Loveland continues a long line of super stylish, super cinematic, and sometimes super weird Australian sci-fi movies. Travis Johnson picks the 10 all-time greatest.
Australian director Ivan Sen’s neon-and-rain-drenched cyber-noir Loveland is just one example of Australia’s rich heritage of science fiction movies. We don’t make many, but the ones we do tend to leave a mark, operating outside the constraints of accepted genre conventions and offering up unique takes on the future.
Want an example? Here are 10, all worth checking out.
Dark City (1998)
Alex Proyas’ follow up to The Crow stars Rufus Sewell as a man who begins to realise his benighted, art deco city is controlled by pale-fleshed aliens called Strangers, who can alter both the architecture of the city and the minds and memories of its citizens. Wanted for murder, he goes on the run, but his only hope is to bring the very walls of reality crashing down.
Overshadowed by the similarly themed The Matrix at the time of its release, Dark City is a gorgeous parable of free will vs conformity, boasting immaculate production design and a stacked supporting cast that includes Jennifer Connolly, Kiefer Sutherland and the late William Hurt.
I Am Mother (2019)
After a worldwide apocalyptic event, a young woman (Clara Rugaard) is raised from an embryo by a robot, Mother (voiced by Rose Byrne) programmed to replenish the human race. However, when an older women (Hilary Swank) intrudes into their high tech bunker, she begins to suspect that Mother has not been telling the entire truth. This post-apocalyptic three-hander is the debut feature of Grant Sputore, who brings philosophical substance to the well-worn “Evil A.I.” trope.
The Infinite Man (2014)
The romantic weekend planned by scientist Dean (Josh McConville) for he and his girlfriend Lana (Hannah Marshall) is ruined by the arrival of her obnoxious ex Terry (Alex Dimitriades). What’s a genius to do but invent time travel in order to go back in time and fix things? Unfortunately, when Dean arrives in the past, his past self is already there, and so begins a darkly comic tale of love, yearning and temporal paradoxes. Made for pocket change at a single location, Hugh Sullivan’s high concept rom-com is masterpiece of creativity over budget.
The Mad Max series
Yes, all of them, but that’s mainly to placate the purists who bristle at the fact that 2015’s Fury Road is the best of the bunch by a long chalk. George Miller’s ongoing (Furiosa is in pre-production now) apocalyptic saga follows the exploits of former cop Max Rockatansky (Mel Gibson, then Tom Hardy) as he uses his incredible driving skills to help the innocent in the radiation-blasted but seemingly oil-rich wasteland.
Rockatansky takes on a wide variety of punkish grotesques, played by the likes of Hugh Keays-Byrne (Mad Max), Vernon Wells (The Road Warrior), Tina Turner (Beyond Thunderdome) and Hugh Keays-Byrne (again—Miller likes reusing actors—in Fury Road). The result: Australia’s greatest action franchise and Australia’s greatest sci-fi franchise, all in one fuel-injected package.
Occupation: Rainfall (2021)
You can’t fault writer/director Luke Sparke for ambition: no other Australian directors have mounted a full scale War of the Worlds/Independence Day style alien invasion movie, and he’s done it twice.
2018’s Occupation saw Australia take the brunt of a massive incursion by conquering aliens, but it’s 2020’s Occupation: Rainfall which really has the goods, with a mixed bag of heroes haring off across Occupied Australia to Pine Gap in hopes of uncovering a secret weapon. Expect dogfights, running gun battles, chases, escapes and more as Aussie action mainstay Dan Ewing leads us to victory (hopefully).
Otherlife (2017)
Arrow’s Jessica de Gouw is Ren, a researcher working on a drug that can induce artificial memories in subjects. Her end goal is using the technology to rebuild the mind of her comatose brother. The government wants to use it as a punitive alternative to prison, implanting memories of years of isolation into criminals.
The stage is set for a paranoid high-tech conspiracy thriller, with Ren starting to wonder if she’s being subjected to the memory-making process. Directed by Ben C. Lucas (Wasted on the Young) and based on the novel Solitaire by Kelley Eskridge, this is a smart, tight little thriller.
Predestination (2014)
The Spierig Brothers (Undead, Daybreakers) adapt Robert Heinlein’s twisty short story All You Zombies, bringing us the convoluted, cerebral, but breathlessly exciting tale that sees veteran Temporal Agent Ethan Hawke and rookie Sarah Snook try to track down a terrorist bomber who travels through time.
That is really all the news that’s fit to print: this is one film in which the spoilers really do matter, and you’re better off going in completely cold. Suffice to say this is a top notch head-scratcher from both one of the modern masters of sci-fi and two of our finest genre proponents.
The Rover (2014)
Animal Kingdom director David Michôd’s post-apocalyptic thriller feels like a particularly grim response to the original Mad Max, depicting a world on the brink of complete collapse. After his car is stolen by a gang, Guy Pearce’s bitter loner Eric sets off in hot pursuit, teaming up with Reynolds (Robert Pattinson), the mentally challenged brother of one of the thieves.
What unfolds is tonally of a piece with Wake in Fright: a bleak, violent odyssey across the outback and into the heart of darkness, as Eric struggles to reclaim the one thing that holds any meaning for him in this fallen world. Grim but great.
These Final Hours (2014)
As a global firestorm descends on Perth, Western Australia, all James (Nathan Phillips) wants to do is get to the end of the world party his mate is throwing. Instead he finds himself caring for young Rose (Angourie Rice in her first film role) and trying to reunite her with her family. That involves driving across a city gone mad as people grapple—or fail to grapple—with their imminent and inescapable demise.
Zak Hilditch’s pre-apocalypse mini-epic is a minor classic, forefronting humanity in the face of oblivion but not skimping on the action and horror inherent in the subgenre.
Upgrade (2018)
After his wife is killed and he is paralysed in a horrific attack, mechanic Grey Trace (Logan Marshall-Green) is implanted with an experimental A.I. chip that can control his motor functions for him. But the chip, called STEM, is capable of much more than that. Grey soon sets off on a roaring rampage of revenge, with STEM piloting his body whenever combat is called for.
How far is Grey willing to go and who is really controlling who? Saw mastermind Leigh Whannell serves up a note-perfect cyberpunk actioner, complete with some of the most inventive fight choreography we’ve seen in years.
