Tag: retro futurism

Retro SF Movies that Everybody Should See

On By Dan HarrisIn Sci-Fi and Fantasy4 Comments

More retro-futurism stuff from io9 here.

There are some classics in here, and real favourites of mine. Moon was fantastic, minimalist and claustrophobic with a nice turn in growing tension. Dark City was brilliant as well, one of those cult classics that not enough people have seen.

I was a little surprised to see The Truman Show in the list, but it makes perfect sense – the combination of the cliché of suburban white picket fence America with Big Brother-style hi-tech surveillance absolutely makes it retro SF.

But I’m sorry – Flash Gordon was terrible, though.

Retro Futurism

On By Dan HarrisIn Sci-Fi and Fantasy, WritingLeave a comment

Nice post on io9 here.

I’m drawn to the Anachronista category – the others don’t do a lot for me. I’m no good at history so hardly qualified to suggest alternates. Cheese is . . . well, cheesy. And I think there are enough people writing steampunk – the best example of it, China Mieville’s work, doesn’t even get called it because it’s so much more as well.

But anachronista, that I could do. The next book I’ve got planned is somewhat tinged with this – it’s a Chandler-style detective noir, but set in the same technologically advanced far-future universe of my current WIP.

It wouldn’t quite fit the anachronista mould the io9 article talks about, as it’ll be stylistically redolent of 1930s/40s/50s pulp crime lit, rather than actually containing any technology that you might have found back then. But still – that’s one of the things I love about SF, the scope to combine it with another genre entirely and come up with an interesting hybrid. I’m looking forward to writing it.