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RETROSPECTIVE 2017:
“THE PERFECT FUTURE IS THE MOST BORING THING
IMAGINABLE”
Section head Rainer Rother talks about the positive aspects of negative future scenarios, an interstellar model in the
energy revolution, starfishshaped aliens and other surprises in this year’s Retrospective.
The
universe
is
infinite.
The
Berlinale
is not.
Through
which,
by
© National Film Archive, Czech Republic
Ikarie XB 1 by Jindřich Polák, Czechoslovakia 1963
necessity limited, “universes” is the Retrospective travelling?
The Berlinale Retrospective is closely connected to our “Things to Come” exhibition at the Museum für Film und
Fernsehen which is exploring the history and motifs of science fiction films and runs until April 2017. The
Retrospective thus revolves around two of the genre’s central themes: encounters with the “Other” and designs for
the “society of the future”. We have eschewed the third classic aspect of science fiction, space exploration, in favour
of these two subject areas. This means that the film selection is not predominated by space operas.
What makes these two main topics so interesting?
We are starting from the premise that although science fiction tells a story set in the future, it actually uses this future
to negotiate contemporary questions and situations. These socially relevant questions revolve particularly around
“How will we live in the future?” and “Which developments could determine our future lives?”. In this respect, science
fiction constitutes a continuation or accentuation of tendencies already present in our world. Regarding the concept of
https://www.berlinale.de/en/im_fokus/berlinale_themen/retrospektive_1/interview_retrospektive_2017.html 1/7
the “Other”, however, it is interesting to see
that the “Other” is not always depicted in the
form of an aggressive invasion as in, for
example, the 1950s classic The War of the
Worlds (dir. Byron Haskin, USA, 1953). The
“Other” can also be a decisive factor in how
we define ourselves.
What does this mean with regards to the
temporal and geographical positioning of the
selected films?
The films selected were made between 1918
and 1998. We didn’t deliberately set this
© Courtesy of Park Circus / Paramount
timeframe, it came about in the selection
process. Himmelskibet (A Trip to Mars, dir. The War of the Worlds by Byron Haskin, USA 1953
HolgerMadsen, Denmark) from 1918 is the
oldest film in our selection; Dark City (dir. Alex Proyas, USA / Australia) from 1998 is the most recent. This means we
have not restricted ourselves to a specific time period although, for example, there was a big science fiction film
boom after World War Two, especially of course in the USA. But beyond that we are also looking towards Eastern
Europe where we are particularly interested in the future scenarios developed there during the time of real socialism.
And have you come across particular characteristics in the films from the former Eastern Bloc?
Yes, you would think that a society which
defined itself as being on the road to
“classlessness” would have little need to
create alternative future scenarios, because
the future already lays clearly ahead. But
that was actually not the case in Eastern
Europe which instead gave birth to an
astonishing number of dystopian future
visions.
The title of the Retrospective, “Future
Imperfect”, already suggests that visions of
© KADR FILM STUDIO/www.SFKADR.com the future on the big screen are, in general,
Na srebrnym globie by Andrzej Żuławski, Poland 1978/89 not a particularly rosy one. Do sceptical
future scenarios make the better films?
Yes, of course! Because narratives of a dystopian nature can be applied much more productively than those set in a
future where everything is hunkydory. In the latter, the potential for conflict, so essential for every good story, is
virtually zero. Science fiction profits from doomsday scenarios, negative societal developments and catastrophes
which must be or have just been survived. Only then can a story unfold in a popular medium like film which has an
emotional impact on the audience. The perfect future is, in storytelling terms, the most boring thing imaginable.
Are there nevertheless any films in the selection which project a positive vision of the future?
Yes,
there is
always
the
narrative
© Courtesy of Park Circus / Sony
Close Encounters of the Third Kind by Steven Spielberg, USA 1977
possibility of a happy ending which allows for a positive outlook on the future. For example, Le cinquième élément
(The Fifth Element, France 1997) by Luc Besson in which not only the future of the earth but also the entire order of
the universe is jeopardised. Now it may seem a bit cheesy that love is the force which averts the end of the world, but
within the scope of a science fiction spectacle with Hollywood appeal it is totally plausible. Himmelskibet, the Danish
film from 1918, can also be included in the positive visions. In it, humans encounter a peaceloving culture on Mars
and love causes a female Martian to accompany the protagonist back to earth to spread a message of peace during
the First World War. Close Encounters of the Third Kind (USA 1977) is also interesting in this respect. Here, Steven
Spielberg creates a situation which would normally result in a violent confrontation between humans and aliens. But
in the end, the hero is presented with the prospect of travelling with the aliens to their home planet.
In this way, the selection also allows encounters of a peaceful kind, which are unusual in cinema?
Yes, to combat the cliché that aliens only ever arrive to exterminate humankind and destroy the world we have a few
alternatives on offer that are really beautiful. For example, the wonderful Japanese feature film Uchūjin Tōkyō ni
arawaru (Warning From Space, dir. Kōji Shima) from 1956 in which starfishshaped aliens seek to warn the
“earthlings” about an impending collision with another planet.
Science fiction films are actually, in the main, period drama projected into the future. “Period pieces” often use a
historical backdrop to reflect upon their own time. Is this also the case in the Retrospective films?
Yes, absolutely. And sometimes you don’t even need costumes which appear futuristic. We have two or three films in
the selection with a science fiction setting which do not find it necessary to turn themselves into period drama. Welt
am Draht (World on a Wire, West Germany 1973) is a good example. Here, Fassbinder depicts an apparently near
future in the 1970s which, at first sight, feels very familiar and contemporary before it is revealed to be an electronic
simulation. Or Na srebrnym globie (On the Silver Globe, Poland 1978/89): this film by Andrzej Żuławski is set in the
future but on a planet with an archaic tribal
culture which, with its primitive clothing,
seems to belong to the past. Its totalitarian
traits, however, come across as totally
timeless because it depicts universal
patterns of the decline of humanity.
If science fiction can be just as much about
the present and the past, does this mean
technical innovations are not necessarily
definitive of the genre?
For the genre in general they are. But those
science fiction films which ignore the
technical aspects are particularly fascinating.
© Rainer Werner Fassbinder Foundation This is more frequently the case in European
auteur films than in big Hollywood
Klaus Löwitsch in Welt am Draht (World on a Wire) by Rainer Werner
Fassbinder, West Germany 1973 productions. So in films like the German
urban thriller Kamikaze 1989 (dir. Wolf
Gremm, West Germany 1982) or the Polish apocalyptical vision Obi, oba: Koniec cywilizacji (OBi, OBa: The End
of Civilisation, dir. Piotr Szulkin, Poland 1985). These are films which display a certain restraint regarding the kind of
production values usually employed to illustrate credible future cities. Instead, they concentrate more on the
philosophical implications of their future scenarios. Such films are also often dark films; in them, societies reflect upon
their fears about the future stemming from their current situation. This is particularly obvious in films which
presuppose a nuclear apocalypse like Stanley Kramer’s literary adaptation On the Beach (USA 1959) and the Soviet
production Pisma myortvogo cheloveka (Letters from a Dead Man, dir. Konstantin Lopushansky, USSR 1986).
If the same fears prevailed in the USA and
the USSR, are there any differences in the
systems recognisable in the films?
One difference can certainly be observed in
the 1972 DEFA production Eolomea (dir.
Herrmann Zschoche, East Germany). It
revolves around a woman played by Cox
Habbema who, as a scientist, has the chief
responsibility for the entire situation. In this
you can recognise a clear difference
between the two models of society. In
America it took until the end of the decade,
until Alien (dir. Ridley Scott, USA 1979) put a
woman – the astronaut Ripley, played by
© DEFAStiftung / Alexander Kühn
Sigourney Weaver – in charge of the
controls of a Hollywood spacecraft. Eolomea by Herrmann Zschoche, East Germany 1972
Which means that there are also films that not only reflect the given situation but also trigger discourse?
In this regard the second silent film in the programme, Algol. Tragödie der Macht (Algol. Tragedy of Power, dir. Hans
Werckmeister, Germany) from 1920, with Emil Jannings in the lead, is definitely worth a mention. It’s fascinating how
contemporary the issues in this film feel today. Especially the energy scarcity and how hooked humans are on
“conventional” energy like coal. And how they overcome this addiction with a new energy source from another planet.
At the start, the genre was defined by a great enthusiasm for technology. Since then, a rather more sceptical attitude
has spread throughout society. Is this change also present in the films?
Yes, Kathryn Bigelow’s Strange Days (USA 1995) is a good example. Today, virtual reality goggles show that
prophecies from 1995 have become reality. You can watch someone else’s life and actually experience it for yourself.
This is depicted in the film as quite doubleedged. Especially as Strange Days is probably one of the first American
films to address the excessive use of violence by the police against black people, which today comes across as a
prophesy of a development in American society which has now become a much more present topic of discussion.
Science Fiction has also always been a testing ground for cinematic technological innovation. Which films in the
selection were in this sense avantgarde?
Blade Runner (dir. Ridley Scott, USA 1982)
has unquestionably been styledefining as
the model of a future city. Ridley Scott was
surely inspired by Metropolis but he himself
has inspired an entire succession of films,
above all with regards to what a globalised
world would look like in an imperfect future –
with the vision of an admittedly multicultural
society which is sometimes also populated
by mutants, but which at the same time is no
longer a truly civil society. Instead, a
concealed kind of civil war is going on and
certain rules which we hold indispensable for
civilised cooperation are suspended. If you
© 1998 New Line Productions, Inc. All Rights Reserved™
are looking at animation technology, then
Dark City by Alex Proyas, USA / Australia 1998 Dark City is also a very special film which in
the way it depicts the changing of a city
could be seen as the godfather to the latest superhero blockbuster Doctor Strange. The latter represents the current
high point of digital 3D animation in which worlds and buildings continuously change. This appears in Dark City for
the first time and in Doctor Strange is taken to its extreme.
In 1998 Dark City, which is about lost memories, was also seen as pioneering with regards to its treatment of the
topic of human identity.
Yes, questions of identity are a very important topic for the genre. In Dark City everyone is a different person each
day: every 24 hours you receive a new programme which changes your entire personality. But already in John
Frankenheimer’s Seconds (USA) from 1966 a character is reacting to the promise that he can be something entirely
different – actually, younger. He is subsequently fitted with another body and that then plays out in a beautifully dark,
dystopian way. This topic is also important in the Alien films in the sense that the extraterrestrial life is physically
“incorporated” by the attacked astronauts. All these films, whether they are about aliens or technical manipulations,
eventually pose the decisive question: what is genuinely human in human beings?
Some popular titles you would definitely
expect to appear in this Retrospective are
actually absent from your selection. For
example, Metropolis. Why?
We have deliberately left out some classics,
including Metropolis and 2001: A Space
Odyssey, because they have already been
thoroughly introduced and analysed in the
exhibition “Things to Come”. We found it
more appealing to boldly go into less familiar
galaxies. So instead of a film by Andrei
Tarkovsky, for example, with Pisma
myortvogo cheloveka we are screening a
less wellknown work from his former
assistant Konstantin Lopushansky which © Courtesy of Park Circus / Paramount
tells of a postapocalyptic world no less
Seconds by John Frankenheimer, USA 1966
hauntingly than Tarkovsky himself.
The genre, among other things, feeds off the fact that there are incredibly bad films which, for this very reason, have
become tremendously popular. Can some of these “guilty pleasures” also be found in the Retrospective?
To a certain extent, yes. The Fifth Element has fun spending a lot of money to make things look especially beautiful
which, in a cheaper film, would come across as totally cringeworthy – just think of the different embodiments of the
aliens. Or The War of the Worlds: although the film won an Oscar in 1953 for Best Special Effects, today some parts
of it are unintentionally funny, from which it derives its high entertainment value. In this way, the selection also reflects
this aspect of the genre.
© Internationale Filmfestspiele Berlin

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