What Makes a Science-Fiction Movie Feel Scientifically Believable?

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Science-fiction movies often take ideas from real physics and technology, but some films feel much more believable than others.

[Mentor Note: The bulk of this thread start text has been deleted for now because it was 100% written by AI. That can be allowed in the General Discussion forum, but only when attribution is given. Since the OP did not provide attribution and has not responded to DMs asking for it, we have deleted the bulk of the OP text. Thread will be reopened, since it is an interesting topic and has already generated good responses.]

What science-fiction movie do you think does the best job of balancing real science with entertainment? Does scientific accuracy make a movie more enjoyable for you, or is consistency within the fictional world more important?
 
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An entertaining story works because the story tellers and the audience cooperate.
The writers create something that is understandable, interesting, and fit for the target audience.
The members of the audience suspend disbelief and allow themselves to become involved with the characters and the plot.
In the case of science fiction, the author uses pseudo-science to provide and eliminate plot options. If that pseudo-science is constant throughout the story, less story time will be needed to explain it. And for those who are analytically-minded, we can admire the characters and/or the plot by making creative use of those rules.

This is similar to what happens with a mystery - a mystery foretold by clues and patterns is more interesting once the mystery is revealed. It's part of the "mystery story" contract - the audience can participate in the story by trying to discover the mystery before the reveal.

Sci-fi stories also have a contract. The pseudo-science is expected to be predictable - or at least to appear predictable. It's bad form to resolve a major plot component with new, previously undescribed pseudo-science. More importantly, most scifi audience members expect the kind of tempo you see in Star Trek or Dr. Who - where, for the most part, you get a new problem, a struggle, and a resolution in a single episode - or if not a single episode, in some well-define prearranged time.
I have watched soap-opera fans watch Star Trek. A character contracts a fatal illness. He asks how long he has to live. 36 hours. The soap-opera fans are stunned and appalled - they were expecting 36 months.

"Under the Dome" killed itself by breaking this sci-fi contract. It was suppose to be one summer (2013). By the end of the summer everything should have been resolved. But it was such a hit that mid-season they decided to amend the story line so that the problems would not be fully resolved so quickly. They quickly lost their audience and after three seasons it was cancelled.
 
.Scott said:
"Under the Dome" killed itself by breaking this sci-fi contract. It was suppose to be one summer (2013). By the end of the summer everything should have been resolved. But it was such a hit that mid-season they decided to amend the story line so that the problems would not be fully resolved so quickly. They quickly lost their audience and after three seasons it was cancelled.
Is that what happened... Huh.

It did have a very weird story arc. I assumed it was trying to copy "Lost"'s wild success.
 
Apologies for the delayed reopening of the thread; this could be a really interesting thread. The OP used AI to generate the thread start and did not include attribution for which AI they used. We need to wait for that attribution in order to reopen the thread. Hopefully by tomorrow...
 
Update: after a good suggestion by @.Scott the OP has been edited down for now (until the OP provides the AI attribution), and the thread is reopened. :smile:
 
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Alextann said:
Does scientific accuracy make a movie more enjoyable for you,
Yes. Inaccuracies I become aware of rip me out of the story and restore my disbelief.

Alextann said:
or is consistency within the fictional world more important?
Yes. The science must be internally consistent.


That is not to say there can't be sci-fi elements. Warp drive technology contradicts neither requirement above.
 
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