July is over and with it the dog days of summer. We still have a few weeks to bask in the sun, but there’s nothing better than sitting outside after a hot day and watching a good movie. If you’re looking for a thrilling sci-fi flick on Netflix to watch this weekend, you’re in luck: we’ve once again picked out the streamer’s best films for this month. Whether it’s neo-noir dramas exploring the intersection of nostalgia and grief, grandiose space opera epics, or a transformative sequel from one of the genre’s living masters, there’s plenty to choose from and enjoy in August.
Let’s see what this month has to offer!
Editor’s Choice: Reminiscence
Photo: Warner Bros.
Director: LisaJoy
Pour: Hugh Jackman, Rebecca Ferguson, Thandiwe Newton
reminiscence is not what I would call a “great” film. So why do I recommend reminiscence? Quite simply, while I don’t think it’s perfect, I do find it interesting. And what I find most interesting about it is its unabashed willingness to face the future without batting an eyelid. Unlike so many other modern science fiction films that conspicuously avoid confronting, let alone acknowledging, one of the most pressing existential questions of our time, offering audience-friendly nostalgia fare instead.
Director Lisa Joy’s sci-fi neo-noir explores the relationship between nostalgia and trauma and tells the story of Nick Bannister (Hugh Jackman), a man who uses a machine that can turn memories into 3D projections to search for his missing lover Mae (Rebecca Ferguson). Imagine if someone had copied the scene with the Esper machine from Blade Runnerwhere Deckard uses generative technology to use a voice-activated computer to forensically examine the contents of a Polaroid camera and built an entire film around it.
reminiscence is set in a future where climate change has reached its natural tipping point, flooding Miami’s shores and in turn forcing the city’s population to adapt to their new reality. The opening expository sequence, with its flood-devoured skyscrapers and Venetian nightlife, is a braver, more refreshingly honest vision of the future than I’ve seen in any other modern science fiction film in recent memory. It’s a world where the world’s powers are too busy fighting over scarce resources to care for or protect their own citizens, leaving them at the mercy of the private security forces of the land barons who rule the remaining “dry lands” with impunity.
In a world like this, it is no wonder that people retreat into a world of their own memories of a past in which the semblance of a different, better future still seemed possible. And what else is more What is more fascinating than this is that this world-building does not even draw attention to itself and remains more or less on the sidelines of Nick’s personal journey. For these reasons alone reminiscence is worth seeing, even if only once. –Toussaint Egan
Rebel Moon Part 1 and 2 Director’s Cut
Image: Netflix
Director: Zack Snyder
Pour: Sofia Boutella, Djimon Hounsou, Ed Skrein
Rebel Moon is the kind of science fiction film that really shouldn’t exist anymore. It’s a perfect crossover between Warhammer, Star Wars and Seven Samurai that mixes all three into something completely unique and interesting.
The plot of the film is an almost exact copy of Seven Samuraiwith a disgraced warrior who gathers a small band of outlaws and tries to protect a small farming planet from the military might of the Empire. But what makes the film great is director Zack Snyder’s vision for this universe. Although we don’t spend much time in one corner of it, Rebel MoonThe world of feels both carefully crafted and fully lived in. Bars are filled with strange aliens with tentacles that can somehow control people’s minds, an order of warrior priests collect teeth from fallen enemies for some sort of religious practice, and ships can travel faster than light thanks to the tears of a giant machine god.
It all looks absolutely incredible, and if huge, unique space operas are your thing, then Rebel Moon should be at the top of your watch list. One thing worth mentioning here is that almost nothing of what Rebel Moon Greatness is present in the original cuts of the film. They obscure almost everything that makes Snyder’s world cool and cruel in favor of sanitized PG-13 boredom. Even if you’ve already seen those terrible versions, the director’s cuts are still worth your time. —Austen Goslin
Terminator 2: Judgment Day
Image: Sony Pictures Home Entertainment
Director: James Cameron
Pour: Arnold Schwarzenegger, Linda Hamilton, Robert Patrick
Few action blockbusters have ever been or will ever be as good as Terminator 2Director James Cameron had already proven with Aliens that with the right sequel he could turn a monster movie into an action movie, but in Terminator 2: Judgment Day (or T2) he takes the concept a step further by combining the two genres and creating a fantastic fusion that has remained unmatched until now.
The film takes place several years after the original film. T2 follows John Connors (Edward Furlong) as a child when Skynet sends a newer, more advanced model of Terminator after him. To protect him, the resistance sends back a reprogrammed Terminator of their own (Arnold Schwarzenegger), who just happens to look like the one that tried to kill Sarah Connor (Linda Hamilton) in the original film.
This is perhaps Cameron’s most brilliant idea in this film. On the one hand, it brings the fantastic Schwarzenegger back as the hero this time around, but it also lets us see how Sarah was forever changed by her experiences in the first film. It’s a more careful look at survivor trauma than almost any monster movie sequel since, and it largely plays out in the background of this excellent action film. —AG
