15 Greatest Hard Science Fiction Movies Of All Time
10. Children Of Men
Whereas Gattaca explored the idea of mankind created in the image of a genetically engineering superior class, Children Of Men sees the population of the world reeling from a genetic defect in which mass infertility has left the species on the brink of extinction, with the discovery of a pregnant refugee perhaps the only hope for the future.
If Gattaca was a cinematic nod to Aldous Huxley, Children Of Men's world of terrorism, surveillance and an authoritarian police state is much closer to that of George Orwell's 1984. Director Alfonso Cuarón constructs a science fiction world a million miles away from his later film Gravity, full of run-down city streets and apartment blocks damaged by civil conflict, all shot in desaturated hues by cinematographer legend Emmanuel Lubwezki.
On top of the dystopian framework of species-wide degeneration sits subtle layers of additional complexity - the tension between faith and hope; the descent into nihilism following on from the dissolution of the Christian faith - which makes Children Of Men a modern science fiction masterpiece.