The Forbidden Planet International Blog Log

This year’s nominees for the annual Saturn awards from the Academy of Science Fiction, Fantasy and Horror films has been announced with The Dark Knight leading the field easily with no less than eleven nominations. I have to admit to being a little underwhelmed at some of the contenders in the three Best Film categories (one each for Horror, Fantasy and Science Fiction) – not so much that I dislike most of the contenders, just that the majority of them, while often being enjoyable enough, simply didn’t excite my enthusiasm or tickle my sense of wonder (something I always thought SF&F movies and books could do better than any other genre), although there were a couple I really did enjoy in among others that I could take or leave.

(Ron Perlman as Hellboy in the Golden Army, nominated in Best Horror Film)

It seems a bit of cultural jar though when you see non genre movies like Gran Torino and Valkyrie among some of the nominees in what is meant to be a celebration of the fantastical genres (although having seen both of those they are very good films) and I’m wondering why there are so many nominees throughout the entire thing for non fantastic genre movies in here? Aren’t these films already covered in many other movie awards unlike the fantastic genres, hence why they have the Saturns? I’m sure there is a reason for it I am not aware of but it still sticks out like a sore tentacle. The television categories have some decent entries (Galactica, Terminator: Sarah Connor Chronicles etc) but from a Brit point of view I’m a bit disappointed to see it appears to consist entirely of US-made offerings; not that there is anything wrong with the programmes nominated (some of which I watch regularly) but it lacks the sort of outlooking, international quality I normally associate with SF&F fans. The awards will be announced on June 25th; the full list of nominees can be found here.