Summer SciFi Thread

[ReindeerThistle]

"I thought we agreed on total body prosthesis... now, lose the arm!"
-- Bob Morton, Security Concepts

 

[Glassfan]

Transcendence

Currently playing.

Directed by Wally Pfister
Johnny Depp
Morgan Freeman
Rebecca Hall
Kate Mara
Cillian Murphy
Cole Hauser
Paul Bettany

Sci-Fi Thriller. Dr. Will Caster (Johnny Depp) is the foremost researcher in the field of Artificial Intelligence, working to create a sentient machine that combines the collective intelligence of everything ever known with the full range of human emotions. His highly controversial experiments have made him famous, but they have also made him the prime target of anti-technology extremists who will do whatever it takes to stop him. However, in their attempt to destroy Will, they inadvertently become the catalyst for him to succeed-to be a participant in his own transcendence. For his wife Evelyn (Rebecca Hall) and best friend Max Waters (Paul Bettany), both fellow researchers, the question is not if they can...but if they should. Their worst fears are realized as Will's thirst for knowledge evolves into a seemingly omnipresent quest for power, to what end is unknown. The only thing that is becoming terrifyingly clear is there may be no way to stop him.

YouTube trailer

Featurette

 

[Kyriakos]

I heard it did not get good critiques or positive audience response.
Got to say that it is pretty dumb to have the premise be that only "anti-technology extremists" would find such experiments a bad idea. But then again the rest of the premise is already dumb in my view.
Suspension of disbelief becomes very hard, moreso when:

(Johnny Depp) is the foremost researcher in the field of Artificial Intelligence

 

[Glassfan]

There's a scene in the Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles where she considers the Manhattan Project scientists. What were they thinking? Did they consider the consequences of their actions?

I sometimes have the same questions when I read about AI researchers and their progress today. Do they know what they're doing? Will AI be a threat or a boon to mankind? I don't know...

 

[Glassfan]

Captain America: The Winter Soldier

Now playing

Directed by Anthony and Joe Russo
Chris Evans
Scarlett Johansson
Sebastian Stan
Anthony Mackie
Cobie Smulders
Frank Grillo
Emily VanCamp
Hayley Atwell
Robert Redford
Samuel L. Jackson

After the cataclysmic events in New York with The Avengers, Marvels Captain America: The Winter Soldier finds Steve Rogers, a.k.a. Captain America, living quietly in Washington, D.C., and trying to adjust to the modern world. But when a S.H.I.E.L.D. colleague comes under attack, Steve becomes embroiled in a web of intrigue that threatens to put the world at risk. Joining forces with the Black Widow, Captain America struggles to expose the ever-widening conspiracy while fighting off professional assassins sent to silence him at every turn. When the full scope of the villainous plot is revealed, Captain America and the Black Widow enlist the help of a new ally, the Falcon. However, they soon find themselves up against an unexpected and formidable enemy the Winter Soldier.

YouTube trailer

Extended clip

Spoiler :

Is it just me, or is that SHIELD Helocarrier crazy vulnerable?

 

[Kyriakos]

^Hmm:

Honest review, before a review

 

[Kyriakos]

A better Godzilla trailer:


Link to video.

 

[Terxpahseyton]

^Hmm:

Honest review, before a review

great find

 

[timtofly]

A better Godzilla trailer:

Yes, I enjoy movies that preach global warming and show the oceans overflowing their banks.

 

[Glassfan]

Divergent

Now playing

Directed by Neil Burger
Shailene Woodley
Theo James
Ashley Judd
Ansel Elgort
Jai Courtney
Ray Stevenson
Zoë Kravitz
Miles Teller
Tony Goldwyn
Kate Winslet
Maggie Q

DIVERGENT is a thrilling action-adventure film set in a world where people are divided into distinct factions based on human virtues. Tris Prior (Shailene Woodley) is warned she is Divergent and will never fit into any one group. When she discovers a conspiracy by a faction leader (Kate Winslet) to destroy all Divergents, Tris must learn to trust in the mysterious Four (Theo James) and together they must find out what makes being Divergent so dangerous before it's too late. Based on the best-selling book series by Veronica Roth.

Youtube trailer

 

[Terxpahseyton]

Was destroyed by some house critics.

 

[Kyriakos]

Re Godzilla, at least the scene with the dropping F-16s (i suppose some sort of electrical field/power-control the monsters have?) looks reasonably cool

That said, the winged monster looked smallish from one of the scenes, so i am not sure how it could take on Godzilla.

 

[ReindeerThistle]

Divergent

Now playing

Directed byNeil Burger
Shailene Woodley
Theo James
Ashley Judd
Ansel Elgort
Jai Courtney
Ray Stevenson
Zoë Kravitz
Miles Teller
Tony Goldwyn
Kate Winslet
Maggie Q

DIVERGENT is a thrilling action-adventure film set in a world where people are divided into distinct factions based on human virtues. Tris Prior (Shailene Woodley) is warned she is Divergent and will never fit into any one group. When she discovers a conspiracy by a faction leader (Kate Winslet) to destroy all Divergents, Tris must learn to trust in the mysterious Four (Theo James) and together they must find out what makes being Divergent so dangerous before it's too late. Based on the best-selling book series by Veronica Roth.

Youtube trailer

It was dull, contrived, derivative and altogether unbelievable. The Hunger Games, for all its faults, was better!

I deleted the ebooks as soon as I saw the film.

 

[Serutan]

There's a scene in the Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles where she considers the Manhattan Project scientists. What were they thinking? Did they consider the consequences of their actions?

I sometimes have the same questions when I read about AI researchers and their progress today. Do they know what they're doing? Will AI be a threat or a boon to mankind? I don't know...

I doubt there will be AI until we understand how natural intelligence works well
enough to duplicate it. Sort of like how a working airplane wasn't built until the
physics/mechanics of bird flight were understood.

 

[Glassfan]

I doubt there will be AI until we understand how natural intelligence works well
enough to duplicate it. Sort of like how a working airplane wasn't built until the
physics/mechanics of bird flight were understood.

Respectfully disagree. AI is being researched by computer scientists - not by psychologists or biologists. They're designing increasingly more powerfull computer entities with little regard to it's resemblence to human intelligence. Eventually, some machine will become self-aware, but it will posses machine intelligence, not organic.

Spoiler :

...creating the potential problem of two, entirely different intelligences competing for the dwindling resources of the planet.

And I've never heard that Orville or Wilber were bird-watchers. The early attempts by some inventors to strap-on bird wings were zany failures. The Wrights broke with nature and assembled a machine - engine, props and fixed airfoils to conquor the air.

 

[Loppan Torkel]

I thought there was a fair bit of overlap in AI research. Creating increasingly powerful computers isn't something that with any certainty will lead to AI, is it?! It perhaps may, but the other, brain resembling route might be quicker.

 

[Glassfan]

The Amazing Spider-Man 2
The Amazing Spider-Man 2: Rise of Electro (in some markets)

Openning today

Directed by Marc Webb
Andrew Garfield
Emma Stone
Jamie Foxx
Dane DeHaan
Colm Feore
Felicity Jones
Campbell Scott
Embeth Davidtz
Paul Giamatti
Sally Field
Music by Hans Zimmer

We've always known that Spider-Man's most important battle has been within himself: the struggle between the ordinary obligations of Peter Parker and the extraordinary responsibilities of Spider-Man. But in The Amazing Spider-Man 2, Peter Parker finds that a greater conflict lies ahead; only Spider-Man can protect his fellow New Yorkers from the formidable villains that threaten the city. With the emergence of Electro (Jamie Foxx), Peter must confront a foe far more powerful than he. And as his old friend, Harry Osborn (Dane DeHaan), returns, Peter comes to realize that all of his enemies have one thing in common: OsCorp.

Trailer

 

[Glassfan]

Godzilla

May 16th, 2014.

Directed by Gareth Edwards (Monsters 2010)
Aaron Taylor-Johnson
Ken Watanabe
Elizabeth Olsen
Juliette Binoche
Sally Hawkins
David Strathairn
Bryan Cranston

In Summer 2014, the world's most revered monster is reborn as Warner Bros. Pictures and Legendary Pictures unleash the epic action adventure "Godzilla." From visionary new director Gareth Edwards ("Monsters") comes a powerful story of human courage and reconciliation in the face of titanic forces of nature, when the awe-inspiring Godzilla rises to restore balance as humanity stands defenseless.

Spoiler :

...hence, Rhodan? ("Let them fight." - Ken Watanabe.)

YouTube trailer

Another

And another

Some monsters

 

[El_Machinae]

So gonna see that.

 

[Kyriakos]

It does look a bit better than in the original trailer. I suppose i will also have to check it out The electric field (?) causing the F-16 to drop to the sea seems interesting too.

Besides, i like that actor (Watanabe).