AFI’s 10 TOP 10 — CHALLENGE RANK: SCI-FI

Hello and welcome to “AFI’s 10 Top 10 — Challenge Rank,” this is an article series where we put to test the American Film Institute’s various list rankings through a critical and audience consensual assessment scale. We will be breaking down “AFI’s 10 Top 10” lists, right here. The “AFI’s 10 Top 10” originally broke down by genre of what are the 10 best films in that specified genre. We have covered Courtroom Drama, Romantic Comedies, Mystery, Animation, and Western in the five prior articles in the series so far, as we are now going to tackle “AFI’s 10 Top 10: Sci-Fi” category. Here’s the list of films and how they ranked from “AFI’s 10 Top 10: Sci-Fi”:

1.) “2001: A Space Odyssey”

2.) “Star Wars: A New Hope”

3.) “E.T.-The Extra-Terrestrial”

4.) “A Clockwork Orange”

5.) “The Day the Earth Stood Still”

6.) “Blade Runner”

7.) “Alien”

8.) “Terminator 2: Judgment Day”

9.) “Invasion of the Body Snatchers”

10.) “Back to the Future”

If you want to see the actual AFI page of the Top 10? The link is below: http://www.afi.com/10top10/category.aspx?cat=7

Now, this is how AFI ranked the best films of the sci-fi genre. But do critics and audiences agree with AFI’s consensus? Well, through a rather collective algorithm from various critical and audience aggregators, I came to forming an overall consensual ranking of the collective films from “AFI’s 10 Top 10: Sci-Fi”. I was a rather surprised how things turned out here among the consensual rankings compared to AFI’s rankings but here’s how it laid out:

Consensual Placement: 10th

THE DAY THE EARTH STOOD STILL (1951)

AFI’S RANKING: #5

LOGLINE: An alien lands and tells the people of Earth that they must live peacefully or be destroyed as a danger to other planets.

DIRECTED BY: Robert Wise

STARS: Michael Rennie, Patricia Neal, Hugh Marlowe and Sam Jaffe

CONSENSUS RESPONSE: “The Day the Earth Stood Still” descended 5 spots from #5 to #10 among the consensual critics and audiences assessment over AFI’s placement of the film on their list.

Consensual Placement: 9th

E.T.-THE EXTRA-TERRESTRIAL (1982)

AFI’S RANKING: #3

LOGLINE: A troubled child summons the courage to help a friendly alien escape Earth and return to his home world.

DIRECTED BY: Steven Spielberg

STARS: Henry Thomas, Drew Barrymore, Peter Coyote and Dee Wallace

CONSENSUS RESPONSE: “E.T.-The Extra-Terrestrial” plunged a whopping 6 spots, going from #3 to #9 among the consensual critics and audiences assessment over AFI’s placement of the film on their list. This was the biggest drop among all films on the list.

Consensual Placement: 8th

A CLOCKWORK ORANGE (1971)

AFI’S RANKING: #4

LOGLINE: In the future, a sadistic gang leader is imprisoned and volunteers for a conduct-aversion experiment, but it doesn’t go as planned.

DIRECTED BY: Stanley Kubrick

STARS: Malcolm McDowell, Patrick Magee, Michael Bates and Warren Clarke

CONSENSUS RESPONSE: “A Clockwork Orange” dropped 4 spots from #4 to #8 among the consensual critics and audiences assessment over AFI’s placement of the film on their list.

Consensual Placement: 7th

INVASION OF THE BODY SNATCHERS (1956)

AFI’S RANKING: #9

LOGLINE: A small-town doctor learns that the population of his community is being replaced by emotionless alien duplicates.

DIRECTED BY: Don Siegel

STARS: Kevin McCarthy, Dana Wynter, Larry Gates and King Donovan

CONSENSUS RESPONSE: “Invasion of the Body Snatchers” slid down 2 spots from #7 to #9 among the consensual critics and audiences assessment over AFI’s placement of the film on their list.

Consensual Placement: 6th

BLADE RUNNER (1982)

AFI’S RANKING: #6

LOGLINE: A blade runner must pursue and terminate four replicants who stole a ship in space, and have returned to Earth to find their creator.

DIRECTED BY: Ridley Scott

STARS: Harrison Ford, Rutger Hauer, Sean Young and Edward James Olmos

CONSENSUS RESPONSE: “Blade Runner” stayed put at #6 among the consensual critics and audiences assessment matching AFI’s placement of the film on their list.

Consensual Placement: 5th

2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY (1968)

AFI’S RANKING: #1

LOGLINE: A space-opera spanning the dawn of man to humanity reaching the stars, telling the story of the Black Monolith, humanity’s evolution and the rise of A.I.’s ultimate supercomputer HAL 9000.

DIRECTED BY: Stanley Kubrick

STARS: Keir Dullea, Gary Lockwood, William Sylvester and Leonard Rossiter

CONSENSUS RESPONSE: “2001: A Space Odyssey” fell 4 spots from #1 to #5 among the consensual critics and audiences assessment over AFI’s placement of the film on their list.

Consensual Placement: 4th

STAR WARS: A NEW HOPE (1977)

AFI’S RANKING: #2

LOGLINE: Luke Skywalker joins forces with a Jedi Knight, a cocky pilot, a Wookiee and two droids to save the galaxy from the Empire’s world-destroying battle station, while also attempting to rescue Princess Leia from the evil Darth Vader.

DIRECTED BY: George Lucas

STARS: Mark Hamill, Harrison Ford, Carrie Fisher and Alec Guinness

CONSENSUS RESPONSE: “Star Wars: A New Hope” ticked up 2 spots from #4 to #2 among the consensual critics and audiences assessment over AFI’s placement of the film on their list.

Consensual Placement: 3rd

BACK TO THE FUTURE (1985)

AFI’S RANKING: #10

LOGLINE: Marty McFly, a 17-year-old high school student, is accidentally sent thirty years into the past in a time-traveling DeLorean invented by his close friend, the maverick scientist Doc Brown.

DIRECTED BY: Robert Zemeckis

STARS: Michael J. Fox, Christopher Lloyd, Lea Thompson and Crispin Glover

CONSENSUS RESPONSE: “Back to the Future” ascended 7 spots from #10 to #3 among the consensual critics and audiences assessment over AFI’s placement of the film on their list. This was the biggest climb among all films on the list.

Consensual Placement: 2nd

TERMINATOR 2: JUDGMENT DAY (1991)

AFI’S RANKING: #8

LOGLINE: A cyborg, identical to the one who failed to kill Sarah Connor, must now protect her teenage son, John Connor, from a more advanced and powerful cyborg.

DIRECTED BY: James Cameron

STARS: Arnold Schwarzenegger, Linda Hamilton, Edward Furlong and Robert Patrick

CONSENSUS RESPONSE: “Terminator 2: Judgment Day” rose 6 spot from #8 to #2 among the consensual critics and audiences assessment over AFI’s placement of the film on their list.

Consensual Placement: 1st

ALIEN (1979)

AFI’S RANKING: #7

LOGLINE: After a space merchant vessel perceives an unknown transmission as a distress call, it’s landing on the source moon finds one of the crew attacked by a mysterious life form, and they soon realize that its life cycle has merely begun.

DIRECTED BY: Ridley Scott

STARS: Sigourney Weaver, Tom Skerritt, John Hurt and Ian Holm

CONSENSUS RESPONSE: “Alien” jumped 6 spots from #7 to #1 among the consensual critics and audiences assessment over AFI’s placement of the film on their list.

In concluding, you can see the critical consensual assessment with critics and audiences ranked rather differently with every placement except for one position in AFI’s ranking list. So, how would you personally rank these top-tier sci-fi films?

Article Note: All loglines are sourced from IMDb.com.

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