It’s fascinating to see how the imaginations of designers are complimented by the ever-evolving intricacies of special effects on film and the evolution of the spaceship in film and the role it plays in the message and tone of the film.
The old paradigm of constructing a sci fi movie pre CGI and all other sorts of cinematographic wonder involved a concentrated effort on the plot. The focus was to explain why astronauts were embarking on a space mission and who they encountered when they got there.
There was little mention of what vehicle took them to the land beyond the stars; although the intelligence and imagination was there in droves from a century’s worth of best-selling authors, the social and political context was still evolving and the computer-animation and graphical demonstrations of the inner workings of the most flamboyant space vessels did not yet cater for their portrayal on celluloid print.
As time elapsed and the digital geniuses got their alien paws into the inner workings of the design and production offices, we’ve had mostly all possible encounters with spacefolk and we’ve milked the concept of why we’re going to space dry.
Looking back at the first few films to feature a space craft of some variety, more thought was focused on the plot of the film and explanation as to why we were needed in space, which badass evil aliens we had to fight off and which planets needed their natural resources pillaged and raped.
The psyche of early sci fi filmmakers involved overlooking the personality of the vessel itself. The vessel was just that – a vessel to facilitate the story – a means to enter the discourse and tell some morally ambiguous tale of alien worlds, parallel universes and the shortcomings of man.
With retro design budgets; producers and innovators couldn’t rely on massive production values so the story took focus. Without a solid story it’d be a hard sell. Today’s design budgets allow for the vessel to take centre stage quietly or otherwise, whilst providing useful technical insight as to the origins and inspiration for the construction of the model.
Although contemporary movie makers have the budget to make a fully fledged bastard of a spaceship, they have learned their craft from the strong story lines of the sci fi pioneers so recognise that all boxes need to be ticked.
One of the first films to ever feature space aircraft was Fritz Lang’s Metropolis, an uncomfortable silent capitalist vs. workers dystopia set in outer space which directly referenced the economic struggle in the inter war period of Weimar Germany.
Absurdly futuristic and recognised as being an early pioneer hosting the core ingredients of what would become crude sci fi, Metropolis made in 1927 encapsulated a world where monorail, aircraft and early cars denote the planets main modes of transportation.
Having a look at the first few films concerned with the voyage into outer space, the space craft models are based on the actual models built during the space race. Rocketship X-M (1950) detailed the first celluloid excursion into the outer sphere when the astronauts had a moral adventure on Mars.
The ship itself was little more than an identikit of the NASA shuttles of the time, if a little fatter. Looking back through modern sci f-eyes it’s all a bit camp. Filming and production was rushed for a quick release to edge ahead of rival film Destination Moon, but that doesn’t divert attention from (by today’s standards) the ludicrously phallical shiny headed rocket. Very basic, smooth shaft pointy head, we get the idea.
In 1953, HG Wells’ seminal text War of the Worlds was adapted for the big screen and its production team negotiated the design of one of the first martian space ships in film.Without wishing to take anything away from the project, the martian space craft utilised little imagination and wound up looking fairly identical to the emerging range of stealth aircraft being developed by the US forces. With a lamppost attached.
Again, the focus of the film was on the insignificance of man and the prospect of our world crashing down as we stand helpless in defence, not on the detail employed to involve a bombastic spaceship. It was only when the 1960’s came that the concept of the spaceship really took off as an entity in itself.
First Man into Space in 1959 reverted back to a stealth plane model breaching the sky/galaxy threshold. Films for the sci-fi fans of the 1960’s were never really tested to any notable advertising models; artistic eyes were satisfied by designers of the craft following the take what you’re given idea.
It was not until 1968 when Stanley Kubrick and Arthur C. Clarke’s momentous 2001: A Space Odyssey came around when the era of the cinematic, and very fabulous, space ship came into its own with personality in droves.
Discovery One, the ship in the film was a honed craft more indicative of a later-genre space station. The ship was beautifully and thoughtfully designed and helped the spaceship idea move away from the rocket shape and into a more universal vessel.
Kubrick’s mantle as one of the pioneers of cinema was honed in the creation of this beast of film. The necessity of the vessel and its intricate inner workings were combed through whilst the visual designers instigated marvelous new features to really set the spacecraft and dynamic effects into the wider context of the film thus combining two entities.
The need to convey a strong story with a salient message and need to explain the third dimension of space did not waver yet the spaceship had an identity of its own, a functionality we got to see the working of and became a personality in itself that complimented and enhanced the film. Spaceship effects and storyline working together in perfect harmony to create a monster film – as 2001 undoubtedly was.
Spaceship miniatures were highly detailed and carefully photographed for a realistic depth of field whilst Kubrick’s deliberately assembled team of design contractors combined shots of their model spaceships with hand drawn rotoscopes and utilised careful motion control work. The then-new front projection technique was used where a pre-filmed scene has a new set of images projected and dubbed on top also using new soundstage photography.
For scenes set in zero-gravity environments, were staged with hidden wires, mirror shots, and large-scale rotating sets. Slit-scan is a photography-meets-film trick to create a “stretching” or warping effect such as that of starship Enterprise-D when it engaged warp drive and in the finale of 2001, the hallucinogenic scenery was created in slit-scan.
Speaking of warp speed, the original series of Star Trek of 1966 and its USS Enterprise ship was absolutely seminal for the space ship concept forging ahead. Arguably the first celluloid spaceship with a personality of its own, before post-production could be finished on 2001.
The vessel was an ambitious design taking account of some pretty minute detail and based on real scientific concepts with some technologically superior plays on relatively trivial items; the sliding doors for instance.
The initial 1701 design of the Enterprise was the ship that first took Kirk and his hardy bunch of slender spandex sorts to the final frontier in the revolutionary and, for science fiction – evolutionary, adventures into the beyond. The development of Enterprise models would be the lynchpin for a multi-billion pound media franchise with films, merchandise and numerous off-shoots.
Discovery One was similarly based on ambitious, if unproven, science and moved the concept of a starship into a new era of film and sci fi. They gave it lights, a deck, a bridge, a style a scheme and a star quality.
Colour television was asserting its dominance whilst the space race, cold war and, harnessing and using nuclear power led film makers, designers and writers to really go to town on the concept. Ships would become ever more elaborate and impressive; saturating the genre until they would become formulaic.
Solaris from 1972 harked back to a more primitive era of a science fiction storyline in its dialogue and morality yet is set mostly on a space station in orbit around a planet called of the same name. The film was photoscopically reminiscent of 2001 but graphically a lesser project.
The film concentrates on the thoughts and the conscience of its characters and its complex and slow storytelling is in stark contrast to most western space-obsessed films, yet the craft used art and other artistic media to woo the viewer rather than dazzling effects to captivate them. Albeit this is a Russian film without the dynamic buttons and widgets at the disposal of the labs of Hollywood but by this token, 2001 had not yet crystalised the format sci-fi movies would take.
Close Encounters of the Third Kind was another example, if a lot bigger than Solaris, of the director and graphics department letting the hint and suggestion of the spaceship’s awe-inspiring appearance do the talking without flexing their muscles with the interior. Another instance of awarding respect to the land beyond without insulting the audience with effects just to wipe out the budget sheet.
I guess one of Spielberg’s best director tricks from that era (Jaws) was the hint of peril being more satisfactorily and mysteriously than overt peril itself. Nonetheless, the film still utilised the same team that worked on 2001 with a ridiculous budget.
There came a change with the onset of much better graphical prowess in Star Wars with these contraptions you may recognise.
The Star Wars trilogy brought us more of the same but with revolutionary graphics and improved interaction between the studio and the space station setting not least in the award winning sound improvements developed for the film and now a household name.
Lucas hired Ben Burtt to oversee the sound effects on A New Hope and the job he did was such that the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences presented him with a Special Achievement Award.
Lucasfilm also developed the THX sound reproduction, which is now a standard format for movie theaters, screening rooms, home theaters, computer speakers, gaming consoles, and car audio systems, for Return of the Jedi.All of which superlative engineering techniques helped to enforce the popularity and importance of the space travel genre in modern cinema. Star Wars was able to delve deep into the morality of man through a battle as old as the bible in good vs. evil. The fact that the setting, contraptions and vessels used to portray the story were so compelling and detailed set a precedent for merchandisers, furthering the need to detail a films setting and world to the nth degree.
Obviously you don’t need me to enforce the now rather hackneyed message, but Star Wars was seminal for countless reasons affecting almost every tentacle of cinema let alone just the sci fi genre.
From Star Wars it really was all systems go as advances in editing and hyper-technology imposed its influence all over films with a fairly sized budget.
Ridley Scott’s Alien from 1979 it could be argued, was a scaled down saga of the Star Wars ilk. Set aboard space stations and relying on space crafts and ships to award its unique cinematography the kudos it eventually received. The settings and contexts were a mix of scaled down models, many of which were lifted from airfix kits, enhanced by bluescreens and advances in sound technology.
Much of the artwork was provided by HR Geiger’s blueprints as graphical integration packages allowed the film to be based on his artwork and pseudo set designs.
Alien, along with Star Wars, harnessed another evolving example of merging a strong moral tale with twists and turns whilst the setting itself: large, bombastic, intricate and full of every tentacle of life, accessed every artistic amoeba of the viewer.
Before science fiction had really established itself at the fore of modern cinema, a decent-sized space movie was a once-every-two-or-three-years phenomenon and really captured the imaginations of star gazers, conspirators and film fans; to watch the evolving concepts and medium take shape.
At the turn of the naughties cinema-goers voted with their feet in avoiding sci fi brutes; sure they pack a punch but there was little substance in there. Directors would have a budget to play with and dazzled with special effects but left the storyline and acting to fade into the background. A host of such movies began to become a little too recognisable and predictable. Lost in Space or Red Planet for example.
The context-setting films of the modern genre as technology has advanced has allowed creators to create whole universes based on CGI, elevated stunts, model reenactments and all the techniques pioneered by those early sci fi films.
They have the option to shoot for a heartless, brainless space blast-em-up which usually requires a lot of thought into the guns and the spacecraft. A soulful moral tale of man’s inhumanity to man and the significance of his being in a context we can’t comprehend. Or perhaps a combination of the two where the graphics work in parallel to the storyline and none supersede the other. With a sound moral code and message that treats the human condition the film works hand in hand with a beautifully complementary setting.
The last state to mention is when directors and artistic designers seek to totally create a new setting where the world as we know it is humped and a whole new thing is happening that involved aliens and cyborgs and inter-planetary relations as we travel from star to ship.
Some notable creations of modern film fall into one of the above categories, see if you can spot what film they featured in. Hover over for the answers.
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