Movies about Science are an eye-opener and worth watching. We have gathered the list of the best movies for you to watch!
Four years have been passed four years since Physics World proclaimed ” Science cleans up at the Oscars” -and things have been getting better since the time. In the year 2000, The Shape of Water was the first sci-fi movie to be awarded Best Picture; this year, Black Panther might make it back-to-back wins for this category (although Roma — a drama written by Alfonso Cuaron, who won Best Director for Gravity in 2014 – is the preferred choice of bookmakers).
The Shape of Water and Black Panther are both fantastic science-based films. Particularly Black Panther is a great film for kids. Black Panther character Princess Shuri is called an inspirational role model in encouraging girls to pursue STEM subjects. But which are the top films that focus on science or about scientists? It’s a question that you could want to debate while you enjoy the Oscars ceremony. It starts on February 24 in the evening at 5:30 p.m. Los Angeles time.
To get the discussion going, here is my suggestion of the five best films about scientists or science – in not in any particular order. They cover a period of 51 years, including the works of two Stanley Kubricks, one Ridley Scott another by Steven Spielberg, and one film made by the less-known Shane Carruth.
None of these films are notable Oscar winners. They have four awards between them and none of them included the “big five” categories of Best Picture, Best Director or Best Actor or the Best Actress and Best Screenplay. However, all of them have the unique aspect of scientists or science.
2001: A Space Odyssey
1968 | Director: Stanley Kubrick
Let’s face it: the everyday tasks that lead to discoveries in science can be a bit boring. In the first 161-minute film 2001 Kubrick attempted to convey the monotony by directing a long scene in which NASA astronaut Dave Bowman simply jogs around and around (and around) inside Discovery One. Discovery One spacecraft. It didn’t go over well. At the film’s premier audience members began booing as well as hissing and shouting “Let’s move it along” and “Next scene”. After the disastrous premiere241 people were ejected from the theater as did executives of the production company MGM — Kubrick removed 19 minutes of the film. It is recommended as one of the best movies about science!
Jurassic Park
1993 | Director: Steven Spielberg
Steven Spielberg’s third sci-fi film following Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1977) and E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial (1982) It is the most frequently cited film by scientists and journalists in presenting new findings to the general public. Between 1998 until the year 2017, Jurassic Park was referenced 21 times in Nature News, from “Jurassic Park got it right” in an article that discussed theropod dinosaurs, such as velociraptors used their tails in order to “Say goodbye to Jurassic Park” in a discussion on the challenges in restoring species that were extinct for over a couple of thousand years. The Jurassic Park’s best-known quote being used to begin the article Physics World. It is recommended as one of the best movies about science!
Primer
2004 | Director: Shane Carruth
As Niels Bohr said once: “How wonderful that we encounter a paradox. There is a sense of advancements.” The writer would’ve loved Primer, an acclaimed independent film in which two scientists as well as us, the viewers -are confronted brutally with the perplexities that arise from time travel. It’s the most “hard” sci-fi film. Although 2001 was a bit lacking in expository material, Primer is an exposition-free zone. In 2001, Arthur C. Clarke’s novel was a great way to fill the gaps. For Primer it has (mercifully) numerous fan sites that do an amazing task of explaining the way everything is done. It is recommended as one of the best movies about science!
The Martian
2015 | Director: Ridley Scott
If this were a list of the best five sci-fi movies, Ridley Scott would probably include two films: Alien (1979) and Blade Runner (1982). This is an overview of the top five films that focus on scientists or science — and there’s no better film that The Martian at showing us the scientist who uses science (and sometimes and sometimes, the use of duct tape) to resolve issues. As the astronaut Mark Watney: “In the faced with massive odds, I’m faced with just one choice. I’ll need to research the hell to get this.” It is recommended as one of the best movies about science!
Night on Earth (2020)
Netflix
Plimsoll Productions, who are the producers of the documentary show Hostile Planet, recruited virtually every person in this wildlife filmmaking industry to show the audience, in six episodes of what is it that the natural world is up to when we’re asleep. It’s a little tinny and full of hyperbole the narrator Samira Wiley discusses the night as if viewers have never been up after 9 pm. Night on Earth is nonetheless an original concept, mixing both night and day-time footage to expose, in some disturbing ways, the behaviors of animals that we are all familiar with. The Zimbabwe segment, filmed by the series’ creator Bill Markham, in which leopards and hyenas hunt infant elephants, is an incredibly disturbing the highlight. It is recommended as one of the best movies about science!
Spaceship Earth (2020)
Hulu and Amazon Prime Video
Director Matt Wolf draws on an amazing archive of never-before-seen footage to tell the often-repeated (and often misrepresented) story of Biosphere 2 The highlight and delight of an innovative theater group that was experimental that originated from San Francisco called the Theater of All Possibilities.
The project, conceived by the ebullient ecologist and writer John Allen, and bankrolled by billionaire Ed Bass, involved eight individuals who entered a huge roof situated in Oracle, Arizona, on 26 September 1991, locked in the dome behind to determine if they would survive in a enclosed, self-built ecosystem. The dome was reopened two years later slightly wiser, definitely less slender and extremely cautious about the idea of their experiment, initially designed as a dazzling method to increase awareness of environmental issues and is now embroiled in scientific and financial controversy. It is recommended as one of the best movies about science!
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