habitat (Stanford torus design) called Elysium.

The film itself offers deliberate social commentary which explores political and sociological themes such as immigration, overpopulation, health care, worker exploitation, the justice system, and social class issues. Blomkamp has stated that it is a comment on the contemporary human condition.”Everybody wants to ask me lately about my predictions for the future,” the director has said, “No, no, no. This isn’t science fiction. This is today. This is now.” (The film’s Earth-bound scenes were shot in a dump in the poor Iztapalapa district on the outskirts of Mexico City, while the scenes for Elysium were shot in Vancouver and the wealthy Huixquilucan-Interlomas suburbs of Mexico City.)

director Neil Blomkamp expressed some regrets regarding Elysium, commenting: “I feel like I fucked it up, I feel like ultimately the story is not the right story.. I still think the satirical idea of a ring, filled with rich people, hovering above the impoverished Earth, is an awesome idea. I love it so much, I almost want to go back and do it correctly. But I just think the script wasn’t… I just didn’t make a good enough film is ultimately what it is. I feel like I executed all of the stuff that could be executed, like costume and set design and special effects very well. But, ultimately, it was all resting on a somewhat not totally formed skeletal system, so the script just wasn’t there; the story wasn’t fully there.”

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