A dystopian themed film shows the vision of a society that is the opposite of utopia. A dystopian society is often a planned structured society in which the conditions of life are deliberately made miserable, characterized by poverty, oppression, violence, disease, scarcity, and/or pollution for the benefit of a select minority or some unnatural societal goal.Their stories emphasize one or more detrimental societal characteristics that would be considered unusual if practiced in a utopian society. With that being said I'm going to bring you my top 10 favorite dystopian themed films of all-time. So without further ado...
10. The Hunger Games: Catching Fire
I'm a huge fan of the frnachise and this is the best by far. After winning the 74th Annual Hunger Games Katniss Everdeen (played by Jennifer Lawrence) and Peeta Mellark (played by Josh Hutcherson) return home to District 12. However they must embark on a "Victory Tour" to all of the other districts, leaving behind their close friends and family. The day of the tour, President Snow (played by Donald Sutherland) threatens Katniss's best friend and pretend cousin Gale Hawthorne (played by Liam Hemsworth). During the tour, Katniss senses that rebellion is brewing in the districts, but the capitol is still firmly in control as the world prepares for the 75th Annual Hunger Games (known as a Quarter Quell), a competition that could change Panem forever.
9. Metropolis
If you want to talk about changing the game, then this is the film did just that and it's still hard to top to this day. The film follows Freder (played by Gustav Fröhlich), the wealthy son of the city's ruler, and Maria (played by Brigitte Helm), to overcome the vast gulf separating the classes of their city. Metropolis has a rating of 99% on rottentomatoes.com.
8. Mad Max; Beyond Thunderdome
This film is just simply fantastic and it is my favorite out of the three in the franchise eventhough it's critically the worst (81% on rottentomatoes.com). About 15 years after the events of Mad Max 2, nuclear war has finally destroyed what little was left of civilization. Grizzled and older, former cop Max (played by Mel Gibson) roams the Australian desert in a camel-drawn vehicle -- until father-and-son thieves Jebediah Sr. (played by Bruce Spence) and Jr. (played by Adam Cockburn) use their jury-rigged airplane to steal his possessions and means of transportation. Max soon winds up in Bartertown, a cesspool of post-apocalyptic capitalism powered by methane-rich pig manure and overseen by two competing overlords, Aunty Entity (played by Tina Turner) and Master (played by Angelo Rossitto), a crafty midget who rides around on the back of his hulking underling, Blaster (played by Paul Larsson). Seeking to re-equip himself, Max strikes a deal with the haughty Aunty to kill Blaster in ritualized combat inside Thunderdome, a giant jungle gym where Bartertown's conflicts are played out in a postmodern update of blood and circuses. Although Max manages to fell the mighty Blaster, he refuses to kill him after realizing the brute is actually a retarded boy. Aunty's henchmen murder Blaster nonetheless, then punish Max for violating the law that "Two men enter, one man leaves." Lashed to the back of a hapless pack animal and sent out into a sandstorm, a near-death Max is rescued by a band of tribal children and teens. The descendants of the victims of an airplane crash, the kids inhabit a lush valley and wait for the day when Captain Walker, the plane's pilot, will return to lead them back to civilization. Some of the children, refusing to believe that Max isn't Walker and that the glorious cities of their mythology no longer exist, set off in search of civilization on their own. Max and three tribe members must then rescue their friends from Bordertown and the clutches of Aunty Entity. Mad Max: Beyond Thunderdome has a rating of 81% on rottentomatoes.com.
7. RoboCop
The film has a lot of over-the-top action, but it was just so original and it is so much fun. Set in Detroit sometime in the near future, the film is about a policeman (played by Peter Weller) killed in the line of duty whom the department decides to resurrect as a half-human, half-robot supercop. The RoboCop is indestructible, and within a matter of weeks he has removed crime from the streets of Detroit. However, his human side is tortured by his past, and he wants revenge on the thugs who killed him. RoboCop was nominated for 3 Academy Awards including Best Sound Editing, Best Sound and Best Film Editing, while winning the Academy Award for Best Sound Editing and it has a rating of 88% on rottentomatoes.com.
6. The Fifth Element
This film has an all-star cast and it is just a fun, exciting action sci-fi film. In the movie's prologue, which is set in 1914, scientists gather in Egypt at the site of an event that transpired centuries earlier. Aliens, it seemed, arrived to collect four stones representing the four basic elements (earth, air, fire and water) - warning their human contacts that the objects were no longer safe on Earth. A few hundred years later (in the 23rd century), a huge ball of molten lava and flame is hurtling toward Earth, and scientist-holy man Victor Cornelius (played by Ian Holm) declares that in order to prevent it from destroying the planet, the same four elemental stones must be combined with the fifth element, as embodied by a visitor from another world named Leeloo (played by Milla Jovovich). However, if the force of evil presents itself to the stones instead, the Earth will be destroyed, and an evil being named Zorg (played by Gary Oldman) will trigger the disaster. Despite her remarkable powers, Leeloo needs help with her mission, and she chooses her accomplice, military leader-turned-cab driver Korben Dallas (played by Bruce Willis), when she literally falls through the roof of his taxi. The Fifth Element was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Sound Editing and it has a rating of 71% on rottentomatoes.com.
5. Planet of the Apes
This film really helped the sci-fi genre get off the ground and it really presented a lot of new ideas and had a lot of similarities with what was going on in the world at that time. George Taylor (played by Charlton Heston), one of several astronauts on a long, long space mission whose spaceship crash-lands on a remote planet, seemingly devoid of intelligent life. Soon the astronaut learns that this planet is ruled by a race of talking, thinking, reasoning apes who hold court over a complex, multilayered civilization. In this topsy-turvy society, the human beings are grunting, inarticulate primates, penned-up like animals. When ape leader Dr. Zaius (played by Maurice Evans) discovers that the captive Taylor has the power of speech, he reacts in horror and insists that the astronaut be killed. But sympathetic ape scientists Cornelius (played by Roddy McDowell) and Dr. Zira (played by Kim Hunter) risk their lives to protect Taylor -- and to discover the secret of their planet's history that Dr. Zaius and his minions guard so jealously. In the end, it is Taylor who stumbles on the truth about the Planet of the Apes: "Damn you! Damn you! Goddamn you all to hell!" Planet of the Apes was nominated for 2 Academy Awards including Best Costume Design and Best Original Score and it has a rating of 89% on rottentomatoes.com.
4. Moon
This movie is fantastic, vastly underrated and it is Sam Rockwell's best performance and he was robbed of an Academy award nomination as well as the entire film. For three long years, Sam Bell (played by Sam Rockwell) has dutifully harvested Helium 3 for Lunar, a company that claims it holds the key to solving humankind's energy crisis. As Sam's contract comes to an end, the lonely astronaut looks forward to returning to his wife and daughter down on Earth, where he will retire early and attempt to make up for lost time. His work on the Selene moon base has been enlightening -- the solitude helping him to reflect on the past and overcome some serious anger issues -- but the isolation is starting to make Sam uneasy. With only two weeks to go before he begins his journey back to Earth, Sam starts feeling strange: he's having inexplicable visions, and hearing impossible sounds. Then, when a routine extraction goes horribly awry, it becomes apparent that Lunar hasn't been entirely straightforward with Sam about their plans for replacing him. The new recruit seems strangely familiar, and before Sam returns to Earth, he will grapple with the realization that the life he has created may not be entirely his own. Up there, hundreds of thousands of miles from home, it appears that Sam's contract isn't the only thing about to expire. Moon has a rating of 89% on rottentomatoes.com.
3. The Matrix
This film literally re-wrote the book on stunt fighting and visual effects. It depicts a dystopian future in which reality as perceived by most humans is actually a simulated reality called "the Matrix", created by sentient machines to subdue the human population, while their bodies' heat and electrical activity are used as an energy source. Computer programmer Neo (played by Keanu Reeves) learns the truth and is drawn in to a rebellion against machines, which involves other people who have been freed from the "dream world". This film is just a beautiful cinematic masterpiece. The Matrix was nominated for 4 Academy Awards including Best Film Editing, Best Sound Effects, Best Sound Editing and Best Visual Effects, while winning all 4 and it has a rating of 87% on rottentomatoes.com.
2. Blade Runner
This is one of the most visually stunning movie I have ever seen. The film depicts a dystopian Los Angeles in November 2019 in which genetically engineered organic robots called replicants (visually indistinguishable from adult humans) are manufactured by the powerful Tyrell Corporation as well as by other "mega-corporations" around the world. Their use on Earth is banned and replicants are exclusively used for dangerous, menial or leisure work on off-world colonies. Replicants who defy the ban and return to Earth are hunted down and "retired" by police special operatives known as "Blade Runners". The plot focuses on a brutal and cunning group of recently escaped replicants hiding in Los Angeles and the burnt-out expert Blade Runner, Rick Deckard (played by Harrison Ford), who reluctantly agrees to take on one more assignment to hunt them down. This film is breathtaking and stunning. Blade Runner was nominated for two Academy Awards including Best Visual Effects and Best Art Direction and has a rating of 91% on rottentomatoes.com.
1. A Clockwork Orange
This film is freaky and comes from my favorite director of all-time Stanley Kubrick. Alex (played by Malcolm McDowell). who is a charismatic, sociopathic delinquent whose interests include classical music (especially Beethoven), rape and what is termed "ultra-violence". He leads a small gang of thugs (Pete, Georgie and Dim), whom he call his droogs (from the Russian word for friends or buddy). The film chronicles the horrific crime spree of his gang, his capture and attempted rehabilitation via controversial psychological conditioning . Alex narrates most of the film in Nadsat , a fractured adolescent slang composed of Slavic (especially Russian), English and Cockney rhyming slang. This film is a masterpiece and has one of the most brutal rap scenes in film history. A Clockwork Orange was nominated for 4 Academy Awards including Best Picture, Film Editing, Director and Adapted Screenplay, it also has a rating of 89% on rottentomatoes.com.
10. The Hunger Games: Catching Fire
I'm a huge fan of the frnachise and this is the best by far. After winning the 74th Annual Hunger Games Katniss Everdeen (played by Jennifer Lawrence) and Peeta Mellark (played by Josh Hutcherson) return home to District 12. However they must embark on a "Victory Tour" to all of the other districts, leaving behind their close friends and family. The day of the tour, President Snow (played by Donald Sutherland) threatens Katniss's best friend and pretend cousin Gale Hawthorne (played by Liam Hemsworth). During the tour, Katniss senses that rebellion is brewing in the districts, but the capitol is still firmly in control as the world prepares for the 75th Annual Hunger Games (known as a Quarter Quell), a competition that could change Panem forever.
9. Metropolis
If you want to talk about changing the game, then this is the film did just that and it's still hard to top to this day. The film follows Freder (played by Gustav Fröhlich), the wealthy son of the city's ruler, and Maria (played by Brigitte Helm), to overcome the vast gulf separating the classes of their city. Metropolis has a rating of 99% on rottentomatoes.com.
8. Mad Max; Beyond Thunderdome
This film is just simply fantastic and it is my favorite out of the three in the franchise eventhough it's critically the worst (81% on rottentomatoes.com). About 15 years after the events of Mad Max 2, nuclear war has finally destroyed what little was left of civilization. Grizzled and older, former cop Max (played by Mel Gibson) roams the Australian desert in a camel-drawn vehicle -- until father-and-son thieves Jebediah Sr. (played by Bruce Spence) and Jr. (played by Adam Cockburn) use their jury-rigged airplane to steal his possessions and means of transportation. Max soon winds up in Bartertown, a cesspool of post-apocalyptic capitalism powered by methane-rich pig manure and overseen by two competing overlords, Aunty Entity (played by Tina Turner) and Master (played by Angelo Rossitto), a crafty midget who rides around on the back of his hulking underling, Blaster (played by Paul Larsson). Seeking to re-equip himself, Max strikes a deal with the haughty Aunty to kill Blaster in ritualized combat inside Thunderdome, a giant jungle gym where Bartertown's conflicts are played out in a postmodern update of blood and circuses. Although Max manages to fell the mighty Blaster, he refuses to kill him after realizing the brute is actually a retarded boy. Aunty's henchmen murder Blaster nonetheless, then punish Max for violating the law that "Two men enter, one man leaves." Lashed to the back of a hapless pack animal and sent out into a sandstorm, a near-death Max is rescued by a band of tribal children and teens. The descendants of the victims of an airplane crash, the kids inhabit a lush valley and wait for the day when Captain Walker, the plane's pilot, will return to lead them back to civilization. Some of the children, refusing to believe that Max isn't Walker and that the glorious cities of their mythology no longer exist, set off in search of civilization on their own. Max and three tribe members must then rescue their friends from Bordertown and the clutches of Aunty Entity. Mad Max: Beyond Thunderdome has a rating of 81% on rottentomatoes.com.
7. RoboCop
The film has a lot of over-the-top action, but it was just so original and it is so much fun. Set in Detroit sometime in the near future, the film is about a policeman (played by Peter Weller) killed in the line of duty whom the department decides to resurrect as a half-human, half-robot supercop. The RoboCop is indestructible, and within a matter of weeks he has removed crime from the streets of Detroit. However, his human side is tortured by his past, and he wants revenge on the thugs who killed him. RoboCop was nominated for 3 Academy Awards including Best Sound Editing, Best Sound and Best Film Editing, while winning the Academy Award for Best Sound Editing and it has a rating of 88% on rottentomatoes.com.
6. The Fifth Element
This film has an all-star cast and it is just a fun, exciting action sci-fi film. In the movie's prologue, which is set in 1914, scientists gather in Egypt at the site of an event that transpired centuries earlier. Aliens, it seemed, arrived to collect four stones representing the four basic elements (earth, air, fire and water) - warning their human contacts that the objects were no longer safe on Earth. A few hundred years later (in the 23rd century), a huge ball of molten lava and flame is hurtling toward Earth, and scientist-holy man Victor Cornelius (played by Ian Holm) declares that in order to prevent it from destroying the planet, the same four elemental stones must be combined with the fifth element, as embodied by a visitor from another world named Leeloo (played by Milla Jovovich). However, if the force of evil presents itself to the stones instead, the Earth will be destroyed, and an evil being named Zorg (played by Gary Oldman) will trigger the disaster. Despite her remarkable powers, Leeloo needs help with her mission, and she chooses her accomplice, military leader-turned-cab driver Korben Dallas (played by Bruce Willis), when she literally falls through the roof of his taxi. The Fifth Element was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Sound Editing and it has a rating of 71% on rottentomatoes.com.
5. Planet of the Apes
This film really helped the sci-fi genre get off the ground and it really presented a lot of new ideas and had a lot of similarities with what was going on in the world at that time. George Taylor (played by Charlton Heston), one of several astronauts on a long, long space mission whose spaceship crash-lands on a remote planet, seemingly devoid of intelligent life. Soon the astronaut learns that this planet is ruled by a race of talking, thinking, reasoning apes who hold court over a complex, multilayered civilization. In this topsy-turvy society, the human beings are grunting, inarticulate primates, penned-up like animals. When ape leader Dr. Zaius (played by Maurice Evans) discovers that the captive Taylor has the power of speech, he reacts in horror and insists that the astronaut be killed. But sympathetic ape scientists Cornelius (played by Roddy McDowell) and Dr. Zira (played by Kim Hunter) risk their lives to protect Taylor -- and to discover the secret of their planet's history that Dr. Zaius and his minions guard so jealously. In the end, it is Taylor who stumbles on the truth about the Planet of the Apes: "Damn you! Damn you! Goddamn you all to hell!" Planet of the Apes was nominated for 2 Academy Awards including Best Costume Design and Best Original Score and it has a rating of 89% on rottentomatoes.com.
4. Moon
This movie is fantastic, vastly underrated and it is Sam Rockwell's best performance and he was robbed of an Academy award nomination as well as the entire film. For three long years, Sam Bell (played by Sam Rockwell) has dutifully harvested Helium 3 for Lunar, a company that claims it holds the key to solving humankind's energy crisis. As Sam's contract comes to an end, the lonely astronaut looks forward to returning to his wife and daughter down on Earth, where he will retire early and attempt to make up for lost time. His work on the Selene moon base has been enlightening -- the solitude helping him to reflect on the past and overcome some serious anger issues -- but the isolation is starting to make Sam uneasy. With only two weeks to go before he begins his journey back to Earth, Sam starts feeling strange: he's having inexplicable visions, and hearing impossible sounds. Then, when a routine extraction goes horribly awry, it becomes apparent that Lunar hasn't been entirely straightforward with Sam about their plans for replacing him. The new recruit seems strangely familiar, and before Sam returns to Earth, he will grapple with the realization that the life he has created may not be entirely his own. Up there, hundreds of thousands of miles from home, it appears that Sam's contract isn't the only thing about to expire. Moon has a rating of 89% on rottentomatoes.com.
3. The Matrix
This film literally re-wrote the book on stunt fighting and visual effects. It depicts a dystopian future in which reality as perceived by most humans is actually a simulated reality called "the Matrix", created by sentient machines to subdue the human population, while their bodies' heat and electrical activity are used as an energy source. Computer programmer Neo (played by Keanu Reeves) learns the truth and is drawn in to a rebellion against machines, which involves other people who have been freed from the "dream world". This film is just a beautiful cinematic masterpiece. The Matrix was nominated for 4 Academy Awards including Best Film Editing, Best Sound Effects, Best Sound Editing and Best Visual Effects, while winning all 4 and it has a rating of 87% on rottentomatoes.com.
2. Blade Runner
This is one of the most visually stunning movie I have ever seen. The film depicts a dystopian Los Angeles in November 2019 in which genetically engineered organic robots called replicants (visually indistinguishable from adult humans) are manufactured by the powerful Tyrell Corporation as well as by other "mega-corporations" around the world. Their use on Earth is banned and replicants are exclusively used for dangerous, menial or leisure work on off-world colonies. Replicants who defy the ban and return to Earth are hunted down and "retired" by police special operatives known as "Blade Runners". The plot focuses on a brutal and cunning group of recently escaped replicants hiding in Los Angeles and the burnt-out expert Blade Runner, Rick Deckard (played by Harrison Ford), who reluctantly agrees to take on one more assignment to hunt them down. This film is breathtaking and stunning. Blade Runner was nominated for two Academy Awards including Best Visual Effects and Best Art Direction and has a rating of 91% on rottentomatoes.com.
1. A Clockwork Orange
This film is freaky and comes from my favorite director of all-time Stanley Kubrick. Alex (played by Malcolm McDowell). who is a charismatic, sociopathic delinquent whose interests include classical music (especially Beethoven), rape and what is termed "ultra-violence". He leads a small gang of thugs (Pete, Georgie and Dim), whom he call his droogs (from the Russian word for friends or buddy). The film chronicles the horrific crime spree of his gang, his capture and attempted rehabilitation via controversial psychological conditioning . Alex narrates most of the film in Nadsat , a fractured adolescent slang composed of Slavic (especially Russian), English and Cockney rhyming slang. This film is a masterpiece and has one of the most brutal rap scenes in film history. A Clockwork Orange was nominated for 4 Academy Awards including Best Picture, Film Editing, Director and Adapted Screenplay, it also has a rating of 89% on rottentomatoes.com.
So ladies and gentlemen what are some of you favorite dystopian themed films and what do you think of my list? Let me know in the comments section below and let your voice be heard.
Jonah Sparks
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