Derelict Disaster Sub-Genre

[AboveAvgCharles]

So, this is kind of cross-media, but I'll post it here in this forum.

I've been playing a lot of Dead Space lately, and my enjoyment of the game has me contemplating why it appeals so much. I've realized that I have a real soft spot for the underlying "investigating a derelict vessel/facility where something really bad happened" theme. This is a popular theme in a lot of my favorite games, just a few of which include System Shock 2, BioShock, Doom 3, and practically any survival horror title.

So following this line of thought, I began looking at some of my favorite movies that belong in this genre, a few of which are, in no particular order:


Event Horizon
Sunshine
Virus
Deep Rising
Ghost Ship
Silent Hill


... and a whole slew of others that I'm sure I'm overlooking right now. There's some real cheese there, to be sure, but it's a genre that I just can't resist. What about you guys? Anybody else have the same tastes? And please, if you have any suggestions, be it games, movies, books or other, please throw them in.

[Sazime]

I do. I really enjoyed the Silent Hill movie because of that feeling (hate away folks. :)) I think it's the ability for artists and designers to create an environment that's familiar, but creepy because of its emptiness or the horror of its current state.

[AboveAvgCharles]

Yeah. One of my favorite scenes in Aliens doesn't even have an alien in it. When the marines are first searching the colony and they find the room with the doughnut and coffee sitting on a desk with a broken window letting rain in, that 10 second shot just nailed the whole feeling that something seriously bad happened without any warning, just in the middle of a normal day, and that now these people are gone.

Something about evoking that feeling just really intrigues me. I eat it up.

[Sazime]

When you start asking yourself "What would I have done when things went to hell?" they did something right. :)

[Raen]

There's a very emotive scene in the second season of Ghost In The Shell: Stand Alone Complex where one of the main characters is in a derelict Tokyo. In the Ghost In The Shell universe Tokyo got nuked a way before the series started, and it's just incredible to see these buildings that are half destroyed. I loved I Am Legend for the same reason, seeing the loan guy exploring what used to be a bustling metropolis is just such deeply unsettling in some way.

[muddi900]

How is Sunshine? It's by one of my favourite directors but the concept just sounds like The Core in Space!

[Krispy]

How is Sunshine? It's by one of my favourite directors but the concept just sounds like The Core in Space!

As I understand it, the concept is very silly but the movie itself is supposed to be alright. It is just really hard for me to suspend my disbelief at the sheer craziness of what they are doing and how they are accomplishing it. If you like "isolated in space" dramas, you would probably enjoy it.

[AboveAvgCharles]

I immensely enjoyed Sunshine. Watch it for the performances and the artistic vision first, the plausibility second. Of course, bare in mind I seem to be one of two people who actually saw and enjoyed Sunshine, so take that as you will...

[Lint of Death]

Shaun of the Dead does this on the way to the Winchester, and on Shaun's second run to the corner store. I love that movie so much.

In terms of games, Metroid Prime for GCN and Metroid Fusion for GBA do this really well. Prime was enough to make Samus Aran one of my favorite video game characters.

[Reverant]

I enjoyed Sunshine very much. Beautiful visuals and soundtrack, and the main guy is impressive in a quiet sort of way. The only downside was that it followed some basic horror cliches (You know exactly what goes wrong when, where, and why before the movie starts.) Still awesome though, and honestly, the only movie from the OP's list I consider quality viewing.

28 Days Later had an excellent derelict London, though. Very eerie sense of abandonment. "The end is really fucking nigh!"

[VerseD]

The Abyss was about a team investigating a derelict and then finding aliens. That was a good movie. Actually Aliens was also about a team investigating a derelict planet and finding aliens. James Cameron loves alien-infested derelicts.

Michael Chrichton's book Sphere and the bad movie based on it had the same underwater investigation.

[digitalErich]

I really liked Sunshine up until the 3rd act. The reveal was about as lame and boring as you could get. Up until that point I was expecting the reveal to be at least a little smart or interesting. That being said, I'm still glad I saw the movie, plot aside there was some good cinematography in there at places.

[muddi900]

28 Days Later had an excellent derelict London, though. Very eerie sense of abandonment. "The end is really fucking nigh!"

28 Days Later and Shaun of the dead are the only Zombie movies that matter.

[Sazime]

28 Days Later and Shaun of the dead are the only Zombie movies that matter.
How many zombie movies have you seen? 2?

[Morangie]

How many zombie movies have you seen? 2?

Make that one, 28 Days Later isn't really a zombie movie. ;)

[Sazime]

Make that one, 28 Days Later isn't really a zombie movie. ;)
And I thought I was being rough on him with my post. :D

[KamaItachi]

Don't forget Alien/Aliens

[Superman's Dead]

Myst. Going through the brothers' rooms in the different empty worlds? Freaked me out when I was 11.

Kickin' it OLD school.

[muddi900]

How many zombie movies have you seen? 2?

Too many to count!:p

[Jeffool]

Sunspot was a beautifully shot film, with some good acting, but so far as the script...
Like digitalErich said earlier, the 'twist' going into the third act was so contrived and boring. We all knew that the reveal was going to be an enemy in some form or another (other ship crew member or alien,) as the rest of the film just hadn't developed the appropriate tension for any thing else to be driving conflict of the third act. Without that, and with some other point of contention (even just an existing member of the crew being the 'enemy',) it could've been much better.
But it was still beautfully shot. Saw it in HD and drooled.

Silent Hill also evoked the atmosphere of derelict disaster quite well, damn the nay-sayers.

And zombie films... Oh man, my favorite sub-genre ever! :D Then again, I like any time you put a group of people in apocalyptic conditions and then have a character-driven story.