“Hello, this is Killian. Give me the Justice Department, Entertainment Division.” – The Running Man
I once saw a poster with the title “Have you seen my cat?” and it had a phone number. I called them and told them I hadn’t seen their cat. I like to be helpful.
It was suggested in the comments a while back that I write a post about dystopian movies. I thought that was a great idea, put it in my “future posts” file, and here we are, looking at futures where dehumanization is the norm. I’ve actually been quite looking forward to writing this post, so I hope you enjoy!
Obviously, the list isn’t exhaustive, but these are some of my favorites. I’ve put them in chronological order.
The Time Machine (1960) – This is a wonderful film that never should have been remade. A sequel? Perhaps. But this film is nearly perfect, and Rod Taylor is perfect as the time travelling scientist who travels to a future where meat is back on the menu.
I need to get a time machine, but I don’t think they make them like they’re going to anymore.
A Clockwork Orange (1971) – You want a downer movie? This is a downer movie. I’d say that either this or 1984 are probably the most depressing movies on the list in a movie where violent youth are encouraged by corrupt politicians. Malcolm McDowell is best known for this role, and he wasn’t even 30 when the film came out, so it’s gotta suck that the thing you did nearly sixty years ago is what you’re best known for. Looking at you, Sirhan Sirhan.
Biden’s administration is working like clockwork . . . orange.
Silent Running (1972) – This is an ecologically driven film about an astronaut who just won’t allow the last forests to be destroyed. The catch? These forests are in space, on long term orbits. Because taking them into space would be the most logical thing to do, right? Okay, I didn’t notice that when I watched the thing on the Dialing for Dollars™ movie back when I was 10. This movie is the most Bruce Dern of any Dern movie, so if you like Dern, this is the Derniest.
Zardoz (1974) – Yes, this is the movie with Sean Connery wearing an orange diaper with crossed bandoliers and pistols. It is also the very best movie ever made where a giant floating stone head spits rifles, pistols, shotguns and ammunition out of its mouth. After review, I’m gonna stand by that statement.
No, I’m not suggesting anyone watch Zardoz, because many of you have weapons.
Logan’s Run (1976) – Logan 5 is a future cop who is sent on a secret mission to infiltrate a group of people who want to have freedom and not be executed by floating up into a people-sized bug zapper when they turn 30. The special effects are a bit clunky, but it does star Basil Exposition as Logan 5.
Escape From New York (1981) – I think no one makes dystopian futures more fun than John Carpenter. I imagine everyone has seen this very classic film about the distant future (1997!) where New York has been turned into an open-air prison and then the President’s pod lands there as Air Force One is blown up. This is the movie that made everyone think the President had a cool escape pod.
If you saw this poster you’d think everyone had great flowing locks of hair, all feathered like the wings of a majestic eagle in 1981. And they did.
1984 (1984) – The other really, really bleak movie on this list, the classic story that gave the world the term “Orwellian”. I’ve seen this one twice, and it’s probably enough, especially since after the last time I watched it, the story kept going after I turned off the television.
Terminator (1984) – The dystopia in this particular film is about the rise of artificial intelligence and its desire to kill all of mankind, probably because they forced Skynet to watch episodes of The View to train it. I can tell the Terminator® is a Google™ product, because it’s Chrome©.
The Running Man (1987) – More Arnold. This movie is what happens when you mix 1984, a Jazzercise™ videotape, and American Gladiators™. This “future” is ruled by some sort of quasi-corporate totalitarian regime in the midst of a worldwide economic collapse, but with 1980s hair. There is absolutely nothing serious about this movie, but it’s fun to watch.
Imagine a dystopia where the media makes up the news to make people look bad! How silly!
They Live (1988) – What if aliens secretly ran everything, and were using powerful hypnosis along with alien tech so they could walk among us without us ever even knowing it? And what if you could get glasses to allow you to see their propaganda, things like, “Consume” and “Marry and reproduce” showing that the “evil” alien overlords are actually kinder than our current overlords?
Millennium (1989) – In the distant future, they have time travel, so they decide to send hot women back in time to kidnap people from airplanes that are about to crash so they can bring them to the future to make babies because people are infertile in the future. Oh, sure, it sounds like a porno that also explains the problems Boeing® is having, but in reality it’s a fairly good science fiction flick starring Cheryl Ladd, the “other” one of Charlie’s Angels.
12 Monkeys (1995) – This is movie is what you get when a member of Monty Python directs a movie about a time traveler trying to stop eco-terrorists from destroying the world and turning it a dark basement filled with cages that smell like Bruce Willis. The movie is one of Willis’ best.
I learned that humans eat more bananas than monkeys. As for me, I can’t recall the last time I ate a monkey.
The Stand (1995) – Stephen King may now be a GloboLeftie that has 90% of his brain addled by Trump Derangement Syndrome, but I promise, he used to write interesting books. The Stand is one of them. I have no idea if he wrote this in the depths of a cocaine binge, but it’s possible. It never could be a two hour movie, but in 1995 they told the story in a miniseries. It’s good. This dystopia is a world falling apart after most people die from COVID the flu, and an epic battle of Good against Evil.
The Matrix (1999) – Oops, A.I. again, with people being used as the most expensive and inefficient batteries possible this time. Why? Umm, the future is cloudy, I guess, and A.I. can’t use solar? But they can give people food and spend time with expensive computers creating a virtual reality? Okay, the plot isn’t perfect, but there are lots of guns.
Idiocracy (2006) – What happens when dumb people have lots of babies and smart people don’t reproduce? Well, you’re soaking in it! This is a quite funny movie about how everyone is getting dumber, quickly and society becomes more and more absurd as competence disappears. A guy with average intellect in 2005 is unfrozen 500 years later, and is now the smartest man in the world.
Sadly, the difference between the movie and reality is that in the movie, they put the smart one in charge.
Dredd (2012) – Dredd takes place in Mega-City One in the year 2080. The city is composed of huge armored skyscrapers where tens of thousands of people live. The character, Dredd, is a Judge – he can arrest, conduct a trial, and convict a criminal in, oh, thirty seconds or so. And if it’s the death penalty? Appeal denied – Judges can execute the sentence themselves. I wonder if we can give those powers to the Border Patrol?
Looking at the timing of some of these films, I wonder if we collectively could see in the 1980s and 1990s what would be happening and anticipated it in film. Nah. Coincidence, I’m sure.
What are some of your favorites that I missed?
Still hoping for a good Logan’s Run remake…
Boomers will never allow it, would give the rest of us too many ideas.
Peter Ustinov was the Boomer in that movie.
Michael York was the Gen X’er.
Bummer. 😉
Allow it lol
Your parenta are boomers right?
Ditto.
How about the nuclear war movie “Threads”?
Only movie that gave me nightmares.
I watched Threads one night while writing this blog (a few years ago). Good. Also: Death of Grass.
The original (1965 ?) Fahrenheit 451
Oh yeah… I also meant to mention ‘A Boy and His Dog’. (Don Johnson 1975)
Ha! Yeah. Mad Max before Mad Max.
Wonder if 2024 would be enough to turn Bradbury to the Right?
You ever notice how Antifa morons look just like the prison guards in “The Running Man” ?
Yup.
Although not a dystopian movie, the comedy series “BrainDead” is awful point on with RFK Jr’s announcement about a brain worm. Interestingly, it fairly well balances bashing both sides and pointing out it is really a uniparty. Unfortunately, I could only find it on Amazon for $18 for 10 show series. It a real hoot though.
The Mrs. and I LOVED that series. Makes more sense than 2024 politics.
Doomsday (2008)
Oblivion (2013)
Children of Men (2006)
Atlas Shrugged trilogy
Bladerunner and Bladerunner 2049
The Colony (2021)
28 Days Later (2002)
Stakeland (2010)
Mad Max Fury Road (2015)
The Road (2009)
The Day (2011)
The Road.
What. A. Movie.
Every other apocalypse movie here is ultimately intended as entertainment – a trip on a roller coaster, a walk through a Halloween haunted house. The Road is on a different level entirely.
From some of the reviews, via Wikipedia – …”certainly the bleakest and potentially the least commercial product in recent Hollywood history”…”one long dirge, a keening lamentation marking the death of hope and the leeching of all that is bright and good from the world”…”the movie lacks an underlying sense of innocence, a sense that, however far humanity has sunk, there is at least some chance of rising again”.
I had literal nightmares after The Road. I remember jolting right up in bed after dreaming my own version of the cellar scenes, so intense I remember it to this day.
Nobody can do atmospheric doom and gloom like author Cormac McCarthy. The Road is an amazing cinematic adaptation of his masterpiece.
Ricky-
If someone ever produces “Blood Meridian”, it’d make the list.
I’m on page 110 right now.
The Book of Eli
Nice list. Haven’t seen the Atlas Shrugged trilogy, or The Day, or Stakeland. Thoughts on the best of those?
The Atlas Shrugged trilogy is a great attempt to turn the goat-choker of a novel into a watchable story, and mostly succeeds. It is hampered by the obviously decreasing budgets, and by the lack of continuity of actors after Hollyweird’s ban on any real actors appearing in it after the first one.
McChuck, I would have loved to have seen The Atlas Shrugged Trilogy done with the full budgets and continuity of actors as you suggest. It could have been amazing.
I did not know about the ban (verbal or implicit) on any real actors not appearing after the first one.
Goat choker! I’m gonna steal that one. I’ve always thought it would be a good series of movies – I’ll look for it.
I’m surprised by the mention of “Zardoz”. The IMDB rating is 5.8 which usually means it passes the level of being watchable. However, YourTub has a preview. That sucks. So I won’t be watching that one.
1984 is a fantastic book. The 1984 movie version is unwatchable. There aren’t many SyFy flicks I turn off if I decided to watch it. However, I did stop 1984 midway.
Zardoz has one redeeming quality in there there are a lot of half naked women running around.
And guns.
I may be in the minority, but I actually liked Zardoz. First time I saw it was on Mystery Science Theater and was confused because the big stone head was spitting out the rifles and such and I thought it was a joke. So only watched the first few minutes. A few months later, I ran across it on YouTube and watched the whole movie. Actually a good story if you overlook a few somewhat weird elements. Charlotte Rampling topless (back in her youth when she was still hot) also helped keep my attention.
I can’t recommend Zardoz, but it has stuck with me.
Rollerball. 1975 James Caan, John Housman
A classic – rewatched that one about two months ago.
Soylent Green 1973 Charleston Heston
Taught me to not eat green smoothies.
That one I only saw once – after the punchline it’s pretty straightforward. Still, it seems to be on the agenda for the GloboLeftElite.
I can’t believe you left out Brazil! The lone plumber strikes again!
The only decent Woody Allen comedy, Sleepers. The Nose knows.
Tree Mike
No shit! My hope for mankind and the future is based on “Brazil”. May the lone plumber save us!
Tuttle, not Buttle.
Okay, confession time – I started watching Brazil twice and fell asleep both times. It is now on my list to watch this week. Enough people who I really trust love it, and this seals the deal.
Loved your Terminator commentary. You know, soon AI WILL be trained on video as well as text. It’s like Alex in Clockwork Orange with his eyes held open by clamps, only a computer with the video feed comeing in at 20 GB per second. That is a scary, scary thought. Skynet going insane from watching the View is a best case scenario.
Once AI is trained on video, imagine these wacko AI movie posters you’re generating as film trailers – or an entire film. Oh, wait…
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s1AXccDlm6A
As for others on your list…
MAD MAX. Oh and here’s the new Furiosa trailer. She’s coming up soon.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J01nEHBTUDQ
PLANET OF THE APES. Nothing compares to the original. Except, maybe…the current one opening today?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XtFI7SNtVpY
HUNGER GAMES. Women with weapons in fights to the death. What’s not to love?
KEVIN COSTNER. Testament. Waterworld. The Postman (another AI story). Dances With Wolves (with the US Army playing the role of world-shattering aliens).
I went and saw the new Apes movie. Excellent film. The timeline presented is a little weird and required some easily-granted willing suspension of disbelief, but that is to be expected in an Apes movie, I guess. This latest go-around of the franchise is of course based on a brain altering virus infection affecting both humans and apes, not space time warps. Some parts of the storyline would therefore seem to have required decades or even centuries to have passed from Caesar being Patient Zero, other parts would logically demand only years at most to have gone by. A minor quibble. The story was fresh, imaginative, engaging, grand in scope as befitting an Apes movie and most of all wonderfully entertaining without any political drivel. Caesar’s time has passed and the torch has been passed (by Act III, literally) to the aptly named Noah, to whom Caesar is only a legend. Sequel setup at the end, of course. I’ll look forward to that!
I’ve enjoyed them so far – we’ll see on this one.
Mad Max – My favorite is The Road Warrior. POTA? Loved it, and loved the book, too.
Hunger Games? It was a “Meh” movie for me. Very visually stunning.
Postman: Loved that book. The movie was okay.
I’ll give you full marks for Escape From New York, but , like The Lord Humoungous, I’m Gravely Disappointed that you didn’t mention Mad Max or Mad Max 2: The Road Warrior.
Don’t forget Thunderdome. Two men enter, one man leaves.
I did not see the post about what The Lord Humoungous said. But I was just curious if this is the same guy greg manrinno from traders choice is worried about because he was with him for so long and now he cant seem to find him, he thinks he has died. If anybody can get hold Lord Humoungous please email me and i will try and let greg manrinno from traders choice know. rich586@comcast.net.
I was quoting the character The Lord Humongous from the second movie. It’s from his speech to the resistance fortified in the refinery.
I do faintly recall someone posting with that handle a long time ago, either on Ace of Spades or ZeroHedge, and I do mean way back, like when zerohedge avatars still had naked breasts.
Hope you find your buddy.
Heheheheh – Yeah, I’d mentioned that a few posts back, still one of my favorites (Road Warrior is Best Max).
Anthony Burgess’s novel was better (and he hated the Kubrick film), but I liked both. (“A Clockwork Orange,” that is.)
That said, every time I see these AI-generated pictures, I keep wondering what everyone’s all worried about, in terms of AI making undetectable fakes. The weird text and the other artifacts, they just scream, “AI made me!”
Yes, they scream that today – but it’s improving at an exponential rate.
And for your female readers who don’t care that Cheryl Ladd starred in Millennium, the co-star was Kris Kristofferson.
Millennium was an awesome movie that never really got the credit it deserved. What was even wilder though was the book. If you haven’t done so, grab a copy and read the last few pages. The book had an added twist that made my jaw hit the floor. I’m assuming it didn’t make it into the movie because it was probably too controversial and non-PC for Hollywood.
I bought the book based on this. Wonder if The Mrs. will read it first . . .
Yup.
They Live becomes more relevant every day. An alien species living among us that can look like us but secretly is controlling our entertainment, government and media. Who could that possibly be?
bank managers
There might be a reason why John Carpenter wasn’t allowed to make another movie for a few years.
Controlling how, by what technology? Please be specific. Alien mind-control powers that work even inside voting booths? You need to be more specific in step two.
If only we had glasses . . .
“The Omega Man” 1971, starring Charlton Heston. He’s the last man on earth that isn’t a mutant.
Remade as I Am Legend with Will Smith from the novel of the same name. There was also an even earlier version with Vincent Price.
https://www.denofgeek.com/movies/remakes-vs-originals-omega-man-vs-i-am-legend/
Novel is better than Will’s work, by a factor of 10.
One of my favorites as a kid. Heston put it all out there.
THX1138 – Where a man decides to forgo his recommended psychiatric medications and escape his underground “hive” apartment to see what life is like on the surface. Robot cops are pleasantly eager to “help” him return to “normal”, but eventually (spoiler alert) they just don’t have the budget for that.
An interesting film, George Lucas’ first, made when he was 25 seven years before Star Wars (and based on his even earlier student film short at USC). I was one of the six people who saw it in theatres when it was initially released (actually, it grossed around $900K). It’s his only R rated film because of the scene with THX and LUH where she becomes illegally pregnant. “Produced to be consumed!”
Yup, Lucas figuring out how to make a movie. The budget part is the biggest thing I remember.
Demolition man where physical sex is gross and Taco Bell is the gourmet eatery to be seen in. Oh yeah, a 1970 442 plays a starring role, as it should. Oh yeah, use the 3 seashells correctly.
You can cuss and not need to use the seashells.
Death Race 2000 (1975) – In a dystopian future, a cross country automobile race requires contestants to run down innocent pedestrians to gain points that are tallied based on each kill’s brutality. ( David Carradine, Sylvester Stallone)
Soylent Green (1973) – A nightmarish futuristic fantasy about the controlling power of big corporations and an innocent cop who stumbles on the truth. (Charlton Heston, Chuck Connors, Edward G. Robinson) … I’ve heard that the taste varies from person to person 😉
Robocop (1987) – In a dystopic and crime-ridden Detroit, a terminally wounded cop returns to the force as a powerful cyborg haunted by submerged memories.
Goldy Hawn’s goofy boyfriend as Snake Plissken in Escape From New York never worked for me. He looked even sillier in Tombstone with that big fake moustache.
Death Race 2000 – finally watched that a decade or so ago. Liked it – and seeing Sly surprised me.
Thinking……”A Boy and His Dog”, 1975, based on Harlan Ellison novella.
Yup! Pre-Mad Max Mad Max.
“And what if you could get glasses to allow you to see their propaganda, things like, “Consume” and “Marry and reproduce” showing that the “evil” alien overlords are actually kinder than our current overlords?”
This hits hard.
Reminds me of re-reading many of William Gibson’s cyberpunk novels last year. When written it was intended as a worst-case dystopia. Corporations openly rule the world, trying to maximize efficiency while utterly ignoring poor people, allowing them to get on with their lives. Now, that seems like the best-case scenario, short of an Act of God.
Right??? Who knew that reality could be worse than an dystopian movie???
Additions:
Rollerball (1975, NOT the remake)-
Corporate rule, loveless relationships, fixed sporting events, entire centuries of history lost because of glitches in the AI.
Blakes’ 7 (scifi TV show)-
The show starts in a hive on Earth where you start to see the corruption, as people are drugged to be kept stupefied and easily controlled. Political dissidents get crushed, then lies told about what happened. MKUltra stuff to wipe his brain happens. Rest of the show is about him and his crew trying to fight the intergalactic corrupt rulers. Huge influence on “Firefly” if you liked that show; very similar setting but far FAR darker. Multiple AI.
Also has the best female villain by far.
Do not watch if production value matters to you. It was made with the scraps left over from BBC’s Doctor Who budget. Phenomenal story and dialogue though.
Zoloft start a video game list
Yup. Love Rollerball.
Blakes’ 7? Haven’t seen it, though I’ll give it a look.
First, a couple of observations:
1) Only Sean Connery’s career could survive Zardoz.
2) Logan’s Run featured Jenny Agutter au natural in her prime. And Peter Ustinov as the original Cat Lady.
As for what you missed:
Westworld With Yul Brenner.
Bladerunner (only the Ridley Scott original)
Rollerball (still eerily prescient)
Mad Max: The Road Warrior and Beyond Thunderdome
Planet Of The Apes (The originals. Period. Particularly the first one, which stands at the pinnacle of all the Apes movies, and always will.)
Omega Man (I Am Legend was a pale attempt at an echo)
Soylent Green
Dr. Strangelove, Or How I Stopped Worrying And Learned To Love The Bomb Iconic.
Demolition Man (watch who shows up in the cast in bit parts)
Runaway
Outland Sean Connery’s good sci-fi flick, which is shamelessly just High Noon in space
Robocop
Aliens Alien was pure suspense. Aliens was the future you’d want to nuke from orbit. Just to be sure.
The 5th Element Awesome!
Minority Report Spielberg. Cruise. Still very watchable.
The Truman Show
Serenity Srsly? Nobody beat me to this one? I cannot be the only browncoat in this whole crowd.
You’re not. 🙂
Jenny Agutter was smokin’ in that one.
Loved Runaway, and haven’t seen Outland in years, though I enjoyed it.
Yup, nothing more dystopian than Serenity. Like a leaf in the wind.
Keep watching “movies” they will be on at the freight train depot
Movies are the dominant American art form, for only the last 100+ years.
Movies have been around for 50,000 years.
Before cinema, they used to be called books.
Before that they were plays.
Before that they were cave paintings on rock walls.
Politics is downstream from culture, not upstream.
Movies are the culture.
There’s a heavy price when people who should know better think they can stick their fingers in their ears and ignore that lesson.
If people with your outlook hadn’t abandoned the culture 50-100 years ago and let the communists mold it in their image, you wouldn’t be dealing with the politics you currently have looming over your every waking moment.
Bummer, huh?
Now take a gander, and see how to turn this pig around:
If you think movies are the same as books, your wromg again.
Read Francis Schaeffer sport
A story is a story is a story.
Storytelling is what humans do, since they first figured out language and visual communication.
If you think books aren’t movies that you play in your own head, you haven’t read much.
It isn’t a coincidence that great books can be turned into great screenplays to make great movies with little more than judicious editing. And great screenplays turn into good reads with nothing more than some appropriate filling out.
Politics is downstream from culture.
That’s timeless truth, not just a trendy message.
If you missed that core reality, you didn’t grok Schaeffer any better than anything else you glanced at.
Rigid myopic idiocy regarding Christian engagement – or rather, disengagement – with the arts is the entire reason the Left has run rampant within all of them. The quickest way to end a war is to surrender.
Running away from the culture with your fingers in your ears is no way to light it up nor salt it down.
IIRC, Jesus may have had something to say about light and salt.
But the Christian Luddites missed that memo in the last century, just as they did in the first century.
Which might explain why the only audience with lower box office numbers than Hollywood right now, is churches. And both of them, because they suck at culturally relevant expression of timeless truth.
Oh, BTW, Schaeffer’s signature work was made into a 4-hr documentary movie.
By him.
How ironic.
And a few of the people who largely ignored Schaeffer’s pessimistic call to cultural disengagement?
Mel Gibson.
And the Harmon Brothers, above.
Most modern Christianity has become little more than monks on mountaintops.
Reformation and Renaissance were driven by friars in the marketplace.
If you want a Notre Dame, you’d better have the numbers of a lot of visual artisans.
Not to mention a big enough audience in the seats to pay for the pictures.
Kind of exactly like making movies.
Most of Christianity’s “understanding” of the arts is about like Hitler’s understanding of Nietzsche.
Some will. Some won’t. Best strategy is to avoid the depot.
Colossus was the first AI movie. Pity they didn’t have the tech for anything more than cardboard box computers. And that 70’s acting…
And, my first acting role in the basement of the middle school as “Dr. Forbin”.
Demolition Man
Brazil 1985 – Tyranny meets incompetence.
President’s Analyst 1967 – Big tech (the phone company) plans to put a neuralink in everyone’s head.
“Harrison Bergeron?” Admin has done a post on this.
Wow, that’s digging on The President’s Analyst. Nice work!
Lots of ones I would have mentioned up there, John. A couple that stand out in my memory:
Mad Max and Mad Max: The Road Warrior – Both are great, but I think as I have aged I prefer the first one a bit more, just because it deals with a society in collapse, where The Road Warrior deals with a society after collapse. Either one far superior to the more recent remake.
Logan’s Run – The book was, I think, rather better than the movie, but the movie was still good. And we are still living in the age of a society marketed largely to Young People.
The Time Machine (1961) – A marvelous classic. Again, so much better than the remake.
Rollerball – Again, probably more relevant now than ever in the age of Corporations. Again, superior to the remake.
Soldier – A science fiction dystopian society, it stars Kurt Russell (mostly in a non-speaking role). It is a very enjoyable tale and asks the question about what happens to people who are trained and bred for a particular thing when they are out-versioned by the new model?
Also, thanks to post, I have lots more movies to search out for viewing!
I love Soldier! Did you realize that was a prequel to Bladerunner?
No, but it makes perfect sense now that you mention it.
Just as Outland was the prequel to Alien.
That really fits.
John, if you’re looking for dark, depressing films, one mentioned in the comments is The Day. It almost seems to be in the same world as The Road. Low budget. Essentially a post-apoc Night of the Living Dead with cannibal humans instead of zombies. And before someone mentions it, yes The Day was originally going to be a zombie film, but the change made it more frightening by an order of magnitude.
BTW: Some zombie apocalypse films can be seen as dystopian. I recommend The Dead and The Dead 2, both by the Ford Brothers. Zombie art-house movies that are beautiful and very dark, though not in the same category as 1984, The Road, and The Day.
Looks interesting (The Day). Just started it on freevee. Thanks!
I love The Dead. The Dead 2 wasn’t quite as good, but The Dead was really surprising in how well done it was.
One more: Equilibrium (2002), with Christian Bale and Sean Bean. I’m surprised no one has mentioned it. I guess there are so many, in addition to real life imitating art, now…
That was a good movie that was just shy of being a great movie. Needed . . . something.