Ghost in the Shell

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Ghost in the Shell is a 1995 animated science fiction/cyberpunk film.The film in set in the future where artificial evils like cybernetic implants and consciousness uploading is considered normal.Cyborg federal agent Makoto Kusanagi is sent to track down a criminal hacker known as the Puppet Master who hacks into other people’s minds to get information and commit crimes.Once Makoto manages to track down the Puppet Master they engage in a conversation.During the conversation Makoto realises that the Puppet Master isn’t so much of a villain as he is really the victim with a different opinion.He opposes the idea of using cybernetics and mind uploading to stay immortal.He believes that the way life should work is to be mortal and that gives meaning to one’s life and the limited time they have.So his goal is to find a physical body and brain to transfer to and then live out his life and die.He reveals that the real reason why the government wants to track him down is because he was an artificial intelligence illegally created by them and has escaped their clutches.To cover everything up the government has branded him a criminal to track him down. Realising something wrong as Makoto had entered the building for a long period of time and not come out,the authorities decide to cover things up by blowing up the building and killing everyone inside.However unknown to them Makoto’s consciousness has escaped through the network and is now installed in a new body that she purchased. Realising that justice isn’t really true justice, Makoto leaves to start a new life.

This film considered one of the greatest animated films of all time and is the inspiration for the film The Matrix. Things like the film opening with the codes to the cybernetic plugs at the back of the head to the themes of artificial intelligence are all adopted by The Matrix from this film.

Guardians of the Galaxy

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Guardians of the Galaxy is a 2014 superhero/science fiction/space opera film. The film is about a group of interstellar outcasts who come together to save the galaxy from the supervillan Ronan the Accuser. In the film the protagonist Peter Quill/Starlord steals an artifact called the orb. However unknown to him Ronan also wants the orb so that he can use it to destroy the planet Xander which is home to a large population of the galaxy. Ronan is a member of the alien race the Kree who are enemies of the Xandarians and that’s why he wants to destroy Xandar. After Ronan finds out that Peter has the orb he sends people to hunt him down. During the confrontation between Peter,Gamora(the alien sent by Ronan) and some bounty hunters who also want the orb (Rocket and Groot),Peter along with the other bounty hunters get arrested by the galactic police force Nova Corps and are imprisoned.In prison Peter meets a prison inmate called Drax and forms and alliance with him and the other bounty hunters to make an escape.They successfully escape and decides to sell the orb and divide the price equally among each other.However during the deal they are found by Ronan and after a confrontation they are left beaten and the orb taken from them.With the orb in possession Ronan decides to use its power to destroy Xandar along with half of the galaxy.Feeling guilty and responsible for this,Peter decides to form the Guardians of the Galaxy with this group in order to stop Ronan. They eventually managed to successfully stop Ronan and afterwards decides to stick together.

The film stars Chris Pratt as Peter Quill/Starlord, Zoe Saldana as Gamora, Dave Bautista as Drax, Bradley Cooper as Rocket, Vin Diesel as Groot, Michael Rooker as Yondu and Lee Pace as Ronan. The director of the movie is James Gunn.

Avatar

Avatar is a 2009 science fiction film directed by James Cameron. The film in set in the mid 22nd century when humans are colonizing a planet called Pandora in order to obtain a fictional mineral called unobtanium. This threatens the existence of the Na vi who are the natives of this planet.The conflict of the film results from this.Jake is at first sent to infiltrate the Na vi in order to gain their trust and find out the location of the pandoran ‘Tree of Souls’ where a large amount of unobtanium is located.He does so by transferring his consciousness into a genetically engineered Na vi called an avatar,so that when the Na vi sees him they will think that he is one of their own.However,as time goes on he begins to develop a bond with these people and over time he becomes more Na Vi than human.He also falls in love with Neytiri who is a Na vi and daughter of the leader of her tribe.These two things combined eventually leads him to rebel against the humans and fight alongside the Na vi.In the end he is able to become a Na vi by both soul and body.He does so by permanently transferring his consciousness into an avatar.

Sam Worthington plays the protagonist Jake Sully. Jake is a disabled who joins the avatar program in exchange for an operation that will enable him to walk again.The film also stars Zoe Saldana as Neytiri who is the protagonist’s love interest and daughter of the leader of the main Na vi clan,and Stephen Lang who plays Colonel Miles Quaritch a military man,head of the mining operations and the main antagonist of the film.Others actors include Sigourney Weaver as Dr Grace Augustine who is an astrobiologist and head of the avatar program,Giovanni Ribisi as Parker Selfridge the corporate administrator for the mining operation,and Michelle Rodriguez as Trudy a combat pilot who also eventually rebelled against the humans and fought alongside Jake and the Na vi.

The film is also known for its breakthrough in visual effects and 3D technology at the time. Visuals effects being the entire world of Pandora and the characters as before this movie there was never a movie where everything from the setting to the characters were shot entirely in CGI and many of the creatures in the movie were considered impossible to create until this movie was released. 3D technology also had a breakthrough in that before this movie,3D movies had images popping out of the screen whereas this movie immersed audience within the fictional world.

The Matrix

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The Matrix is a 1999 science fiction/cyberpunk film directed by the Wachowski brothers.It is set in a dystopian future where everyone is living in a simulated reality created by machines to keep everyone under control.One day the protagonist Neo is contacted by Morpheus who is the leader of the resistance,a group of humans who managed to escape the matrix and whose goal is to free the humans and fight against the machines.Morpheus tells Neo that the world he is in is not the real world and that he alongside the rest of humanity are actually captured by the machines and placed in this fake world called the matrix.After hearing the truth Neo joins the resistance.After going through intense training he manages to harness abilities within the matrix allowing him to manipulate time and fly.Ready to take on the machines he phones the matrix telling it that humans will be freed.

The film stars Keanu Reeves as Neo the movie’s protagonist who is a computer programmer by day and hacker by night,he eventually joins the resistance to fight against the machines.Carrie Ann Moss plays Trinity who is the love interest and a member of the resistance fighting against the machines.There is also Morpheus played by Laurence Fishburne who is the leader of the resistance.Other actors include Hugo Weaving as Agent Smith who is a sentient computer program created to prevent humans from escaping the matrix and the main antagonist of the film,Joe Pantoliano as cypher another freed human with the resistance,Matt Doran as Mouse a human and programmer,and Gloria Foster as the Oracle who is a prophet inside the matrix guiding the freed humans into salvation.

The film is also known for its breakthrough special effects of the time.One example is “bullet time” in which Neo dodges multiple bullets in slow motion which at the time is a never before seen.

Pacific Rim

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Pacific Rim is a 2013 science fiction monster film.The film is about the war between humans and kaijus. Humans piloting robots called jaegers to do battle with the kaijus which are giant monsters from the depths of the pacific ocean.During the war,after the death of his former jaeger piloting partner/brother,Raleigh Becket gets partnered with a new pilot Mako Mori. Over the course of the movie the two are able to bond through their mutual respect for each other as well as through sharing similar experiences of both losing close family members to kaijus. Eventually the humans were able to stop the kaiju invasion by closing the portal releasing the kaijus, located at the bottom of the pacific ocean.Also they were able to kill off every single remaining kaiju on Earth.

Charlie Hunnam plays Raleigh Becket the protagonist and Rinko Kikuichi plays his jaeger partner Mako Mori. Others include Idris Alba who plays Marshal Stacker Pentecost who is the commanding officer and Mako’s adoptive father after the death of her family at the hands of the kaijus,Charlie Day as Dr Newt Geiszler a scientist who studies kaijus, and Ron Perlman as Hannibal Chau a black marketeer who sells kaiju organs.

The Terminator

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The Terminator is a 1984 science fiction film directed by James Cameron.The film is about a cyborg from the year 2029 who gets sent back in time to the year 1984 to kill a woman called Sarah Connor. The reason is that in 2029,humans are at war with sentient machines.The leader of the humans is John Connor, who is the son of Sarah Connor. The only way for the machines to gain total victory over the humans is to wipe out the leader of the humans. To do so they send a cyborg back in time to kill his mother so that he will never have been born.The cyborg arrives in 1984 and kills every woman named Sarah Connor until it finds the one he is looking for.Luckily for Sarah Connor, a time traveler named Kyle Reese arrives just in time to rescue her.Afterwards Kyle reveals to Sarah that he is sent by John Connor to protect his mother in order to ensure his own existence.While on the run from the terminator,Sarah and Kyle fall in love with each other.Eventually the terminator tracks them down and attempts to terminate them.Kyle sacrifices his own life to destroy the terminator and save Sarah’s life.The movie ends with Sarah being pregnant with Kyle’s child and decides to name the child John Connor.

The cast of this film are Arnold Schwarzenegger as The Terminator which is the cyborg sent back in time to terminate,Linda Hamilton as Sarah Connor who is the mother of future leader and last hope of humanity John Connor, and Michael Biehn as Kyle Reese who is the resistance fighter sent back in time to ensure Sarah’s survival and John Connor’s secret father.

Elysium

Elysium is a 2013 science fiction film directed by Neill Blomkamp. The film is set on a future Earth that is polluted and overpopulated and everyone is poor. The world is basically a pile of rubbish.There is also the Elysium which is a space habitat inhabited by the rich and elite.Max Da Costa who is from Earth is exposed to lethal radiation and was told that he has five days to live before dying from radiation poisoning.In a desperate attempt to live Max decides to get into Elysium where his cure awaits.Max contacts a human smuggler named Spider to help get him to Elysium.Once on Elysium Max realises that Elysium’s computer core can grant everyone on Earth Elysian citizenship and save them from their miserable lives.Instead of saving himself he decides to fight his way towards the computer core and reboot the computer core which grants everyone on Earth Elysian citizenship.In the end Max sacrificed himself for others.

The film stars Matt Damon as the protagonist Max Da Costa. Others include Jodie Foster who plays Jessica Delacourt who manages Elysiusm’s defenses preventing anyone on Earth from getting in,Wagner Moura as Spider,Alice Braga as Frey Santiago, and Faran Tahir as President Patel.