Category: Meta
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The 10 Weirdest Pre-1950 SF Movies
Science fiction has never been averse to the strange and bizarre, but some movies baffle even the most hardened SF fan. The latter part of the 20th century hosts some of the most famous examples, but here we highlight some lesser known gems released before 1950.
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Turning a new leaf for Scifist
This is a post to thank all my regular readers and followers. I have now written my last movie review based on writings from my old, locked blog, and am setting forth towards the great unknown. Please join me on my journey!
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Top 25 Pre-1950 Sci-Fi Films
Here we have gathered the 25 greatest SF movies made during the first 50 years of cinema. On the list you will find timeless classics known to all movie fans, but also a surprising number of films that have been all but forgotten through the passage of time, and which…
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Top 10 Sci-Fi Films of the 1940s
The forties was not a good time for SF movies. But the genre sputtered along with mad scientist B-movies turned out by Hollywood. The decade produced none of the immortal classics of the twenties and thirties, but hidden among the low-budget dregg, one can find a few genuine gems worthy…
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Top 10 Sci-Fi Films of the 1930s
In the 1930’s science fiction finally made the leap from European screens to Hollywood. More than anything, the SF invasion of the thirties can be attributed to Universal Studios’ resurrection of Victorian horror stories, many of which had a clear SF element to them. The new Talking Pictures brought on…
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Farewell Kirk Douglas
One of the greatest stars of Hollywood, Kirk Douglas, has passed away at 103 years old. Known for such films as Ace in the Hole (1951), Paths of Glory (1957) and Spartacus (1960), Douglas had one of his biggest successes in 1955 with the science fiction film 20,000 Leagues under…
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Top 10 Silent Space Films
It was a trip to the moon in 1902 that gave birth to the narrative film, and propelled cinema forward. The theatrical fairy-tale A Trip to the Moon turned French director Georges Méliès into the uncrowned king of international cinema. The silent era provided some of the timeless classics of…
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10 Most Popular Scifist Reviews of 2019
The Roaring Twenties are back, albeit with perhaps less optimism about the future than a hundred years ago. At Scifist we’re taking some time to look back at the last year of the ‘teens, and we’re listing the 10 most popular reviews on the site in 2019.
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Top 10 Futuristic Silent Films
The birth of cinema coincided with a period of huge technological advances, followed by radical social upheaval. No surprise, then, that the silent era was a golden age for futuristic movies. Here we have gathered the ten best of the lot.
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Remembering Julie Adams, beloved Creature star
We were reached by the sad news today that one of the elder stateswomen of science fiction films, Julie Adams, has passed away at 92 years old. Adams, of course, is fondly remembered by fans of creature features as the female lead in Universal’s 1954 horror/sci-fi film Creature from the…
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Top 10 Sci-Fi Films of the 1920s
The 1920s was an exciting time in science fiction film history. Cinema was booming after WWI, giving filmmakers successively bigger budgets to realise their visions with, and groundbreaking technical advancements allowed for ever more realistic depictions of the impossible. Here’s a list of the 10 best sci-fi films released between…
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Top 10 Sci-Fi Films of the 1910s
The 1910s was the decade when the feature film established itself as the global industry standard, significantly adding budget, production value, prestige and narrative depths to movies. The horrors of WWI also prompted filmmakers to seek out SF as a format for telling stories as metaphors, resulting in a number…
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Top 10 Sci-Fi Films Pre-1910
1895 is generally considered the the starting point for the movies as a mass medium, and sci-fi films were part of the staple diet from the very beginning. Here’s a list of the ten best science fiction (or proto-sci-fi) movies made between 1895 and 1909. Do you agree or disagree?…
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The Trailblazers
Early cinema was the pulp fiction of its time: a crude and undistinguished novelty, and just as with other lower-tier entertainment, there were surefire moneymakers: nudity, shock, thrills and escapism. And thanks to the possibility for movie magic, science fiction was popular in these early days. All the pioneers dabbled…
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Before the movies
This blog concerns science fiction films, not literature. But it would be unwise not to pay some homage to the roots of the genre. Here then, is a small essay on the origins of science fiction.
Scifist. 