FIVE SCI-FI FILMS YOU'LL PROBABLY NEVER SEE

The UK cinema market isn't a big deal, globally speaking.  There aren't enough of us here to make our island that important - from a purely financial perspective.  Therefore, sadly ... annoyingly, a lot of films simply never see the light of day here, either because they can't get a distributor or because the distributor they do have doesn't think a UK release will be financially worthwhile.

Thankfully thanks to the miracle of internetography and free trade ... it is possible to import DVDs or download films you really want to see, irrespective of where they were released.

Nowadays, if you know a film is out there ... you can usually track a copy down.  I hardly need add at this point that independent and art-house films need your support even more than big mainstream Hollywood releases and, therefore, downloading them illegally for free is even more damaging to the careers of the people who made the film.  So, if you like their work please pay them for it.  Then they will be able to make something else you enjoy. 

Now, a few cases in point ... trailers for films which, unless I'm very much mistaken, will not be playing at a multiplex near you any time soon ... if you, like me, live in the UK.

Because of the page width of my blog, these YouTube links run off the side of the page on some browsers so, to see the full picture double click on the image.  A second window will open taking you to YouTube where you can watch the trailer in glorious fullscreen if you choose.

Cos, well, cos this is my blog ... I'll start with science fiction films:

The first is a film that has just played at the SXSW festival - Cargo: a horror/sci-fi from Switzerland that bears more than a passing resemblance to Pandorum and contains not a hint of a cuckoo clock ...



Secondly, another SXSW debut: Mars, a film which seems to follow on the motion-capture work Richard Linklater did with Waking Life and A Scanner Darkly:



This atmospheric little piece was released in Europe in 2009, Metropia:



And finally, two films which became available on DVD in The States in 2009, firstly: Battle For Terra:



Last and very much not least is the only one of these films I've seen: Dreams With Sharp Teeth - a documentary about the great SF writer Harlan Ellison.  I saw this film at its only UK screening at 2008's Edinburgh Film Festival.  It is a great film about writing as a career, it's a great film about this particular writer and, even if you don't know how great a writer he is, he'll win you over in what is, essentially, as magnificent an extended interview as I've ever seen an SF writer give.  A real must see ... and only available on DVD in The States.



Go on, try something the big corporations don't want you to see ... because they don't think you matter.  If enough of us import enough films ... they might decide that we are important enough, after all.