Seems every week there’s another article out about people being Concerned over the possible dangers posed by artificial intelligence (AI for short). A lot of the tech people involved in developing it are asking for some government guidelines and regulation, Somehow, they can’t seem to slow down on their own. Can’t afford to let someone else get it first, you see.

The big worry is that somehow, any AI might determine that its goals are not in line with those of humans, and it will take over the world. The one movie that’s constantly referenced is The Terminator (1984), in which the military gave control of its weapons systems to something called “Skynet”, which became self-aware and turned against humanity. Some commenters might mention War Games (1983), where a supercomputer was given control of the US’ nuclear missiles and then, thanks to some glitches, thought that a simulation was a real attack…..

So far, though, I haven’t seen anyone mention what is probably the first of these “give a supercomputer control of the nukes” movies – the adaptation of D.F. Jones 1966 novel, Colossus: The Forbin Project. Continue reading →

It boggles the mind (well, mine at least) that it took nearly a century for one of the most important works in all of science fiction to be adapted for the big screen. Edgar Rice Burroughs’ “Barsoom” novels, starting with 1912’s A Princess of Mars, have influenced everything from Ray Bradbury’s “Martian Chronicles” to James Cameron’s Avatar. The novels have pretty much everything you’d want in a grand epic. Action, adventure, romance, and spectacle, all in an exotic (but still understandable) setting. Admittedly, depicting giant, four-armed, reptilian warriors on any screen would be a problem – but nothing that you can’t use an Artistic License to work around. Ordinary two-armed people in latex head masks will do fine.

That’s the method chosen by Asylum Pictures, the rulers of the “direct to DVD” domain, in their 2009 adaptation of the first of the novels. They must have gotten wind that Disney was going to throw megabucks at their own version, and figured “Anything you can do, we can do cheaper and faster.” With some $300,000 at their disposal, they set to work.

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It’s not your usual “get me to the church on time”. A team of demon fighters is racing through the streets, hot on the trail of….something unseen that is tearing up the pavement as it goes. Even a bunch of kids playing in the street isn’t going to stop them. Fortunately for the kids, the team has “portal guns” that open a sort of tunnel / gate that lets them pass through the space where the kids are playing.

You will note two things right off the bat.

Whatever it is ripping up the streets doesn’t bother taking shortcuts through / across lawns or even sidewalks. And the kids make no move at all to get out of the street when they hear something coming.

Well, at least they set the tone right away. And they got the stupidest bits taken care of at the start.

Anyway, they arrive too late to the wedding in the park to stop the Thing from attacking the wedding party and killing the groom. It almost kills the bride, but it turns out that she’s prepared. Thanks to a concealed blade (that looks like it would have cut her leg quite a bit as she walked around), she is able to fight and kill the Thing.

Turns out she – Summer Vale (Brigitte Kinglsey) – is a “warrior princess” whose mission is to kill demons who sneak over into our realm. And there’s been a surge in demonic activity lately. Can she and her team find out the reason behind it – and save the world?

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It is pretty much agreed that the Star Wars prequel trilogy was….. well, “Not Good”. Admittedly, it’s not easy to tell a story when the ending is predetermined. But one shouldn’t need three whole movies to tell how Anakin Skywalker became Darth Vader. Quite a few fans took it upon themselves to edit the trilogy (removing the boring or tasteless parts (i.e. Jar-Jar Binks)) into a single, more “streamlined” film.

These fans pretty much succeeded in creating films that are faithful to the Star Wars universe, and tell the story rather well. It’s essentially a Grand Tragedy, how a young Jedi filled with promise was turned to the Dark Side.

The team at Film Addicted went a bit further. What if you not only condensed the story, but changed the tone?

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Get your mind out of the gutter. This is NOT some sort of soft-core porn “nudie cutie”. It’s a “made for TV” play that aired on the BBC’s “Theater 625” drama anthology series, so other than a hint of some passing nudity in one scene, there’s nothing that could be considered lascivious.

It just happens to be set in the Year of the Sex Olympics. We’re not given any clue as to what a “sex Olympics” might entail. But what we do know is that the teleplay takes place in a not too distant overpopulated future, where everyone is effectively divided into the “hi-drives” (the leaders, movers and shakers, the “One Percent”) and the “lo-drives” (the plebians, the workers, the unwashed masses). The lo-drives are fed a nearly constant stream of lowest-common-denominator entertainment to keep them in line.

There are some who dissent, and some of the hi-drives are worried that their usual methods of keeping the lo-drives sated and content aren’t working anymore. Coordinator Ugo Priest (Leonard Rossiter) has a plan to try the broadest of physical comedy – a pie fight – in the hopes of getting people to laugh. It fails completely. When the accidental death of a protester on the set during a live “introduction” of some of the year’s sex Olympians causes the viewing audience to break out laughing, director Nat Mender (Tony Vogel) gets an idea. Continue reading →