Technological Spectacle

Prabhanjan Mutalik

Technology has benefited Science Fiction in two ways: it has enabled works of
science fiction to materialize into reality (typewriters, special effects in movies) and it
has fertilized the soil of its imagination. Science Fiction has always viewed
technology as a catalyst, a harbinger of change, a vehicle to its ideas. A good work of
SF uses technology to hack away at the in-essentials in a story, so that the characters
ponder on problems slightly more complex than the mundane. In "A Brave New
World", the people in the society are provided for in every possible way through
technology (genetic engineering for one) and as a result, they spend their lives
indulging in hedonistic pursuits. The members of the society are drugged (with a
psychedelic called Soma, ironic in its usage, as the Ancient Indian sages used it to
attain the heights of spiritual ecstasy) to distract themselves from the emptiness and
angst that lies beyond. The oeuvre of technology in Cinema is invariably a product of
history.

Technology, in a direct way, seeped into the SF genre through movies, pioneered by
Georges Mlis. He used trick photography to induce special effects, heavily
influenced by his career as a magician and an illusionist. Technology, in this case,
was treated as an extension of a magical performance. As industrialization took hold
of Europe, the dangers of a mechanised technological world were seen as an
anathema to the romantic notion of a world filled with nature and spontaneity. Films
such as Frankenstein (1910) and Metropolis (1927) were born out of this paranoia. As
SF hit the Hollywood market in the 1950s, it exploded into pop culture, leading to
the "Golden Age of Science Fiction Films". In America, technology was viewed as an
optimistic force, a window into the future, a speculation on how things could be. The
space race of the 50's drove SF into the territory of space exploration and alien
invasions. A slew of creature based B-movies took hold of the American Imagination.
The movies dealt primarily with technology as magic portals and devices, never
delving deeper into its societal or philosophical implications. Stanley Kubrick's
"2001: A Space Odyssey" (1968) opened a new chapter in SF; ambitious in its scope,
grand in its vision, ground-breaking in its special effects, and utterly bewildering in
its philosophical import, the movie attracted and challenged the audience visually,
emotionally and intellectually. The trend started by Kubrick was followed into the
70's with explorations and eclectic synthesis of SF with other genres. Andrei
Tarkovsky's Solaris (1972) used technology as merely a vehicle to probe the deep,
introspective landscapes of human nature. Star Wars (1977) melded SF with
mythology and Jungian Archetypes to great success. Silent Running (1972) dealt with
the environmental concerns of scientific progress.

William Gibsons cyberpunk masterpiece "Neuromancer" stripped the spectacle and

magic out of technology and made it accessible to everyone. The clean, smooth
design and operations of machines in the movies of the previous era became an in-
elegant mess of wires, grease and dirt. Hermetically sealed and holistic gadgets of the
previous era were transformed into dissected, dismembered, reverse engineered
conglomeration of overused machines parts. Technology trickles to the lowest strata
of the society and undergoes a transformation into the banal and the soulless. This is
clearly evidenced from the opening lines of Neuromancer The sky above the port
was the color of television, tuned to a dead channel". The neon landscapes of Tokyo
became an expression of the dystopic reality of technology. The aesthetic percolated
into the film medium with movies like Blade Runner (1982), Terminator(1984),
Alien(1979). They depicted the societal and sociological impact of technology.
Concepts of trans-humanism and dangers of artificial intelligence were seen as a
threat to the human identity.

The emergence of the internet in the 1990's spurred the cyberpunk genre further,
with "The Matrix" (1999) being a trendsetter. "Ghost in the shell" (1995) deserves a
special mention as it deals with weighty issues of memory, trans-humanism and
consciousness in defining the human identity. "The Matrix", heavily influenced by
the works of Lewis Caroll and Jean Baudrillard, viewed technology as a creator of an
existential landscape, a virtual reality, an alternative universe, a simulation.
Therefore the case can be made technology in the works of SF have been constantly
reinterpreted by the hopes, dreams and ideas of the generation that gave birth to it.