Connections
Every film in the archive is a node in a web of shared directors, actors, themes and studios. Pick a thread and follow it down the rabbit hole.
- Star Wars (1977)Flash Gordon (1980)Direct influence: George Lucas has cited Flash Gordon serials as Star Wars's model
- Brazil (1985)The Rocketeer (1991)Same theme: retrofuturism — tomorrow, built from yesterday's imagination
- Back to the Future (1985)Tomorrowland (2015)Same theme: the imagined future of an earlier, more optimistic decade
- The Day the Earth Stood Still (1951)The Iron Giant (1999)Same theme: a powerful visitor mistaken for a Cold War weapon
- Forbidden Planet (1956)Flash Gordon (1980)Same theme: chrome-and-ray-gun space opera, mid-century style
- Metropolis (1927)Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow (2004)Same theme: the deco megacity, rebuilt decades apart
- Johnny Mnemonic (1995)Blade Runner 2049 (2017)Same theme: memory as commodity — sold, implanted, borrowed
- Videodrome (1983)The Thing (1982)Same theme: the body betraying its owner — peak practical body horror
- Videodrome (1983)They Live (1988)Same theme: broadcast media as mind control
- Dark City (1998)The Matrix (1999)Same theme: manufactured reality — The Matrix even reused Dark City's sets
- Ghost in the Shell (1995)Akira (1988)Same subgenre: anime cyberpunk — the two films that conquered the West
- Ghost in the Shell (1995)The Matrix (1999)Direct influence: the Wachowskis pitched The Matrix as 'Ghost in the Shell for real'
- Soylent Green (1973)Logan's Run (1976)Same theme: dystopian population control
- Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956)They Live (1988)Same theme: conformity and hidden invaders among us
- Contact (1997)Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1977)Same theme: patient, hopeful first contact
- Starship Troopers (1997)The Terminator (1984)Same composer: Basil Poledouris (RoboCop link) meets a shared war-against-machines theme
- Escape from New York (1981)Mad Max 2: The Road Warrior (1981)Same theme: civilization after the fall
- Westworld (1973)Jurassic Park (1993)Same creator: Michael Crichton — a theme park's technology fails, twice
- Forbidden Planet (1956)Star Wars (1977)Same theme: Robby the Robot's design influenced generations of movie robots
- Metropolis (1927)Blade Runner (1982)Same theme: the vertical dystopian city
- RoboCop (1987)Blade Runner (1982)Same theme: what's left of the human inside the product
- Alien (1979)The Thing (1982)Same theme: isolated crew vs. perfect organism
- Twelve Monkeys (1995)Back to the Future (1985)Same theme: time travel — tragedy vs. comedy
- Twelve Monkeys (1995)The Terminator (1984)Same theme: fatalistic time loops
- Mad Max 2: The Road Warrior (1981)The Terminator (1984)Same theme: civilization after the fall
- A Clockwork Orange (1971)They Live (1988)Same theme: engineered obedience
- Akira (1988)Blade Runner (1982)Same theme: the neon megacity
- Akira (1988)The Matrix (1999)Direct influence: anime action and digital dystopia
- Blade Runner (1982)The Matrix (1999)Same subgenre: cyberpunk
- The Thing (1982)Aliens (1986)Carpenter's crew meets Cameron's — shared DNA of siege horror