Will & Grace star Eric McCormack plays an astronomer possessed by an alien in the film, Alien Trespass. The movie spoofs science fiction movies from the 50s. McCormack talked to New York Magazine about what is was like playing Urp.
I think my first instinct was to make him more alien, sounding like Mr. Spock, and [writer-director R.W. Goodwin] wanted more innocence — like a lilting, childlike inflection. So the image I used was that Urp is on another planet and has to steal a vehicle. And that vehicle happens to be my body. So the walk, the hands, the voice, and of course the erection that keeps happening, those were all just somebody trying to understand a machine that it needs to get around.
Here's a trailer. It looks hilarious. Alien Trespass opened in limited theatres on April 3rd.
AMC is moving forward with a tv series based on the novel Red Mars.
"Mars," a 1992 novel by Kim Stanley Robinson, chronicles the inhabitants of the first human colony on the planet. Hensleigh ("Armageddon") is the writer and will executive produce alongside Michael Jaffe and Howard Braunstein of Jaffe Braunstein Entertainment ("The Memory Keeper's Daughter") and Vince Gerardis, Ralph Vicinanza and Eli Kirschner of Created By ("Jumper").
"This fits in with our bigger vision of wanting series that feel like cinematic one-hour movies," said Christina Wayne, senior vp original series and miniseries at AMC. "We're always looking for big genres but to do them in slightly different ways so they feel fresh and new," she added, noting as examples the network's Western mini "Broken Trail" and crime-themed series "Breaking Bad."
Jeremy Elice, vp original programming series, added that the project will be character-driven. "It's not the spectacle of sci-fi that you typically see," he said.
AMC has another great project in the works: the remake of the 1960s classic, The Prisoner. The Prisoner stars Jim Caviezel and Ian McKellen. Ian McKellan is great. But....Jim Caviezel? The guy that freaked out when he had to shoot a love scene with Jennifer Lopez because of his strict religious beliefs? That's going to take some work on his part. Because Patrick McGoohan was awesome in the role.Perhaps he's loosened up a bit since then. And it's not like The Prisoner had a lot of love scenes, anyway. Lots of bit white bubbles chasing the hero, but not much romance. In any event, AMC has our attention.
Science fiction author and poet Thomas M. Disch is dead, reportedly by suicide. Disch is best known for his novella, The Brave Little Toaster and his SF novels, such as Camp Concentration. He was 68
You may know his best-known work, the novella The Brave Little Toaster, which was adapted to film as the acclaimed 1987 Disney cartoon. But Disch also wrote ten science fiction novels and scores of short stories that placed him at the center of the genre for their uncommon literary adroitness, dry wit and clear-eyed skepticism. Go read the lyrically beautiful On Wings Of Song (1979) immediately, please.
Disch's primary calling, however, was as a poet. He published a half-dozen collections characterized by a mastery of poetic forms, and in 1995 published a collection of essays, The Castle of Indolence: On Poetry, Poets, and Poetasters, that was positively inspirational in its glowing appreciation and ruthless criticism of what he considered the best and worst tendencies in modern poetry. I kept it on my bedside table for periodic rereading and inspiration.
The American Film Institute announced the top ten greatest genre movies of all time. The Science Fiction list has some notable omissions.
#1 2001: A Space Odyssey
#2 Star Wars: Episode IV - A New Hope
#3 E.T. - The Extra Terrestrial
#4 A Clockwork Orange
#5 The Day the Earth Stood Still
#6 Blade Runner
#7 Alien
#8 Terminator 2: Judgment Day
#9 Invasion of the Body Snatchers
#10 Back to the Future
Star Wars: Episode IV - A New Hope is a classic that began the Star Wars series. But really, The Empire Strikes Back should be on the list. And we're sorry, but E.T. is not one of the best science fiction films of all time -- not by a long shot. What about Planet of the Apes? And The Matrix (the first one)? The list needs some changes.
Sci Fi Channel announced
the dates for its summer premieres.
The new third season of Scare Tactics kicks off July 9 at 10 p.m. ET/PT with two back-to-back episodes. New host Tracy Morgan (NBC's 30 Rock) joins the show.
Before that, Ghost Hunters International returns with seven new episodes beginning July 9 at 9 p.m. ET/PT.
Stargate Atlantis's 20-episode fifth season begins July 11 at 10 p.m. The new season introduces a powerful new race and will feature the show's 100th episode. Robert Picardo joins the regular cast as Richard Woolsey, and fan favorite Paul McGillion returns for five episodes as Dr. Carson Beckett. Amanda Tapping (Col. Samantha Carter) and Stargate SG-1 star Michael Shanks (Daniel Jackson) will also appear as special guest stars this season.
Eureka's third season premieres July 29 at 9 p.m. Season three delves deeper into the classified inner workings of Global Dynamics and will feature new characters, including Eva Thorne, aka "The Fixer" (Frances Fisher), whose mission is to clean up Global Dynamics.
We're most looking forward to the return of Stargate Atlantis and Eureka, although Ghost Hunters is growing on us now that they've gone international.
Academics See HAL, Replicants and Space Viruses in Mankind's Future
British academics have rated Stanley Kubrick's 2001: A Space Odyssey as the science fiction film that most realistically portrays man's future reports Wales News.
The pioneering 1968 film, an adaptation of a screenplay by Arthur C Clarke, deals with questions about the evolution of mankind, and the nature of artificial intelligence - epitomised by the supercomputer HAL 9000.
The group of scientists, including representatives from Cardiff University and the University of Glamorgan, alongside contemporaries from Oxford and King's College London, judged that the cult sci-fi film featured the most plausible view of scientific progress.
Artificially intelligent super computers with the power to conspire against people, such as HAL, were considered the science fiction imagining most likely to become a reality.
Mark Brake, professor of Science Communication at the University of Glamorgan, said: "2001 raised science fiction cinema to a new level. The unfolding four-million-year filmic story brilliantly portrays Arthur C Clarke's disturbing man-machine encounter with HAL a computer turned murderer.
"This unsettling scenario is not something we would ever want to imagine happening in reality, but it is not beyond the realms of possibility that artificial intelligence could turn on its creators."
The article says Ridley Scott's Blade Runner film starring Harrison Ford was ranked second in the study. Following that was the 1971 version of Michael Crichton's The Andromeda Strain. A remake of this film was just released as a mini-series on A&E - it will also be available on DVD on June 3rd.
Doris Lessing Says Winning Noble was a Bloody Disaster
Eighty-eight year old science fiction author Doris Lessing says winning the Nobel Prize for Literature was a "bloody disaster." Apparently, she doesn't have time to write.
Nobel literature prize winner Doris Lessing says she is unlikely to write a new full-length novel, according to excerpts of an interview released Sunday.
In extracts of a British Broadcasting Corp. interview, Lessing said that winning the prestigious prize had been "a bloody disaster."
The 88-year-old author said she no longer has the energy to take on writing a full novel, blaming constant media demands.
"All I do is give interviews and spend time being photographed," Lessing was quoted as saying in the radio interview, which will be broadcast Monday.
Lessing -- the author of more than 50 novels, volumes of short stories, memoirs and plays -- was named the 2007 Nobel Literature laureate in October. The Swedish Academy, which awards the prize, praised her "skepticism, fire and visionary power."
Lessing was born in Persia -- now Iran -- and raised in Rhodesia, now known as Zimbabwe. Her most influential book is considered to be "The Golden Notebook," published in 1962 and regarded as a feminist classic.
But Lessing, the 11th woman to win the Nobel Prize for literature in its 106-year history, said she is now finding it difficult to write.
"It has stopped; I don't have any energy any more," she was quoted as saying.
"This is why I keep telling anyone younger than me, don't imagine you'll have it forever," she said, according to the BBC. "Use it while you've got it because it'll go. It's sliding away like water down a plughole."
Ah, Doris: as irascible as ever. Surely the Nobel committee knew she'd be like this if she won? No doubt the media frenzy will eventually die down and she can get back to writing.
It looks like a new novel by Robert A. Heinlein novel is going to be published.
While going through the archives of Wilson "Bob" Tucker, writers Michael Z. Williamson and Brad Linaweaver found an as-yet unpublished Heinlein novel.
"It turns out Heinlein and Tucker were at dinner one night during MidAmeriCon [the 1976 Worldcon in Kansas City]", Linaweaver said. "Bob (Tucker) made notes of their conversation on three napkins."
The napkins are currently being analyzed for impressions and other marks, and to clarify part of the text blurred by a coffee stain.
"It looked like 'Time for the Pie,'" Williamson said. "But we knew that was wrong. My guess is that it's, 'Time for the Pie in the Sky,' based on a reference he made frequently. Brad thinks it's 'Time for the Pied Piper,' hearkening back to one of his earlier stories."
Since the notes were not in Heinlein's archives, and since Tucker had no legal claim to Heinlein's intellectual property, the ideas were free for the finding. They could be developed in any direction desired.
"As a formality, we're currently in negotiations with the Heinlein estate," Linaweaver said. "We're looking to do something different with this valuable find, and actually write it the way Heinlein would have."
Just because an author is dead doesn't mean he can't still publish books. The question remains, however: is it really a good idea to do so? The book is due out in the next two years.
NBC unveiled its upcoming television schedule and it's quite heavy with SF/Fantasy elements, which certainly works for us. Here's what's coming:
Debuting on May 29:
Fear Itself. The show, a horror anthology series from the makers of Masters of Horror, will feature such stars as John Billingsley and Shiri Appleby and showcase the talents of directors including Brad Anderson, Mary Harron, Ernest Dickerson, Ronny Yu, John Carpenter and Stuart Gordon.
Shows on the fall 2008-'09 schedule:
Chuck, airing Mondays at 8 p.m. ET/PT.
Heroes, airing Mondays at 9 p.m.
My Own Worst Enemy, airing Mondays at 10 p.m. Christian Slater makes his television series debut as Henry Spivey, an efficiency expert and married father of two who learns that he has an alter ego named Edward Albright, an operative who speaks numerous languages and can kill with his teeth. The network is touting it as "Jekyll and Hyde meets Jason Bourne." Heroes veteran David Semel directed the pilot and will stay on as executive producer.
Knight Rider, airing Wednesdays at 8 p.m. NBC scored a hit with a two-hour backdoor pilot movie that aired in February, and the series picks up where the movie left off. K.I.T.T., the supercar with a mind of its own, returns, as do stars Justin Bruening, Deanna Russo, Sydney Tamiia Poitier and Bruce Davison.
Shows debuting in winter 2009:
Merlin, airing Sundays at 8 p.m. A fantasy series set in Camelot but inspired by 21st-century storytelling, Merlin stars Colin Morgan (Doctor Who) as the title character and Bradley James as Arthur, and it explores the characters' lives before they became legends. Co-stars include Anthony Head (Buffy the Vampire Slayer), Richard Wilson and Angel Coulby.
Kings, airing Sundays at 10. A modern-day spin on the King David tale, the show stars Christopher Egan as David and Ian McShane as the king. Michael Green (Heroes) penned the pilot and will executive-produce. I Am Legend helmer Francis Lawrence directed the pilot and will executive-produce the series as well.
Series debuting in summer 2009:
The Listener, airing Thursdays at 10 p.m. Toby Logan (Craig Olejinik of Thirteen Ghosts) is a 24-year-old paramedic and telepath who's always ignored his ability to hear people's thoughts ... until now. Having changed his mind, he uses his unique gift to help others.
Miniseries debuting in 2009:
The Last Templar. In this four-hour miniseries, four horsemen dressed as knights crash the New York Metropolitan Museum during the opening of an exhibition of Vatican treasures and swipe an arcane medieval decoder, thereby sending an archaeologist (Mira Sorvino) and an FBI agent (Scott Foley) on a wild chase for the secrets of the Knights Templar. Co-stars include Victor Garber and Omar Sharif.
We recently read the book, The Last Templar: we liked it and it should make a great miniseries. Plus -- Victor Garber from Alias! Well, and of Eli Stone. And Mira Sorvino, too. That works quite well.
In addition to the new shows, there will also be new webisodes
for Heroes, Chuck and The Office, which will debut on NBC.com beginning in July. Additional chapters of webisodes for each show will roll out throughout the season.
Discover Magazine lists
20 Things You Didn't Know About Science Fiction. Here's a snippet:
1 Arguably the inspiration for much science fiction traces back to classical mythology. Think of it-Earthlings abducted by beings from the sky, humans morphing into strange creatures, and events that defy the laws of nature.
2 Birth of the (un)cool: In 1926 writer Hugo Gernsback founded Amazing Stories, the first true science-fiction magazine.
3 Gernsback loved greenbacks. He tried to trademark the term science fiction, and he paid writers so little that H. P. Lovecraft later nicknamed him "Hugo the Rat."
4 Rat's revenge: The most famous sci-fi writing award is called the Hugo.
5 Writers for the early pulp magazines would often write under multiple pseudonyms so they could have more than one article per issue. Ray Bradbury-taking this practice to another level-used six different pen names.
6 Serious science-fiction heads say sci-fi carries schlocky, B-movie connotations. Many prefer the abbreviation SF.
7 Prominent physicists and space travel pioneers have (often secretly) contributed to SF lit. German rocket genius Wernher Von Braun wrote space fiction and was an adviser to sci-fi movies such as Conquest of Space.
Actually, book editors will tell you that the term "SF" means "Speculative Fiction" which denotes a more serious or even literary science fiction. Cyberpunk is a subgenre of SF, for example. Sci Fi is used to denote space opera, like Star Trek or Star Wars. But it's true that some fans use the term "Sci Fi" to refer to anything in the genre and others use it to refer to B movies. When in doubt, say "SF" so as not to offend an author you might meet at a convention. Hope that clears things up.
The year begins on Jan. 18 with Cloverfield, the mysterious monster movie from producer J.J. Abrams.
On Feb. 15, The Spiderwick Chronicles debuts, a family fantasy based on the children's books.
The horror film The Ruins, based on the book, opens April 11.
Jon Favreau's hotly anticipated Iron Man, the hit of last year's Comic-Con, unspools on May 2.
May 22 brings the long-awaited Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, reuniting director Steven Spielberg and star Harrison Ford.
The animated spoof Kung Fu Panda premieres on June 6. Sept. 26 brings the family fantasy Nowhereland, and the supernatural comedy Ghost Town, starring Ricky Gervais, awaits a fall release date.
The animated sequel film Madagascar: The Crate Escape opens on Nov. 7.
Thanksgiving brings the classic fantasy film The Curious Case of Benjamin Button (Nov. 26), and Christmas Day marks the premiere of Abrams' new Star Trek.
The writers' strike is still going strong, which means no scripts can be revised until the strike is over and no new films can move forward. That means the SF slate for 2009 is going to be absolutely dismal unless the studios come to their senses and cut a fair deal for the writers.
The Nobel Prize for Literature: A Victory For Science Fiction
M.G. Lord, author of Astro Turf: The Private Life of Rocket Sciencecelebrates
the fact that a science fiction author, Doris Lessing, just won the Nobel Prize for Literature.
When Doris Lessing won the Nobel Prize for literature last week, my first thought was: What a victory for science fiction!
In 1979, three decades after her first novel, "The Grass Is Singing," and 17 years after the release of her landmark "The Golden Notebook," Lessing published "Re: Colonised Planet 5, Shikasta." It was the first book in a five-volume outer-space fantasy, "Canopus in Argos: Archives," that aggressively broke with naturalism.
Today, such a novel would be no big deal; literature is full of time travel, gender ambiguity and that nifty catch-all "magical realism." But in the 1970s, mainstream fiction took pains to set itself apart -- and above -- genres like science fiction. "Shikasta" was met with jeers.
"At best, Lessing's prose is stolid and slow and a bit flat-footed," Gore Vidal wrote in the New York Review of Books. Writing three years later about the fourth novel in the sequence, "The Making of the Representative for Planet 8," the New York Times' John Leonard was blunter. "Why does Doris Lessing -- one of the half-dozen most interesting minds to have chosen to write fiction in English in this century -- insist on propagating books that confound and dismay her loyal readers? The answer: She intends to confound and dismay."
*****
Science fiction was messy. It tackled big themes: What makes us human? Are we alone in the universe? Does God exist, and if so, might she be vicious? It aspired to be epic, and an epic, as midcentury novelist Marguerite Young has aptly observed, must have "a vast undertow of music and momentum and theology."
"Shikasta" had all these things, and they contributed, I suspect, to the Nobel committee's recognition of Lessing as an "epicist of the female experience." The book was a reworking of the Bible -- casting the forces of good and evil as warring aliens.
The planet Shikasta, where the action took place, bore similarities to Earth. In "The Marriages Between Zones Three, Four and Five," the second volume in the series, Lessing used this mythic structure to revisit ground she had broken in her earlier, realistic novels: the tumultuous relationship between men and women.
Doris Lessing, at 88, is the oldest person to win the Nobel Prize for Literature. You can find out more about Doris and her work here.
Professor Says Hollywood Movies are Ruining Science For Students
A UCF professor says
that all the inaccurate physics in movies is actually hurting students' understanding of science.
Movies such as Spiderman 2 and Speed generate excitement among audiences with their cool special effects. But they also defy the laws of physics, contributing to students’ ignorance about science.
Two University of Central Florida professors show just how poorly Hollywood writers and directors understand science in an article published in the German journal "Praxis der Naturwissenschaften Physik." Common sense may indicate that people should know the stunts in movies are just make believe, but the professors say that's not necessarily true.
Some people really do believe a bus traveling 70 mph can clear a 50-foot gap in a freeway, as depicted in the movie Speed. And, if that were realistic, a ramp would be needed to adjust the direction of motion to even try to make the leap, said UCF professor Costas J. Efthimiou, who co-authored the article.
"Students come here, and they don't have any basic understanding of science," he said. "Sure, people say everyone knows the movies are not real, but my experience is many of the students believe what they see on the screen."
And that's not just a UCF problem. Efthimiou said students across the United States seem to have the same challenge with science. It starts young.
The Science and Engineering Indicators 2006 report seems to support his observations. The report shows that the average science scores among 12th graders in the U.S. dropped from the previous year. The scores remained stagnant in the fourth and eighth grades. Worse, only about one-third of all students tested were proficient, meaning they had a solid understanding of what they should know.
Is the professor trying to say that the big freeway chase in Die Hard 3 where Bruce Willis driving a huge truck on an elevated freeway while being chased by fighter plane wasn't perfectly plausible? Because we beg to differ. That happened to us just the other day in L.A.
Seriously, though, we do think more science should be taught in schools, along with math. That's why we love the show Numb3rs -- math is cool, people. And speaking of Numb3rs, season 3 premieres Friday, September 28th, 2007 on CBS.
Sunshine Director Danny Boyle Talks Science Fiction
In this video Danny Boyle, the director of the recently released film Sunshine, discusses the science fiction genre and the difficulties of science fiction conventions with Kurt Loder. Sunshine takes place fifty years from now. Our Sun is failing and a vital mission has been sent to explode a bomb inside the Sun to try and reignite it. A couple other interesting Sunshine videos include this video that shows the filmmakers simulating the experience of Zero G and this more horrific video that shows the deaths of each crew member of the Icarus II.
The year begins on Jan. 18 with Cloverfield, the mysterious monster movie from producer J.J. Abrams.
On Feb. 15, The Spiderwick Chronicles debuts, a family fantasy based on the children's books.
The horror film The Ruins, based on the book, opens April 11.
Jon Favreau's hotly anticipated Iron Man, the hit of last year's Comic-Con, unspools on May 2.
May 22 brings the long-awaited Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, reuniting director Steven Spielberg and star Harrison Ford.
The animated spoof Kung Fu Panda premieres on June 6. Sept. 26 brings the family fantasy Nowhereland, and the supernatural comedy Ghost Town, starring Ricky Gervais, awaits a fall release date.
The animated sequel film Madagascar: The Crate Escape opens on Nov. 7.
Thanksgiving brings the classic fantasy film The Curious Case of Benjamin Button (Nov. 26), and Christmas Day marks the premiere of Abrams' new Star Trek.
The writers' strike is still going strong, which means no scripts can be revised until the strike is over and no new films can move forward. That means the SF slate for 2009 is going to be absolutely dismal unless the studios come to their senses and cut a fair deal for the writers.
British academics have rated Stanley Kubrick's 2001: A Space Odyssey as the science fiction film that most realistically portrays man's future reports Wales News.
