Alien, Outland and Moon - a subgenre of SF?

[Toby Frost]

I've been watching Moon, and thought that it made a good companion with Alien and Outland (there is some overlap between the makers of these two films). It felt as if there was a small subgenre in here, and I wondered if there were any other films like them. I would define the main characteristics as:

- Utilitarian, industrial, probably near-future space exploration
- Blue-collar characters in small-scale adventures
- A theme or background involving the corruption of large companies
- Either no alien life or first-contact stories
- A sense of lonliness and the difficult of adjusting to life away from Earth
- No internet, bionics or biological tech (for humans, anyhow).

I suppose Aliens and Prometheus are close to this as well, although the former is very military and the latter rather too slick. Can anyone think of any others?

 

[Vince W]

Hmmm... A thinker to be sure.

Silent Running comes to mind.
Elysium comes close, but that is on and near Earth only.

Can't think of anything else at the moment.

 

[BAYLOR]

Rogue Moon by Algis Budry

 

[J-Sun]

Bladerunner is like this except for being earth-based. Dark Star is like this except for being deep space and being crazy and silly. Europa Report is like this except for being more ambiguous about the corporation (well, and having a crew of scientists, but they're just corporate workers in this context). Obviously, Terminator has a lot of this except for being earth-based and time-travel oriented. I don't think Aliens is disqualified due to its military component as that's just another form of blue-collar work in this context. It's probably with those two Cameron films that I first noticed a lot of the components you list.

In print, Allen Steele's Near Space stories and novels kind of define this subgenre - not as originator as he started in '89 or so, but as hitting all the points. Except for Cherryh's Merchanter/Alliance stuff being deep space and having more complex hierarchies and the occasional alien (especially if you include a lot of her other vaguely connected novels) that would also fit to a great extent. But parts depend on whether you focus on loneliness and difficulty adjusting in space terms or on just having that component at all. She often has the lonely outcast human struggling to fit in with aliens which is exactly on one of your points and diametrically opposed to another. But, yeah, "corporate machine/crushed cog" SF is definitely a thing and emblematic of our multinational conglomerates busily displacing the nation states to the great advantage of the common man.

 

[Toby Frost]

Thanks for the suggestions. I'd query Blade Runner, since it has a big influence of '40s film noir, but it's certainly on the edges, especially in the corporate aspect. Maybe District 9 almost works. Sunshine might work too, but I don't remember it being especially good.

I strongly suspect that we are currently living in '70s SF, with all the fun and exciting bits taken out. Only yesterday the Government made another attempt to sell the NHS to Weyland Yutani (climbs off soapbox).

 

[tinkerdan]

In a way Terry Gilliam's Brazil- though again on earth could easily fall in this category.
But then so could Luc Besson's The Fifth Element
Then we could stretch and add Gilliam's 12 Monkeys
of course all those would just lead the The Handmaidens Tale

 

[Venusian Broon]

Screamers? A reasonable attempt IMHO of a relatively weak PKD short story, Second Variety.

 

[Bick]

I think you are right that this is a definable sub-genre, Toby. I have two suggestions for the list. They don't meet the description as well as Outland, but they kinda work:
The Thing (Kurt Russell is rather blue collar, antarctica's a lonely place, first encounter, industrial environment, no high tech)
Pitch Black (blue-collar protagonists, desolate planet, creepy first encounters, no high tech of the sort you mention I think)

 

[Toby Frost]

Good call. I always thought Alien vs Thing would be more interesting than Aliens vs Predator. Why would the Alien have evolved acidic blood but to prevent the Thing's tentacles from absorbing it?

I've never seen Screamers. Second Variety does contain my favourite bit from a PKD story, where the hero goes back to his base and speaks to someone through the intercom. I think I would exclude most of the big dystopias, though, because they seem to be about fascism and Stalinism rather than the sort of corporate excess of Alien and Outland. Perhaps Farenheit 451 is an exception, but it might be a bit too weird.

Although neither film has quite the right (depressing) tone, Robocop and Jurassic Park (the novel much more than the film) almost fit.