Film Studies Librarian
Dartmouth College
25 N Main ST
Hanover, NH 03755
Other library resource(s)
Science fiction film theory and criticism from Oxford Bibliographies Online by Call Number: Electronic resourceISBN: 9780199791286Defining science fiction is a difficult task. The origins of the term reside in the scientific fantasies of technological developments. However, science fiction can be defined as characteristics of the text (or film), as the speculation on or extrapolation from current events, or as a set of reading (or viewing) protocols. However, in common usage, the term science fiction often encompasses a wide range of concerns, including fantasy and horror.
Science Fiction Film Societies
- International Horror and Sci-Fi Film FestivalThe International Horror and Sci-Fi Film Festival's mission is to support and develop the artistic appreciation, educational opportunities and growth of independent film within Arizona.
Keeping up with the journal literature
Want an easy way to keep up with the journal literature for all facets of Film Studies? And you use a mobile device? You can install the BrowZine app and create a custom Bookshelf of your favorite journal titles. Then you will get the Table of Contents (ToCs) of your favorite journals automatically delivered to you when they become available. Once you have the ToC's you can download and read the articles you want.
You can get the app from the App Store or Google Play.
Don't own or use a mobile device? You can still use BrowZine! It's now available in a web version. You can get to it here. The web version works the same way as the app version. Find the journals you like, create a custom Bookshelf, get ToCs and read the articles you want.
A quick definition for science fiction films
A genre characterized by stories involving conflicts between science and technology, human nature, and social organization in futuristic or fantastical settings, created in cinema through distinctive iconographies, images, and sounds often produced by means of special effects technology. All the technologies of cinematic illusion are displayed at their most cutting-edge state in science-fiction films, and this has been true since the earliest years of cinema, when trick films like Le voyage dans la lune/A Trip to the Moon (Georges Méliès, France, 1902) used stop-motion animation and other effects to create what is in all probability cinema’s first-ever portrayal of space travel: in topic, techniques, and iconography, Le voyage dans la lune was a prototype for the science-fiction cinema to come. The 1920s and 1930s saw portrayals of future and imagined worlds, many of them dystopic, in feature films such as Aelita/Aelita: Queen of Mars (Yakov Protazanov, USSR, 1924); Metropolis (Fritz Lang, Germany, 1926); and Things to Come (William Cameron Menzies, UK, 1936), while many post-World War II science-fiction films offered apocalyptic imaginings of alien invasion and nuclear holocaust. The canonical 2001: A Space Odyssey (Stanley Kubrick, UK/US, 1968) began a new era in science-fiction cinema’s foregrounding of spectacle and impact in moving image and sound by creating a sublime, all-enveloping environment for the viewer. Viewed in cinemas, science-fiction extravaganzas like 2001 offer an encompassing visual, auditory, and bodily experience in which the spectator is invited to succumb to extreme sensory and bodily engulfment (see haptic visuality). Wherever cinema exhibits its own distinctive matters of expression—as it does with science fiction’s displays of state-of-the-art special effects technologies—this is invariably a highly self-conscious, even an exhibitionistic, gesture, eclipsing narrative, plot, and character.
Kuhn, A., & Westwell, G. (2020). Science fiction. In A Dictionary of Film Studies. Oxford University Press. Retrieved 23 May. 2022
Finding library resources for science fiction
To find sci-fi in the Library's collections, you can click on one of the subject headings below:
- science fiction filmsThe call number range for Westerns is PN 1995.9 .S26 on Baker Level 4.
Introductory reading(s)
Historical dictionary of science fiction cinema by Call Number: Baker-Berry PN 1995.9 .S26 B566 2010ISBN: 9780810874626The history of science fiction film now spans more than 100 years, during which time more than 1,000 science fiction films of various kinds have been made. Beginning with the work of pioneering French filmmaker Georges Méliès at the dawn of the 20th century and moving through such silent films as Fritz Lang's classic Metropolis, science fiction film has had a long and eventful history that has taken it in many directions but that has moved the genre inexorably forward into a prominent place at the center of the film industry in the works of big-budget hitmakers like George Lucas, Steven Spielberg, and Michael Bay. The Historical Dictionary of Science Fiction Cinema provides broad coverage of the people, films, companies, techniques, themes, and subgenres that have made science fiction cinema such a vital part of world cinema. ...
The philosophy of science fiction film by Call Number: Baker-Berry PN 1995.9 .S26 P49 2008ISBN: 9780813124728Science fiction films give viewers a glimpse into alternative realities, and also explore various philosophical questions and themes. The contributors to this volume use classic science fiction movies to explore complex philosophical themes and concepts.
Science fiction film: a critical introduction by Call Number: Baker-Berry PN 1995.9 .S26 J45 2011ISBN: 9781847884763Science Fiction Film develops a historical and cultural approach to the genre that moves beyond close readings of iconography and formal conventions. It explores how this increasingly influential genre has been constructed from disparate elements into a hybrid genre.
The science fiction film reader by Call Number: Baker-Berry PN 1995.9 .S26 R53 2004ISBN: 9780879109943An illustrated collection of essays by masters such as H.G. Wells, Luis Bunuel, Jorge Luis Borges, Arthur C. Clarke, Anthony Burgess, Joseph Campbell, Pauline Kael, George F. Will, Robin Wood, and Susan Sontag.
Selected book titles
The cinematic life of the gene by Call Number: Baker-Berry PN 1995.9 .S26 S725 2010ISBN: 9780822345077What might the cinema tell us about how and why the prospect of cloning disturbs our most profound ideas about gender, sexuality, difference, and the body? In The Cinematic Life of the Gene, the pioneering feminist film theorist Jackie Stacey argues that as a cultural technology of imitation, cinema is uniquely situated to help us theorize "the genetic imaginary," the constellation of fantasies that genetic engineering provokes.
Future west: utopia and apocalypse in frontier science fiction by Call Number: Baker-Berry PS 374 .F73 K38 2008ISBN: 9780700616091What is the future of the American West? Is it fated to shine with the benign promise of Ernest Callenbach's Ecotopia? Or will it instead dissolve into postapocalyptic dust, as in Walter Miller's classic novel A Canticle for Leibowitz, or devolve into relentlessly dark and rain-soaked urban landscapes, as in Ridley Scott's 'Blade Runner?' William Katerberg takes a new look at works of utopian, dystopian, and apocalyptic science fiction to show how narratives of the past and future powerfully shape our understanding of the present-day West.
H. G. Wells, modernity and the movies by Call Number: Baker-Berry PR 5778 .F55 W55 2007ISBN: 9781846310607This book investigates Wells's interest in cinema and related media technologies, by placing it back into the contemporary cultural and scientific contexts giving rise to them. It plugs a gap in understanding Wells's contribution to exploring and advancing the possibilities of cinematic narrative and its social and ideological impacts in the modern period.
Science fiction, horror and fantasy film and television credits by Call Number: Baker-Berry PN 1995.9 .S26 L46 1983 v. 1-2ISBN: 9780786409501
Tech-noir: the fusion of science fiction and film noir by Call Number: Baker/Berry PN 1995.9 .S26 M366 2008ISBN: 9780786433254This critical study traces the common origins of film noir and science fiction films, identifying the many instances in which the two have merged to form a distinctive subgenre known as Tech-Noir.
Finding articles & journals
Articles and other writings about westerns can be found in many publications. We have one journal that looks exclusively at sci-fi films. However, you can also use Film & Television Literature Index to find other, relevant articles.
Science fiction film and television by Call Number: Electronic journalScience Fiction Film and Television is a biannual, peer-reviewed journal that encourages dialogue among the scholarly and intellectual communities of film studies, sf studies and television studies.
Film & television literature indexCall Number: Electronic resourceThis index covers over 300 journal and magazine titles for film and television reviews, scholarly and critical analysis of cinema and television, and articles of popular interest about film and television. About half the journals and magazines are film periodicals and the other half cover film and television with some regularity. Subject coverage includes film & television theory, preservation & restoration, writing, production, cinematography, technical aspects, and reviews.
The web of science citation databases by Call Number: Electronic resourceThe online version of 3 separate ISI indexes: Arts & Humanities Citation Index, Science Citation Index and, Social Sciences Citation Index.
A Selected list of science fiction films
Find more science fiction films in the online catalog.
The blob by Call Number: Jones Media DVD #2270ISBN: 9781559409094Residents of a small Pennsylvania town combat a slimy space invader.
The brother from another planet by Call Number: Jones Media DVD #3041ISBN: 9780792858102In this vastly amusing, offbeat fantasy, Sayles takes a fresh look at our society through the eyes of a black extraterrestrial (Joe Morton) who crash-lands on Earth -- in Harlem -- and is taken in by the regulars of a local bar. The alien changes everyone he meets on his original and eye-opening journey through the streets of urban America. But can his message of brotherly love resonate with the intergalactic bounty hunters trying to track him down?
Ex machina by Call Number: Jones Media DVD #19423Caleb, a coder at the world's largest Internet company, wins a competition to spend a week at a retreat belonging to the company's reclusive CEO, Nathan. But when Caleb arrives he finds that he will have to participate in a fascinating experiment with the world's first true artificial intelligence, housed in the body of a beautiful robot woman, Ava. Truths, emotions, and motives are blurred as the relationship between Caleb, Ava, and Nathan intensifies.
Je t'aime je t'aime = I love you, I love you by Call Number: Jones Media DVD #19321Claude Ridder is recovering from a failed suicide attempt after the collapse of his relationship with Catrine. He is approached by an obscure scientific lab, who wants him to participate in the human trials of a new time travel device. The test will send him back one year's time, for one minute. But the machine goes haywire, and Ridder gets caught in a never-ending series of temporal leaps, re-living his tragic life out of sequence.
Killer klowns from outer space by Call Number: Jones Media DVD #19976ISBN: 9780792850540Aliens who look like clowns land in their circus-tent spaceship near a small town with the plan to turn all humans into cotton candy.
Looper by Call Number: Jones Media DVD #15668In the year 2074, the mob sends problem people back in time to 2034, where a hired gun waits to eliminate them. Joe is one such hired gun, good at what he does. But problems arise when the mob tries to 'close the loop,' and Joe comes face-to-face with his future self during a hit. When Joe's future self escapes after he hesitates to finish the assignment, Joe must chase himself down and finish the job.
The Martian by Call Number: Jones Media DVD #19450After a bad storm blows across Mars, astronaut Mark Watney is presumed dead and left behind. Now stuck on a hostile planet he must find a way to signal Earth and in the meantime survive on limited supplies.
Internet resource(s)
- SciFi Film FestivalSciFi Film Festival is an annual festival held in Sydney, Australia, showcasing sci fi and fantasy genre films and filmmaking, video games, virtual reality and new media technologies.
