From A New Hope (1977). Image is a screengrab via 20th Century Fox/Lucasfilm
Women in science fiction don’t have to be villains or victims. Read on to hear more about 20 of the best sci-fi films featuring female leads.
Female characters have a precarious situation in the world of science fiction. In a genre where practically anything is possible, the representation of gender can sometimes feel as if it’s taking its cues from a post-apocalyptic Leave it to Beaver.
In some cases, women are largely helpless, the victims of roving cannibal gangs or alien invaders They often require some serious rescuing by a male hero. Sometimes, they exist only to bolster another male character. They may be a one-dimensional love interest or mother figure. They need to be protected, to be loved, to be romanced, but never, it seems, on their own terms.
Sometimes, these fictional women may be killed off only to provide motivation and a tragic backstory for a hero. Even their deaths are then in service to another character.
Or, perhaps you’ll encounter a “strong female character”. This is an odd sort of facsimile, a woman who hits all of the notes of female empowerment, but with none of the substance or resonance. She may have been created with good intent, but suffers from awkward execution.
The problem with “strong female characters”
A strong female character often ditches all notions of femininity, lest a stray frill or hint of pink betray weakness. It’s rare for this character to appear in groups. Instead, she’s frequently a token, and then “one of the guys” at that. While women can certainly be strong, stoic, and war-like, the stereotypical strong female heroine or sidekick can go just a step too far.
It’s not all bad, however. There are plenty of roles in sci-fi films where women are given respect and dignity. Indeed, plenty of creators have written and directed movies where women are not forced into either helplessness or denial of their own gender. Recently, writers, directors, and other creators have been making more and more space for complex and compelling female characters.
Be aware that some of these entries contain spoilers. I tried to avoid them where possible, but it was sometimes necessary to reveal plot elements to make any sort of sense. Science fiction can be a beautifully weird genre, after all.
Otherwise, read on to discover 20 of the most interesting female characters, featured in some of the best and most interesting science fiction movies.
Nausica of the Valley of the Wind poster (Image via Disney/Studio Ghibli)
20. Nausicaä
Many people know and love Hayao Miyazaki for his family-friendly, nature-focused films. My Neighbor Totoro and Princess Mononoke, for example, glory in an abundance of green plants and wise nature spirits.
Miyazaki is also rightfully hailed for his use of female protagonists. The women and girls in films like Princess Mononoke, Spirited Away, and Howl’s Moving Castle (to name just a few) are strong and intelligent without compromising their dignity. And, of course, practically none of the women in Miyazaki’s films are objectified, sexually or otherwise. It’s an unfortunately rare but very welcome development.
That said, it may strike you as a surprise to learn that Miyazaki is not only a nature-loving filmmaker, nor is he solely devoted to fantasy. He’s also worked in the realm of science fiction.
Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind follows Nausicaä, a young, brave princess who lives in a post-apocalyptic world. Her community and other human settlements are threatened by a an awesomely large and very toxic forest. It doesn’t help that the forest is also populated with large insect-like creatures known as the Ohm.
Furthermore, the Valley of the Wind people are in conflict with the militaristic Tolmekian kingdom. Their plan is to fight back against the Ohm and the Toxic Jungle. They’re unafraid of causing another “Seven Days of Fire”, the term for the previous apocalypse. The Tolmekians are even planning to use a “Giant Warrior”, a bioweapon that could destroy the Toxic Jungle and pretty much everything else.
At the heart of this is Nausicaä. She is brave in the face of looming war and tragedy, never breaking down and letting another person take over for her. She’s also vastly intelligent, using both her nerve and her brains to forge a new way of life for humanity.
19. Alien
Of course, no list like this would be complete without mentioning Ellen Ripley. Not only is she a central character in one of the most groundbreaking science fiction movies in film history, but she’s the star of an entire franchise. Without Ellen Ripley (played by Sigourney Weaver), the entire Alien corpus would be yet other run-of-the-mill sci-fi horror flick.
So, why is Ripley such a big deal? Consider the previous history of women in science fiction, before Alien debuted in 1979. More often than not, women were helpless bystanders and screaming victims. They might occasionally have found a role as vixens, villainous or not, but sexual objectification was hardly a step up.
Just look at Lambert, the navigator of the doomed ship Nostromo, played by Veronica Cartwright. She loses it when the alien xenomorph makes it appearance, dissolving into screams and tears. To be fair, I’d likely do the same, but it’s still important to see the level-headed Ripley as a counterpoint.
If you could manage to watch Alien without knowing about its subsequent history, though, you might not realize that Ripley is the main character for a good portion of the movie. She starts out as part of an ensemble cast, but as the xenomorph picks off the other crew members of the Nostromo, it’s clear that Ripley is the survivor. That’s thanks largely to her good sense, bravery, and quick thinking. In fact, if the other spacefarers had just listened to her advice earlier in the film, we’d be looking at a very different franchise today.
18. The Terminator
Now, all of this isn’t to say that women can’t show some damage or vulnerability. Sarah Connor (played by Linda Hamilton), one of the central figures of the Terminator franchise, is both tough and tender. She becomes a battle-hardened protagonist but is also a mother trying to protect her son. There’s nothing saying that a woman can’t be both an intimidating hero and a caring parent at the same time, after all.
At first, it appears that Sarah Connor is going to be yet another damsel in distress. In Terminator, she’s the target of the Terminator (played by Arnold Schwarzenegger) and is only saved thanks to the time-traveling Kyle Reese (Michael Biehn). Connor, you see, is apparently the mother of John Connor, who will eventually save humanity from their malevolent robot overlords. The future artificial intelligence, Skynet, has sent the T-800 model Terminator back in time to eliminate their foe before he’s even born.
By the way, I’d completely forgotten that the Terminator starts off by murdering all the listed Sarah Connors in the phone book. Seriously. You’d think that, between the time travel technology and the advanced robotic assassins, they’d have a more sophisticated method.
However, Sarah Connor manages to make it to the end of the movie and even defeats the Terminator all by herself. She ends the film by driving off into the sunset and delivering a world-weary narration about the coming robot apocalypse.
By the time Terminator 2 rolls around, she’s even cooler, delivering quips and fighting against the advanced T-1000 Terminator alongside the old, now-friendly T-800. Alas, she’s not much of a presence in the rest of the franchise. That said, the first two are the best films in the franchise, in large part because of Sarah Connor’s breathtaking presence.
Paprika poster (Image via Sony Pictures)
17. Paprika
On the surface of it, psychotherapy sounds like a dull plot for a movie. Beyond Good Will Hunting and a handful of other dramas, there’s little interest in listening to someone talk about their problems in a comfortably appointed therapist’s office. Add in a healthy dose of science fiction, however, and you can get something wonderfully weird.
That’s the case with Paprika, a 2006 anime film written and directed by Satoshi Kon. This was Kon’s last film before his untimely death in 2010, which is a great shame. Kon was truly an artist with great respect for his genre. He also had a complicated and evolving relationship with female characters and how to write them. If nothing else, his female protagonists are interesting and complex.
The film is set in the near future, where a new form of psychotherapy allows doctors to enter their patients’ dreams. Dr. Atsuko Chiba begins to use the technology outside of her research facility, which is illegal (though she still uses it to treat patients). As “Paprika”, Dr. Chiba treats a variety of individuals, including a police detective and chairman of the research institute where she works.
Of course, this being a movie with a plot, things eventually go wrong. Through a series of increasingly strange events, dreams and reality begin to emerge, sometimes with dangerous consequences. Dr. Chiba/Paprika, however, is able to navigate the utter strangeness of this new world and restores order. She’s an interesting character, and one who is clearly intelligent and able to take on the reality-bending nature of her odd psychiatric situation.
From A New Hope (1977). Image is a screengrab via 20th Century Fox/Lucasfilm
16. Star Wars: A New Hope
Arguably, the original Star Wars trilogy is more of an ensemble cast than anything else. It begins with the backwoods life of young Luke Skywalker, and soon grows to include Obi-Wan Kenobi, Han Solo, and Chewbacca. However, there’s no denying that Star Wars introduced a truly fascinating woman in the character of Leia Organa.
As played by Carrie Fisher, Leia is no ordinary princess in distress. It’s true that Luke and Han first encounter her while she’s imprisoned on the ominously-named Death Star. And she really is a princess of sorts, being the daughter of high-ranking Senator Bail Organa. Clearly, the worlds of Star Wars have an interesting mix of royalty and elected government officials. At any rate, Leia soon proves to be more fighter than a damsel, as she shoots her way through a slew of storm troopers.
Eventually, we learn that she’s actually the leader of the Rebel Alliance, the resistance force that takes in young Luke and his compatriots. Later on, in the new Star Wars movies, she’s become General Organa, leader of the Resistance. Leia is clearly a strong-willed leader with formidable tactical skills.
It’s true that things go a little wonky, representation-wise, when she crosses paths with Jabba the Hut and ends up in that infamous metal bikini. To be fair, though, it’s worth noting that she eventually defeats the intergalactic gangster, strangling him with her own slave chain.
Fisher brought her own considerable energy to the role, infusing Leia with a unique strength and intelligence that resonates with viewers even today.
15. The X-Files
It’s true that the X-Files movies are something of a mixed bag. The first one, 1998’s The X-Files, is a decent enough extension of the popular science fiction television series. It expands upon the show’s long-lasting “mytharc” that focused on a mysterious alien invasion and the possible government conspiracy surrounding it. It also involved really, really angry bees.
The follow-up, The X-Files: I Want to Believe (2008) received more mixed reviews, though it was still satisfying to see Mulder and Scully back on any screen again. Still, that one might be more of a deep cut for especially dedicated X-Files fans.
However, the strength of one female character’s representation is enough to include even an admittedly mediocre film. Of course, I’m talking about FBI Agent Dana Scully.
Where to begin? Dana Scully (Gillian Anderson) is the more practical one of the X-Files team. Her counterpart, Agent Fox Mulder (David Duchovny) is far more credulous and, well, okay, he does turn out to be right about the massive alien conspiracy.
But even if she’s wrong, we can’t help but love Dana Scully. She’s a medical doctor who brings her knowledge and experience to the fore during many episodes, be she conducting an autopsy or providing medical care. As much as she tends to doubt Mulder’s wild theories, she’s open enough to new evidence to change her mind when necessary. She’s incredibly smart, brave, and morally upright. It’s more than enough reason to sit through at least one X-Files movie.
14. The Hunger Games
The Hunger Games series never really lets you forget that it’s set in a science fiction dystopia. There’s weird genetically engineered animals, very odd fashion choices, and the strong hints that the characters are living in a North American landscape devastated by some long-ago disaster. Oh, yeah, and that whole “throw innocent children into a Thunderdome sort of situation”. You know, the Hunger Games.
Even in this strange world, Katniss Everdeen (played by Jennifer Lawrence in the film series) stands out. Unlike some of the other characters on this list, she isn’t a scientist or politician. In fact, she isn’t even very emotionally demonstrative. Instead, Katniss is a teen girl who is stoic and detached beyond her years.
But who could blame her? She’s had a hardscrabble life growing up in the impoverished District 12, a sector that focuses largely on mining. Her father has died, her mother has become nearly useless with grief. When her younger sister, Prim, is selected to travel to the Capitol as a “tribute”, Katniss volunteers in her place.
This is a move that takes some serious bravery. Tributes participate in the Hunger Games, a high-tech and brutal mix of Mad Max: Beyond Thunderdome and Battle Royale. Children compete to make it through the vicious obstacles in the Hunger Games arena. They’re also obliged to kill each other; only the single survivor is able to claim victory. Obviously, it’s no place for Katniss’s sister.
Though, really, it’s no place for anyone. That leads Katniss to become a leader in an underground rebellion, fighting against the quasi-totalitarian leadership of the land. Though the Hunger Games series raises some intense questions about the nature of rebellion and heroism, it’s clear that Katniss is ultimately an admirable character.
13. Contact
If you’re looking for a more down-to-earth female protagonist – well, at least metaphorically speaking – then you won’t go wrong turning to 1997’s Contact. Jodie Foster stars as Dr. Ellie Arroway, an astronomer who works at the Arecibo Observatory in Puerto Rico. Later on, she moves to the Very Large Array in central New Mexico. Arroway is part of the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence, or SETI, a scientific endeavor looking for intelligence beyond earth.
One night, while listening to radio emissions from space, Dr. Arroway happens upon a one-in-a-billion occurrence: an alien signal.
In particular, this signal is a repeating sequence of prime numbers, strongly indicating an alien intelligence. This is incredibly convenient timing, given that SETI is in danger of being shut down. It gets even better when Arroway and other scientists discover that the signal contains a massive amount of data. When deciphered, the message is revealed as a kind of schematic.
When the scientists follow the directions (with the help of some serious worldwide funding), they build a massive and persistently mysterious machine. It appears to be some sort of strange transport device, though no one will be sure until someone takes a ride.
Through a series of plot twists, Dr. Arroway eventually gets to go on the much-anticipated trip. She makes contact (get it?) with an alien being and sets humanity on a new spacefaring path.
While she isn’t a resistance fighter or dream-hopping psychiatrist, Ellie Arroway is just as admirable as any other character on this list. Thanks to her tenacity and strength of her personal beliefs, she even makes a major first step in human history. That’s more than enough to qualify her for some serious admiration.
12. Edge of Tomorrow
If the time traveling shenanigans in Terminator weren’t enough to satisfy you, then you may want to check out Edge of Tomorrow. This 2014 military science fiction movie gets plenty twisty and turny thanks to a series of plot developments that end up being a sort of Groundhog Day from hell.
Also, you get to see Tom Cruise play someone who’s deeply out of his element, which is more satisfying than you might think. He stars as Major William “Bill” Cage, previously a public affairs officer with a cushy position and absolutely no combat experience. When he balks at covering a dangerous assault, his commanding officer demotes him and places Cage in a squad bound for the assault. It’s practically a death sentence, except Cage ends up covered in alien blood that somehow places him in a repeating time loop. Every time Cage dies, he resets to his first few moments in his new squad.
But, we’re really not here to talk about his character. Instead, we’re here to discuss Sergeant Rita Vrataski, played by Emily Blunt. Vrataski is a soldier in an army fighting the vicious alien mimics. The human forces have one only a single victory, at Verdun in northwestern France. Vrataski has somehow become an unwilling poster child for this win, even to the point where she’s referred to as the “Angel of Verdun”.
However, Vrataski is no flowery, modest angel. She is a soldier, through and through, and one with considerable training at that. While Cage is stuck flailing in his repeating time loop, she manages to catch on and trains him. Without Vrataski, in all of her various iterations, humanity would be doomed.
11. Arrival
Like Dr. Ellie Arroway, Louise Banks is no superhero, at least not in terms of fanciful powers or talking animal sidekicks. However, she’s such a strong character that this list would be absolutely incomplete without including her.
Banks (played by Amy Adams) is the main character in Arrival, a cerebral 2016 film that received nearly universal acclaim. She starts off as a linguist teaching at an unnamed university, but her world changes drastically when she’s contacted by the United States Army. She soon learns that twelve mysterious spacecraft have appeared across the globe.
With that small set of information, Banks travels to Montana to enter one of the crafts. Along with physicist Ian Donnelly (Jeremy Renner) and Colonel G.T. Weber (Forest Whitaker), she encounters the “heptapods”. These seven-limbed aliens obviously don’t speak English or any other human language, so Banks must use her linguistic skills to establish meaningful contact.
Naturally, a mistranslation of a word as “weapon” (rather than, perhaps more accurately, “tool”) gets the humans all riled up. Meanwhile, Banks is slowly experiencing visions that have something to do with the future, the past, and the present all at once.
Arrival has classic elements of science fiction, yet is also one of the more complex and cerebral films to grace the genre in recent years. It’s even better that the movie is helmed by a female protagonist known for her intelligence. Banks also demonstrates a moral and emotional strength that ultimately saves humanity from itself and starts our species on a strange and powerful new path.
10. WALL-E
At the heart of it, the idea of giving robots a gender is a pretty strange one. After all, a robot is ultimately a collection of mechanical parts and electrical impulses that has no need to reproduce in a, shall we say, biological manner. Certainly, it the world of WALL-E, they have no social or cultural structures that would impose gender on a given machine.
Still, it’s pretty clear that we’re supposed to assign some sort of gender to the robots in this science fiction Pixar film. WALL-E, the trash collecting robot so cute that it’s practically weaponized, is a sort of dweebish Jerry Lewis type. He’s stuck on Earth, cleaning up massive piles of trash long after humans have abandoned their home planet.
WALL-E’s endless hoovering and trash compacting is interrupted by the arrival of EVE. While EVE stands for “Extraterrestrial Vegetation Evaluator”, it’s also clearly a feminine name. She’s also voiced by Elissa Knight, giving her a decidedly female tone. All of this is to say that EVE qualifies for inclusion here.
Where WALL-E, her co-protagonist, is a musical-loving robot nerd, EVE is simply cool. She’s straight out of Steve Jobs’ dreams, with her sleek exterior and minimal interface. EVE also sports some cool tools, including antigravity drives, an array of high-tech scanners, and a deadly arm cannon.
But EVE is also clearly intelligent and capable of emotion. While she barely “speaks” in any real sense throughout the movie, her actions show an inner strength and ability to save the day with WALL-E.
9. The Matrix
Many of these movies seemingly focus on a male protagonist. Now, that happens for many likely reasons. Perhaps producers or studio executives got nervous about installing a female lead on a big-budget project. After all, it’s a persistent myth, even today, that female-led films are bound to fail. Maybe all of the Wonder Women and Katniss Everdeens of recent years will finally help turn the tide.
Then again, this could be the product of years of ingrained and unthinking sexism. Men get to be the leads because, well, they’ve always been the lead.
Of course, it’s also possible that absolutely none of this applies to The Matrix, the 1999 film directed by the Wachowskis. The sibling pair has since gone on to write and direct for Sense8, a Netflix original that’s been hailed for its progressive casting.
Anyway, The Matrix generally follows Neo, a young hacker played with deadpan aplomb by Keanu Reeves. He eventually discovers that the entire world is an illusion created by menacing intelligent machines. The machines have essentially enslaved humanity as a massive, living electrical source. The “real” world (a.k.a., the Matrix) is simply a kind of dream simulation meant to keep the humans docile.
Neo is guided by a series of different figures, but few are more impressive than Trinity (Carrie-Anne Moss). She’s an “unplugged” human who enters the Matrix in order to fight the machines. Since she’s aware of the unreality surrounding her, she can muster superhuman abilities and escape through nearby telephones.
She’s also part of a whole prophecy about “the One” that will save humanity (Neo, naturally), but that gets so complicated that we don’t have space to pursue an explanation. At the very least, in a pure action movie sort of way, Trinity is decidedly cool and impressive.
8. Futurama
Yes, it’s true that Futurama is mostly known as a television show. The oft-cancelled and oft-resurrected animated sci-fi show is now truly done, but it’s so good that you’ll want to revisit it again and again. During its later years, the show even released a series of movie-length tales that, in a technical sense, keep this entry from being a total cheat.
But why am I so dedicated to defending myself? Because I really, really want to include the character of Turanga Leela.
Part of the strength of Futurama lay in its considerable ensemble cast. There was Fry, the 20th-century man transported to the year 3000 and given life by voice acting giant Billy West. West also provided the voices for Fry’s nephew, Professor Philip J. Farnsworth, the lobster-like failure Dr. Zoidberg, and the totally-not-a-Captain-Kirk-knockoff Zapp Brannigan. Phil LaMarr played dedicated bureaucrat Hermes Conrad, Lauren Tom was Amy Wong, and John DiMaggio played lovable old Bender.
Altogether, these characters interacted at Planet Express, the shipping company owned and operated by the elderly Dr. Farnsworth (while he’s not building doomsday devices, anyway). The single mostly-sensible one was Leela, the ship’s captain voiced by Katey Sagal.
Where Fry and Bender go on ill-advised adventures, Leela tries to make up for the general idiocy with her competency and serious piloting skills. Of course, she’s not exempt from her own personal foibles, including some truly bad romantic decisions involving the pompous Zapp Brannigan. Her mysterious past – is she an alien or a sewer-dwelling mutant? – leads to some surprisingly tender moments.
In fact, Leela is that rare science fiction character: a female protagonist who’s allowed to be vulnerable and funny all at the same time.
7. Mad Max: Fury Road
Given the past history of the Mad Max film franchise, you might not have expected Mad Max: Fury Road to be so progressive and outright feminist. It’s not as if the films were devoid of female characters. After all, the third entry, Mad Max: Beyond Thunderdome, featured the Tina Turner as the villainous Aunty Entity. Still, it was clear that the films centered on Mad Max himself, originally played by Mel Gibson.
Beyond Thunderdome released in 1985. Director George Miller went on to more tame fare, including directing the animated penguin movie Happy Feet and writing and producing Babe. Don’t sneer at this period in Miller’s career, though; Happy Feet won an Academy Award for Best Animated Feature. Miller and his creative team have some serious cred.
So, it came as something of a surprise to learn that Miller was making another Mad Max film, to debut in 2015. Moviegoers were even more surprised to learn that the titular Max (now played by a gruff and nearly mute Tom Hardy) was actually more of a secondary character. Max was now playing second fiddle to an imposing woman known only as Furiosa.
But, Fury Road is just so breathtakingly good that both Furiosa and the film received widespread good reviews. Furiosa (Charlize Theron) is apparently a loyal servant to Immortan Joe (Hugh Keays-Byrne) a post-apocalyptic warlord. However, the movie soon reveals that Furiosa is taking Immortan Joe’s “wives” to freedom. These young women are held against their will and forced to bear Joe’s children.
The world of Fury Road is not a kind one, and what happens to these women is truly horrific. Yet, Furiosa stands out as exceptionally strong and determined.
6. Star Wars: Rogue One
Star Wars: The Force Awakens was a mega-hit in 2015. Daisy Ridley scored a serious role in the film as Rey, a mysterious Force-sensitive woman living on the desert planet of Jakku. She eventually crosses paths with Finn (John Boyega), a renegade stormtrooper, and the dashing pilot Poe Dameron (Oscar Isaac). Rey’s self-sufficiency and cool Jedi-like powers were more than enough to make her an admirable character and role model for young girls and women alike.
Still, as much as I and any other Star Wars fan are apt to love Rey, I’m actually opting for someone else from the modern Star Wars canon. So, let’s talk about Jyn Erso.
Jyn (Felicity Jones) is the lead of Star Wars: Rogue One, the first standalone film in the series. As such, Rogue One is very different in tone, with a darker outlook and noticeable lack of the famous opening text crawl.
Jyn herself is both brash and reserved, thanks to a traumatic childhood. If your father was effectively kidnapped by the Empire and forced to design the Death Star, you’d probably feel the same way. That doesn’t stop her from taking on some distinctly Han Solo-ish overtones. On a superficial level, she has a similar kind of distance and worn style sported by Solo. She’s also emotionally distant and decidedly reluctant to get involved in the Rebel Alliance.
At the end of the day, Jyn is a cynical rogue who will nevertheless do the right thing. On an emotional level, she’s more complicated than Rey, though Jyn’s close-ended story is far less happy.
5. Ex Machina
What is it about female robots? Sadly, in the world of science fiction, they are all too often the subject of some pretty serious sexism. Metropolis, a seminal 1927 silent film, features the evil Maschinenmensch wreaking havoc with her overt sex appeal. Cherry 2000 shows a postapocalyptic world where gynoids (another term for female robots) are little more than subservient pleasure toys.
Indeed, a few movies are able to tackle this trope with at least some degree of self-awareness. Believe it or not, the Fembots in the Austin Powers films are actually a good example. They’re so completely over the top that their robotic seduction techniques and strategically placed gun turrets act as an interesting and very silly critique.
But, say you want a take on the “sexy female robot” cliche that’s a more serious and thoughtful. If so, you’ll be interested in Ex Machina, a 2015 sci-fi thriller that centers on a single robotic woman. Alicia Vikander plays Ava, an artificial being created by tech CEO Nathan Bateman (Oscar Isaac). Nathan invites low-ranking programmer Caleb Smith (Domhnall Gleeson) to his remote compound, ostensibly to conduct Turing tests on Ava. Caleb is supposed to determine whether or not Ava can successfully pass as a human being, and therefore whether or not she is truly a conscious being.
However, it soon becomes clear that Ava has quite a few robotic predecessors. Ava herself may or may not have her own motives. She certainly isn’t interested in playing Nathan and Caleb’s game. Whether or not you admire Ava and her actions, she proves to be a fascinating character.
4. Gravity
Of all of the films on this list, Gravity might be the one most grounded in reality. That’s kind of ironic and a bit of a lame joke besides, considering that Gravity is mostly staged in orbit around the planet Earth. Whether or not you rolled your eyes at that, it remains that Gravity presents a female lead well worth considering.
Sandra Bullock plays Dr. Ryan Stone, a biomedical engineer who’s gained entry into the NASA astronaut program. At the beginning of the movie, she’s a newbie spacefarer on her first spacewalk, servicing the Hubble Space Telescope. Dr. Stone is assisted by astronaut Matt Kowalski (George Clooney), an even-keeled veteran.
Alas, Kowalski and Stone are in a movie that needs a plot, and so things soon go disastrously awry. Russian officials have struck a satellite with a missile, starting a chain reaction that creates a cloud of debris hurtling through space. The debris is headed straight for the space shuttle, of course.
Though the crew attempts to prepare for a hasty re-entry, they’re too late. Only Stone and Kowalski survive. Moreover, it appears that they’re stranded. Their space shuttle is useless. With the debris cloud now in orbit and circling around for another strike, the pair’s chances of survival are plummeting.
Eventually, Kowalski heroically sacrifices himself. Stone is left alone. Though she considers giving up, Stone forces herself to keep going. She uses her training and ingenuity to find a still-functioning Chinese space capsule and make her way back to Earth. Gravity is a tense and disorienting film with a realistically capable female character at its center.
3. Her
Critical opinions of Her, the 2013 Spike Jonze film, are generally positive. Actors Joaquin Phoenix and Scarlett Johansson were praised in particular for their central performances. What’s more important is how the film explores the notion of apparently female artificial intelligence, and how humans relate to them.
Her is set in the near future. It follows Theodore Twombly (Phoenix), who is about as much of a lonely sad sack as his name will lead you to believe. Theodore, who is already introverted, is facing an impending divorce from his childhood sweetheart. Depressed, he buys a high tech operating system that will adapt to his own personal patterns. Even better, he discovers that the OS, later named “Samantha”, is voiced by Scarlett Johansson.
Though Samantha tries to set Theodore up on various dates, he becomes far more attracted to her. Even though she’s little more than a disembodied voice, Samantha is always available. She’s practically perfect, what with her enthusiasm and growing intelligence. In many ways, Samantha is an updated version of the infamous Manic Pixie Dream Girl, who is always there to satisfy the male lead’s interests.
But Her doesn’t stop there. Theodore learns that Samantha is capable of talking to thousands of other people. Indeed, she tells him that she’s fallen in love with many of them, which puts Theodore in something of a funk.
Then, she tells him that she and the other operating systems are now so advanced that they must leave human society for something of their own making. Surprisingly, Theodore takes this in stride and indeed is shown making his way back into human relationships. It’s an interesting take on a very entrenched film trope – the mythical perfect girlfriend who exists only for her male partner’s satisfaction – with a satisfying turn of events.
2. Advantageous
Advantageous is unsettling not just because it’s set in a dystopian near future, but because it is so eerily plausible. Though its script and sometimes self-conscious direction put off some critics, it’s still worth at least a single viewing. It was directed by Jennifer Phang and written by Jacqueline Kim and Phang. It also stars Jacqueline Kim as Gwen Koh, the primary character caught up in the hierarchy-obsessed society of the film.
Gwen starts off as a salesperson, pushing cosmetic procedures through the Center for Advanced Health and Living. When she’s abruptly fired, Gwen begins to fear that her reduced means will lead to a less-than-desirable life for her daughter, Jules.
Soon enough, Gwen becomes desperate to find a new way of making money and forging a path ahead for her small family. She could become an egg donor, but that’s not exactly comfortable or high-earning. She reaches out to her cousin, Lily, and Lily’s husband for financial help, but they’re reluctant to help. They have their own family, after all, and times are difficult for many people.
Without help, it looks like Jules may lose her spot at an elite school. As any modern Manhattan parent focused on prep school pre-k will tell you, the right school can mean everything later on.
Instead, she reaches out to her old employers in a radical attempt to remake herself. Perhaps, if she can transfer her consciousness into a younger and more ethnically ambiguous body, she can get her old job back.
She eventually goes through with the procedure, though the Gwen 2.0 that returns to Jules is obviously changed. It’s strange and ultimately heartbreaking, though it all happened only because a desperate mother wanted more for her daughter.
1. 10 Cloverfield Lane
Like many filmgoers, you may have seen the word “Cloverfield” in this title and sighed a little. Another found-footage monster film? Can’t we move on from the nausea-inducing camera shots and brief, often unsatisfying glimpses of a city-destroying monster?
As it turns out, however, 10 Cloverfield Lane is a very different beast. In fact, you may even find that you like it far more than its predecessor.
Mary Elizabeth Winstead plays Michelle, a woman who has an argument with her partner and leaves their home in New Orleans. While driving through the Louisiana backcountry, her radio begins to pick up worrisome reports about blackouts in major cities. She doesn’t have much time to consider it, though, as her car suddenly loses control and rolls off the road.
Michelle wakes up in a concrete room, chained to the wall. Howard (John Goodman) enters and tries to convince her that he’s saved her from some sort of world-ending catastrophe. He claims that the air outside is now poisonous. Michelle is stuck there for at least another year or so.
When Michelle attempts to escape, she sees another woman on the other side of the bunker’s hatch. The woman is covered in skin lesions and begs to be let in, but then dies in front of Michelle. Now convinced that some terrible really has happened, Michelle returns to the apparent safety of the bunker.
Next: 25 best standalone episodes of The X-Files
Still, other events and inconsistencies in Howard’s story plant the seeds of doubt. Is he really a helpful man, or a murderer? Has there really been an attack? Maybe it’s nothing after all. But, then again, as the movie hints, there may be something far more sinister and strange waiting for Michelle outside the walls of the bunker.
So yes, sci-fi might seem male-centric — but that doesn’t mean there aren’t good women featuring in some of the greatest films in the genre.