Silent Running

source: Silent Running

Trailer—Silent Running

Silent Running

Runs at a leisurely pace and a bit silly now and again, but this was the early 70s and even the good old US studios gave some people some slack to see what might happen. What happens here is a unique film of some considerable charm is created. If you are a fan of Bruce Dern, this is a must anyway because its one of his best and there 's barely anyone else in it unless you count mute robots and the three fellow space travellers at the start. Dern maybe goes a little over the top occasionally but is great most of the time and it must have been difficult acting alone with special effects. Some pick fault with the Baez songs but I think with a film of this time you have to accept the 'hippy' stuff and not see it has misjudged sentimentality. No all action sci-fi spectacular but a thoughtful, engaging and very different movie from the usual fare.

... of things to come. Perhaps most notable isn't the destruction of earth's natural resources, we lost the planet some time ago, but the development of robots with human characters that are nearly with us now - whether people are aware that's what they are is still debatable.

This movie revolves around a space ship/station that harbors the last plants and trees from earth. Then there off course is the threat that those plants and trees are destroyed, evil colleagues etc., all very enjoyable. Just the 1 thing they should have left out is this, in an age where they can build space ship this enormous, they do not know plants and trees need sunlight? So stupid, even for that time.

Douglas Trumbull's "Silent Running" offers an unpleasant look at where our planet might be heading. It depicts that nature is wiped out on earth and all wildlife is kept in geodesic domes on a spaceship. When orders come in to blow up the remaining pieces of nature, the idealistic botanist (Bruce Dern) taking care of the forests and animals rebels. The movie makes an important point about how we define progress. One of the crew members notes that earth no longer has poverty, unemployment or disease, but the botanist notes that the price of that is that there's no more natural world, while the entire planet has the same climate. Children will grow up never knowing what a tree is, while everyone eats - and is practically addicted to - synthetic food. So many of these things seem to have come true, but as the theme song notes, it's not too late (I hope not). That forces us to ask: do we care enough to preserve the natural world? Do you?

In a future where all flora is extinct on Earth, an astronaut (Bruce Dern) is given orders to destroy the last of Earth's plant life being kept in a greenhouse on board a spacecraft. The biggest problem with this film is the music provided by Joan Baez. Maybe in 1972 this was cool, but today (2013) it comes off as obnoxious, and it pushes the film over the boundary from "environmentalist" to "hippie", which may be a serious turn-off for many viewers. Beyond that, great film with Bruce Dern being his wacky self. I love his little robot pals and how he trains them to be (almost) human. The actors inside the robots deserve a lot more credit than they probably get.