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Best Future Movies

Ranked by how strongly each film carries the visual signature of future cinema — measured across 3,530 indexed frames from 44 films, against a 408,752-frame catalogue baseline. Not by box office, and not by vote.

Future films over-index on robot, tactical vest and helmet — the objects that make the genre recognisable before a line is spoken.

  1. 1

    RoboCop (2014)

    José PadilhaDP Lula CarvalhoIMDb 6.1TMDB 5.9See in full on FrameThrower →

    The year is 2028 and multinational conglomerate OmniCorp is at the center of robot technology. Overseas, their drones have been used by the military for years - and it's meant billions for OmniCorp's bottom line. Now OmniCorp wants to bring their controversial technology to the home front, and they see a golden opportunity to do it. When Alex Murphy (Joel Kinnaman) - a loving husband, father and good cop doing his best to stem the tide of crime and corruption in Detroit - is critically injured in the line of duty, OmniCorp sees their chance for a part-man, part-robot police officer. OmniCorp envisions a RoboCop in every city and even more billions for their shareholders, but they never counted on one thing: there is still a man inside the machine pursuing justice.

  2. 2

    I, Robot (2004)

    Alex ProyasDP Simon DugganIMDb 7.1TMDB 7.0See in full on FrameThrower →

    In 2035, techno-phobic homicide detective Del Spooner of the Chicago PD heads the investigation of the apparent suicide of leading robotics scientist, Dr. Alfred Lanning. Unconvinced of the motive, Spooner's investigation into Lanning's death reveals a trail of secrets and agendas within the USR (United States Robotics) corporation and suspicions of murder. Little does he know that his investigation would lead to uncovering a larger threat to humanity.

  3. 3

    Chappie (2015)

    Neill BlomkampDP Trent OpalochIMDb 6.8TMDB 6.8See in full on FrameThrower →

    In Johannesburg, the police department reduced the high rating of criminality using robots from the Tetravaal Company, designed by the engineer Deon Wilson. The former military Vincent Moore is envious of Deon, since he has developed another project called Moose, but neither Tetravaal nor the police department is interested. Deon has just developed an Artificial Intelligence but the Tetravaal's CEO Michelle Bradley asks him to abort the project. Deon decides to bring the damaged Robot 22 that was sent to be crushed to test his A.I. However he is kidnapped by the criminals Ninja, Yo-Landi and Amerika that want him to stop the robot cops. When they see the damaged robot in the van, they force Deon to program it to heist banks with them and they call it Chappie. However, Chappie acts like a child and need to be trained to learn and grow. Meanwhile Vincent follows Deon and plots an evil scheme to activate his robot.

  4. 4

    Ready Player One (2018)

    Steven SpielbergDP Janusz KamińskiIMDb 7.4TMDB 7.6See in full on FrameThrower →

    In the year 2045, the real world is a harsh place. The only time Wade Watts (Tye Sheridan) truly feels alive is when he escapes to the OASIS, an immersive virtual universe where most of humanity spends their days. In the OASIS, you can go anywhere, do anything, be anyone--the only limits are your own imagination. The OASIS was created by the brilliant and eccentric James Halliday (Mark Rylance), who left his immense fortune and total control of the Oasis to the winner of a three-part contest he designed to find a worthy heir. When Wade conquers the first challenge of the reality-bending treasure hunt, he and his friends--The High Five--are hurled into a fantastical universe of discovery and danger to save the OASIS.

  5. 5

    Ghosts of Mars (2001)

    John CarpenterDP Gary B. KibbeIMDb 4.9TMDB 5.2See in full on FrameThrower →

    In 2176, a Martian police unit is sent to pick up a highly dangerous criminal at a remote mining post. Upon arrival, the cops find the post deserted and something far more dangerous than any criminal — the original inhabitants of Mars, hellbent on getting their planet back.

  6. 6

    Demolition Man (1993)

    Marco BrambillaDP Alex ThomsonIMDb 6.7TMDB 6.8See in full on FrameThrower →

    Frozen in 1996, Simon Phoenix, a convicted crime lord, is revived for a parole hearing well into the 21st century. Revived into a society free from crime, Phoenix resumes his murderous rampage, and no one can stop him. John Spartan, the police officer who captured Phoenix in 1996, has also been cryogenically frozen, this time for a crime he did not commit. In 2032, the former cities of Los Angeles, San Diego and Santa Barbara have merged into peaceful, utopian San Angeles. Unable to stop him with their non-violent solutions, the police release Spartan to help recapture Phoenix. Now after 36 years, Spartan has to adapt himself to the future society he has no knowledge about.

  7. 7

    Terminator Genisys (2015)

    Alan TaylorDP Kramer MorgenthauIMDb 6.3TMDB 6.0See in full on FrameThrower →

    When John Connor, leader of the human resistance, sends Sgt. Kyle Reese back to 1984 to protect Sarah Connor and safeguard the future, an unexpected turn of events creates a fractured time-line. Now, Sgt. Reese finds himself in a new and unfamiliar version of the past, where he is faced with unlikely allies, including the Guardian, dangerous new enemies, and an unexpected new mission: To reset the future.

  8. 8

    Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets (2017)

    Luc BessonDP Thierry ArbogastIMDb 6.4TMDB 6.6See in full on FrameThrower →

    In the twenty-eighth century, space station Alpha is a city where beings from different planets live together exchanging their knowledge and culture. Peace is granted by a human force, including Major Valerian (Dane DeHaan) and his partner Sergeant Laureline (Cara Delevingne). They are assigned by the Defense Minister (Herbie Hancock) to retrieve the last species of converter in a dangerous mission. They succeed and back to Alpha, unknown humanoids abduct Commander Arun Filitt (Clive Owen) expecting to steal the converter. They head to a forbidden area that is infected, but Valerian and Laureline follow them and disclose a hidden secret about the race and the infected area.

  9. 9

    Metropolis (1927)

    Fritz LangDP Günther RittauIMDb 8.2TMDB 8.1See in full on FrameThrower →

    Sometime in the future, the city of Metropolis is home to a Utopian society where its wealthy residents live a carefree life. One of those is Freder Fredersen. One day, he spots a beautiful woman with a group of children, she and the children quickly disappear. Trying to follow her, he is horrified to find an underground world of workers who apparently run the machinery that keeps the Utopian world above ground functioning. One of the few people above ground who knows about the world below is Freder's father, John Fredersen, who is the founder and master of Metropolis. Freder learns that the woman is called Maria, who espouses the need to join the "hands" - the workers - to the "head" - those in power above - by a mediator who will act as the "heart". Freder wants to help the plight of the workers in their struggle for a better life. But when John learns of what Maria is advocating and that Freder has joined their cause, with the assistance of an old colleague. an inventor called Rotwang, who turns out to be But their nemesis goes to works towards quashing a proposed uprising, with Maria at the centre of their plan. John, unaware that Rotwang has his own agenda., makes plans that include shutting down the machines, with the prospect of unleashing total anarchy both above and below ground.

  10. 10

    The Matrix Resurrections (2021)

    Lana WachowskiDP Daniele MassaccesiIMDb 5.6TMDB 6.3See in full on FrameThrower →

    Return to a world of two realities: one, everyday life; the other, what lies behind it. To find out if his reality is a construct, to truly know himself, Mr. Anderson will have to choose to follow the white rabbit once more.

What future films are made of

How much more often each element appears in a future frame than in an average frame from the catalogue. A ratio, not a share — robot is not in most frames, it is simply far more common here than anywhere else.

  • robot14.7×
  • tactical vest4.1×
  • helmet3.5×
  • sand3.0×
  • debris2.8×
  • concrete wall2.7×
  • handgun2.6×
  • leather jacket2.1×

How future films are shot

Weaker signals than the objects above, and worth saying so: most dramatic genres skew dark and night-heavy, so these numbers separate future from the catalogue far more than they separate it from its neighbours.

  • 12%interior indeterminatevs 7% baseline
  • 29%naturalvs 43% baseline
  • 30%dayvs 42% baseline
  • 25%widevs 20% baseline
  • 50%low keyvs 40% baseline

What breaks the pattern

A Scanner Darkly (2006) is the least typical film here — it carries the least of what the rest of this list is made of. Which is either a failure of the genre label, or the most interesting film on the page.

Method

Every frame in the FrameThrower catalogue is tagged for shot size, lighting, time of day, camera angle, colour and the objects visible in it. This page aggregates those tags across 3,530 frames from 44 films carrying the future label, and compares each figure to the same measurement across the whole catalogue (408,752 frames). Films are ranked by how closely they match the theme’s over-indexed elements, weighted by how distinctive each element is; one film per series. Only films with at least 20 indexed frames and 500 TMDB votes are listed.

Machine-readable: /api/list/future

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These are real movie frames, shown at reduced resolution. All rights remain with their respective owners; they appear here for study, commentary and education under fair-use principles. How these are meant to be used