American Scientist

This Sunday, Captain James Tiberius Kirk celebrates his –218th birthday. (Captain Kirk, you don’t look a day under –219. But I’m sure you hear that from all the ladies.) Not coincidentally, March 22 is also William Shatner’s birthday. What better way to celebrate than with a weekend’s worth of science movie classics?

Happy Birthday, Captain Kirk!

Here at American Scientist we’ve put together some recommendations—nine movies in all, some of them true classics, others hopeful classics, and a couple that are science classics for all the wrong reasons. From your living room command chair you can reflect on how we envision the future or, as Kirk himself did occasionally, revisit the past. Or you can hit autopilot and just have a great time.

Armageddon and The Core

Cue up this double bill of what are widely regarded as the most scientifically inaccurate modern sci-fi blockbusters. Try making a drinking game out of them (take a sip at every "that could never happen" moment) if you dare. Most people won’t make it halfway through the first. Double shot when you hear the word "unobtainium." —Corey S. Powell

Armageddon's trailer:

The Core's trailer:

Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind

This poetic, sci-fi comedy-drama begins at the end. Jim Carrey plays Joel Barish, a man brokenhearted when his relationship with Kate Winslett’s beautiful, high-spirited Clementine ends. Desperate, he seeks out a futuristic medical treatment that promises to obliterate the romance from his memory. Although Joel changes his mind about the procedure midway through, he’s too heavily sedated to stop it, and much of the film’s suspense comes from his efforts to preserve some memories of Clem. Joel and Clem’s ill-fated love story is revealed in reverse order, in a montage of dreamy vignettes that are Joel’s memories being systematically targeted and erased. Using handcrafted, in-camera techniques such as forced perspective, director Michel Gondry makes the portrayal of this loss as visually surprising as it is thought provoking. —Barbara Aulicino

Europa Report

In the real world, NASA is readying a robotic mission to Jupiter’s moon Europa, and a private organization is trying to mount a one-way human trip to Mars. Europa Report mashes up these two ideas into a documentary-style fiction about a group of astronauts traveling to Europa in search of alien life. The movie, which was heavily guided by input from NASA scientists, blends taut sci-fi dramatics with unusually realistic engineering and visual details. It was largely overlooked on its theatrical release but is well worth checking out on DVD or streaming. —Corey S. Powell

The Insider

This 1999 thriller and true story follows the investigative journalists and scientist who exposed the tobacco industry’s concealment of the dangers of their products. Unlike so many scientists portrayed in the media, whistleblower Jeffrey Wigand, played superbly by Russell Crowe, seems real: He’s a thoughtful and soft-spoken guy who feels conflicted between protecting his career and family and doing what he thinks is right. (Added bonus, he wears stellar 1980s wire-rims.) Al Pacino plays 60 Minutes producer Lowell Bergman, who pursues the story despite the frustrating obstacles that slow down reporting. As in many true stories put to film, some of the details are changed or left out. Nevertheless, director Michael Mann succeeds in taking material that other filmmakers might consider lackluster and crafting a suspenseful, riveting flick. —Katie L. Burke

Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan

It’s remembered most vividly for the overripe performances of William Shatner and Ricardo Montalban, and rightly so. But the plot—built around an advanced geoengineering device that can be used as either a research tool or a weapon—is surprisingly thoughtful and well ahead of its time. —Corey S. Powell

The Story of Louis Pasteur

If you want to go vintage, this 1936 Academy Award–winning gem shows—you guessed it—the story of Louis Pasteur. In this fictionalized biopic, the French biologist works to convince the skeptical scientific community that microbes exist and cause infection. As you can see in the trailer, Pasteur, played by the grandiose Paul Muni, is pretty intense. But then again, so is everyone else, in that endearing, theatrical 1930s style of acting. What I love about this movie is that it doesn’t focus on the textbook examples Pasteur is known for, such as the development of milk pasteurization or the experiment that debunked spontaneous generation. Rather, it focuses on the mockery he endured from other scientists as well as his major breakthroughs that tend not to get the same level of attention, such as his discovery of vaccination treatments for anthrax and rabies. —Katie L. Burke

The Terminator

James Cameron’s classic killer-robot epic contains some sly commentary about artificial intelligence (somebody forgot to install the Three Laws of Robotics!), along with one of the most logically airtight time-travel plotlines in the sci-fi world. No wonder this movie is still in heavy rotation at the rest stop along the way to the observatories atop Mauna Kea. —Corey S. Powell

WarGames

Before he was Ferris Beuller, Matthew Broderick was David Lightman, a high school kid we now see as the prototypical teenage hacker, right down to the hoodie. Shy, charming, and whip smart, Lightman gets by at school but lives for video-arcade domination and for the hours he spends hunched in front of his elaborate home computer setup (impressive for its time), programming and mischief making. What begins as pranking takes an ominous turn when Lightman attempts to accesses a game manufacturer’s computer but inadvertently hacks into a U.S. Department of Defense supercomputer instead—and when the game he thought was Global Thermonuclear War turns out to be, well, global thermonuclear war. Despite all the reasons it shouldn’t (myriad technological and political changes, wildly overblown capabilities of AI at the time), WarGames holds up as a thriller 32 years after its release, thanks to thoroughly entertaining performances by Broderick, Ally Sheedy, Barry Corbin, and Dabney Coleman; a tight script by Lawrence Lasker and Walter F. Parkes that deftly mixes terror with levity; and director John Badham’s emphasis on humanity and relatability. For some viewers, WarGames provides a portal back to the Cold War, green screens, and Jane Fonda–style workout wear; for others it may be a visceral introduction to the effects of the arms race and why Cold War politics mattered. Either way, it’s time well spent—grab some popcorn and enjoy the ride! —Dianne Timblin