Science Friction

The discomfort of predicting the future, and getting it right. Andrew Leci, felon, lauds the imagination of those who thought they knew what was going to happen in 2020.

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Confession Time. As a child, I was guilty of larceny. I wasn’t caught, but I committed the crime. I bought and paid for a single cinema ticket to watch 2001: A Space Odyssey, and then watched it two more times without paying again.

My young imagination was so captured by the 144-minute film released in 1968 and directed by the inimitable Stanley Kubrick, that I had to watch it again immediately afterwards, and then again, immediately after that. I couldn’t afford three tickets – my pocket money being commensurate with my parents’ attempts to avoid spoiling their one and only son – but I also couldn’t move from my seat after sitting through the film for the first time. I did have to hide from the cinema staff who made a cursory inspection of the establishment prior to letting the next batch of moviegoers in, but this was a simple enough task in the days before scattered, designer popcorn needed clearing away, and besides, it was a weekday, and only the evening show had more than half a dozen punters.

While I managed to avoid detection, arrest and the inevitable subsequent life of crime and tragedy, I did get into serious trouble with my parents – overshooting my scheduled release time by about seven hours. But it was the start of my fascination with science fiction, and it’s one that has not abated over the years. Who doesn’t want to imagine what life might be like in the future, and what technology might have in store for the people who put it in place and have little or no idea of its ultimate destination or effect?

I became fascinated with the year 2000, not just because of Arthur C Clarke’s original short story