Interstellar

[Deepfake]

SD and I saw this for her birthday. It was really well done and a very solid production overall, wonky sci-fi science and logic aside it made bold strides forward based on high-level scientific concepts. Any film that's concerned with relativistic travel is bound to be something special in my book. Very thrilling, lots of tension. It's definitely Nolan though, so don't see it in the theater if the over-used bass causes you stress.

[United Nations]

I saw this the Tuesday before it came out and I loved it. It's a beautiful film. It's nice to see a good science fiction movie out there. It wasn't perfect. It can be really cheesy at some points, but overall I thought it explored a lot of relevant topics really well.

[Deepfake]

[QUOTE="UNthankful, post: 1501455, member: 31164"]I saw this the Tuesday before it came out and I loved it. It's a beautiful film. It's nice to see a good science fiction movie out there. It wasn't perfect. It can be really cheesy at some points, but overall I thought it explored a lot of relevant topics really well.[/QUOTE]
[spoiler]The best part was Matt Damon. He almost ruined the film, his screen presence is so strong. Second place goes to TARS.[/spoiler]

[United Nations]

[QUOTE="NOTHING MOVES THE BLOB, post: 1501560, member: 25415"][spoiler]The best part was Matt Damon. He almost ruined the film, his screen presence is so strong. Second place goes to TARS.[/spoiler][/QUOTE]
I don't know what you're talking about. Obviously [spoiler] Topher Grace [/spoiler] is what made that movie.

[Kargath]

An interesting (if spoilery) look at the film. http://www.steynonline.com/6665/interstellar
I haven't seen it myself, so I don't know if Steyn's stretching or not.

[Deku Tree]

I enjoyed the movie. I like a big budget movie that goes a little science teacher here and there. I've been reading more about black holes since. Trying to learn more than the handful of usual facts you see on any tv special that discusses them.

[Saria Dragon of the Rain Wilds]

We always need more science fiction that takes itself seriously, despite its very fictional elements.

[ScottyMcGee]

I loved it. I had one big question though.
[SPOILER]Why not just colonize Mars? I get that this future put down space travel in favor of environmentalism but still. It felt too unrealistic and unreasonable to forget about colonizing and terraforming Mars. Besides, since the society turned to a more farm-based culture, they could have applied that to terraforming. Micro biology today can do some really crazy sh*t that can make this possible in the not too distant future.[/SPOILER]

[CaptHayfever]

^
[spoiler]The Martian atmosphere is inhospitable, too thin & full of dust--in that way it's actually kinda similar to the Earth atmosphere they're trying to escape. Everyone would have to stay indoors or wear spacesuits constantly. Mars is also very cold & barren; the trace water we've found on Mars is either in the (small) ice cap or microscopic, not enough to sustain all of humanity for very long. Mars also has very little tectonic activity; it's slowly dying. All in all, colonizing Mars would be like colonizing Dr. Mann's planet: Doable for academic purposes, but not sustainable for any large population.[/spoiler]

And remember, "I'm-a Luigi, number one!"

[ScottyMcGee]

[QUOTE="CaptHayfever, post: 1502536, member: 25169"]^
[spoiler]The Martian atmosphere is inhospitable, too thin & full of dust--in that way it's actually kinda similar to the Earth atmosphere they're trying to escape. Everyone would have to stay indoors or wear spacesuits constantly. Mars is also very cold & barren; the trace water we've found on Mars is either in the (small) ice cap or microscopic, not enough to sustain all of humanity for very long. Mars also has very little tectonic activity; it's slowly dying. All in all, colonizing Mars would be like colonizing Dr. Mann's planet: Doable for academic purposes, but not sustainable for any large population.[/spoiler]
[/QUOTE]
[spoiler]But that's what terraforming would fix. It would MAKE Mars hospitable. You could alter the atmosphere by ways of creating atmospheric factories, venting necessary gases into the air. You could also, alternatively, literally influence asteroids to crash on Mars via space lasers and the impacts create more heat. The concept of terraforming Mars is to really almost like reboot the entire system to make it work for you.
Also alternatively, although the blight issue was vaguely explained, why not just use Mars to grow crops and then import them to Earth? Did they say that the entire Earth was ultimately going to be inhospitable in terms of atmosphere too or just becaues they couldn't grow food?
[/spoiler]

[Deepfake]

^ If they could actually terraform whatever planet they want, they wouldn't need to leave Earth. Plants dying off means no breathable air, anyway.

[ScottyMcGee]

[QUOTE="The human version of rat poison, post: 1502703, member: 25415"]^ If they could actually terraform whatever planet they want, they wouldn't need to leave Earth. Plants dying off means no breathable air, anyway.[/QUOTE]
[spoiler]Well, yeah, that's kind of my point. In the end, I felt like doing all this for the sake of food wasn't compelling to me because there are tons of alternate, less complicated solutions. The more I think about it, the more I realize that advances in biology could solve this problem too. We are going to enter a world where we can create synthetic bacteria and make houses out of them by literally "growing houses." That and nanobots help. Whatever the reason, the soil being infertile or some plant virus going around, advances in microbiology and molecular genetics will most likely solve it. I don't see running out of food as an actual realistic scenario for humanity dying out. Previous sci-fi films like Soylent Green addressed that but now I think the issue is kind of moot; we don't really have to worry about it anymore. You'd have to have a worldly society that completely disregards almost all biology in order for food to run out to be an issue.

I'd be more compelled if the reason was due to some new pandemic/biological warfare gone out of control. However, that wouldn't have created the farming society I think Nolan wanted to bring out. I can assume he/the producers/whomever wanted to make a point about our current society forgetting about space exploration. [/spoiler]