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Key words: Alien, film,<br />
Prometheus spoiler alert,<br />
screenwriting, xeno-species<br />
Science Fact and Science Fiction<br />
Features<br />
Science in film<br />
Helen Lambourne (Wellcome Trust)<br />
On Monday 8 November, Sir John Gurdon <strong>was</strong> <strong>bustled</strong> into a meeting room at the Wellcome Trust<br />
to face a wall of TV cameras, journalists and photographers in a special press conference. Professor<br />
Gurdon, a former governor of the Trust after whom the Wellcome Trust–Cancer Research UK Gurdon<br />
Institute <strong>was</strong> named, had just been awarded the Nobel Prize for Medicine or Physiology for the<br />
discovery that mature cells can be reprogrammed to become immature cells that are capable of<br />
developing into all tissues of the body. That same evening, the Wellcome Trust <strong>was</strong> able to announce<br />
a second prize-winner on its premises. Not for a Nobel Prize this time, but rather the inaugural<br />
winner of the Wellcome Trust Screenwriting Prize.<br />
The Wellcome Trust’s connection to Professor<br />
Gurdon makes sense. It is, after all, one of the world’s<br />
largest funders of biomedicine. But screenwriting?<br />
The Trust’s mission, going back over 75 years, has<br />
always been to further scientific understanding, but<br />
its founder, Sir Henry Wellcome recognized that<br />
science <strong>was</strong> part of culture, that it should be part of a<br />
conversation about society rather than a subculture<br />
characterized by mass incomprehension. Public<br />
engagement has always been very important.<br />
Film is an extremely important medium: a film on<br />
general release has the potential to reach very large<br />
audiences. With the Trust’s mission to make science<br />
a part of society, we acknowledge the potential of<br />
film to inspire audiences and make science a bigger<br />
part of the cultural conversation.<br />
When most people consider science in film, they<br />
invariably think of science fiction: the blockbusters<br />
such as Armageddon, The Day After Tomorrow,<br />
Minority Report, the X-Men films, or the more<br />
cerebral visionary epics such as Blade Runner and<br />
2001: a Space Odyssey. But there are other ways<br />
of bringing the ideas and vision of science to a<br />
cinematic crowd.<br />
Memento, nominated for an Oscar for its<br />
screenplay by brothers Christopher and Jonathan<br />
Nolan, is a mystery thriller about revenge and a<br />
film about anterograde amnesia. Neuropsychologist<br />
Sallie Baxendale from the National Hospital for<br />
Neurology and Neurosurgery argues that it is one<br />
of few realistic portrayals of amnesia in films. But<br />
crucially, Baxendale also gives credit to the format<br />
of the film: “the fragmented, almost mosaic quality<br />
to the sequence of scenes in the film cleverly reflects<br />
the ‘perpetual present’ nature of the syndrome.”<br />
Similarly, Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind<br />
is not only a film about love, but also a film about<br />
the nature of memory. One Flew over the Cuckoo’s<br />
Nest features a narcissistic sociopath, but it is also<br />
a film about how society deals with mental illness.<br />
A Beautiful Mind is a drama about a maths genius,<br />
but also a study of the detrimental effects of<br />
schizophrenia on relationships.<br />
When we watch drama on television or on the big<br />
screen, we expect to be entertained. But we also want<br />
our stories and characters to be plausible. “Could<br />
this really happen?” is an intriguing question for all<br />
film makers (and scientists) and vital in plotting key<br />
elements in any story.<br />
We expect characters in our films to behave<br />
consistently throughout the film and the situations<br />
that they face to make sense, but what about when<br />
it comes to portrayals of science? Should we allow<br />
screenwriters extra dramatic licence when they<br />
bring science into the story? No film-maker sets<br />
out to intentionally betray science, but sometimes a<br />
story might require a ‘suspension of disbelief ’ that<br />
might not be scientifically accurate. In order to enjoy<br />
a cinematic experience, this requirement is part of<br />
the deal for non-specialist and scientific audiences<br />
alike. However, a science-themed film that asks this<br />
too often changes the viewing experience and starts<br />
slipping into another realm, that of fantasy. There is<br />
nothing wrong with fantasy – just look at Avatar –<br />
but it is when the two are tangled that science in film<br />
becomes dissatisfying.<br />
Success in the film world is usually measured in<br />
audience numbers; the notion of accuracy is rarely<br />
discussed outside of scientific circles. Dr Mark<br />
Glassy is a scientist working in cancer research. He<br />
is also a science-fiction enthusiast. In his book The<br />
Biology of Cinema Fiction, Glassy gently interrogates<br />
the science in science-fiction films by asking himself<br />
the question “Could it actually happen?”<br />
December 2012 © Biochemical Society 21
Features<br />
22 December 2012 © Biochemical Society<br />
Science Fact and Science Fiction<br />
In Jurassic Park, a film that features molecular<br />
biology, scientists are able to a dinosaur by<br />
combining dinosaur DNA preserved inside a<br />
mosquito suspended in amber, with frogs’ eggs. As<br />
Glassy argues, in order to do this, a near complete<br />
dinosaur genome would have to be obtained. Using<br />
the techniques in the film, the scientists would<br />
have created, at best, a frog–dinosaur hybrid, not<br />
the fully hatched Tyrannosaurus that appears in<br />
the film. But the fundamental principles of genetic<br />
engineering and cloning were not fractured. The<br />
answer to the question ‘Could it happen?’ is yes,<br />
genetic engineering technology will perhaps one day<br />
advance enough that we can recreate extinct species<br />
from ancient DNA.<br />
In science-fiction classic Alien, Glassy finds “one<br />
of the most interesting life cycles in science-fiction<br />
cinema”. The film delivers credibility and kicks in a<br />
beautifully constructed documentary-style thriller.<br />
The life cycle of the alien in the film is composed<br />
of both a sexual phase and an asexual phase. The<br />
sexual phase, the mating of the alien queen, we<br />
assume happens off-screen: but the asexual phase,<br />
the hatching of the ‘facehuggers’ that begins via the<br />
victims mouth is vividly depicted. The facehugger<br />
latches on to another species and assimilates its DNA<br />
with the host. As a result of this DNA mixing, a ‘chest<br />
burster’ alien emerges from the host and grows into<br />
an adult, completing the cycle. A stunning piece of<br />
visual cinema and visionary science.<br />
The defining and thrilling idea contained within<br />
the Alien films is that the alien DNA can adapt to<br />
any species and combine them into a viable mixture<br />
capable of reproduction (a xeno-species). Since DNA<br />
is passed on from generation to generation, the alien<br />
must have previously assimilated DNA from other<br />
species, combining to make the alien the terrifying<br />
force that it has become. Somehow the alien has the<br />
ability to find the best genes it can and incorporate<br />
these into its own genome and life cycle, making it<br />
one of the most powerful and dominant species seen<br />
in science-fiction cinema.<br />
The key to the credibility of the film is that the<br />
alien life cycle depicted has examples and parallels<br />
here on Earth. It stays true to the principles of<br />
biology; it has an asexual and sexual life cycle, a<br />
cyclopropagative transmission process (much like<br />
malaria), meaning that it changes form and function<br />
as it invades and multiplies within hosts, and it<br />
survives through domination of its environment via<br />
its genes.<br />
Prometheus, the recent prequel to Alien, is, on<br />
the other hand, low on authenticity. Neither the<br />
mission, the biology nor the scientists are consistent<br />
even within the film’s own narrative world, with the<br />
filmmakers choosing instead to mix realities; the<br />
real, the fantasy and the reality within the film. Take<br />
the moment the scientists analyse the alien DNA and<br />
discover it’s a 100% match to our own. In his blog<br />
SciencePunk, Frank Swain describes how puzzling<br />
this is: “I’m not sure what this means. That we’re<br />
them, obviously. But 100%? I share 99% of my DNA<br />
with a chimp. Does that mean [the aliens] made<br />
chimps too? But if they’re a 100% match for us,<br />
where did they get the extra 1% DNA we don’t share<br />
with chimps? Do they use some other DNA that they<br />
manufactured? Does that mean the [aliens] made all<br />
life on Earth or just kick it off and let it evolve?”<br />
It is the mixing of narrative worlds in science<br />
fiction that hampers enjoyment. In Prometheus,<br />
as Frank Swain again points out, the writers make<br />
a big deal out of the characters not being able to<br />
breathe the moon’s atmosphere because of its high<br />
CO 2 potency, but the combination of gases inside<br />
the alien’s moon base enables the expedition team<br />
to breathe normally. That’s fine: the aliens modified<br />
the atmosphere inside the base to suit their lungs. So<br />
why then are the aliens wearing breathing apparatus<br />
inside their own base? And how does one alien<br />
manage to sprint unsuited out of the moon base after<br />
the scientists?<br />
For me, though, it’s the scientists that really stretch<br />
credulity far beyond breaking point. I don’t mind<br />
that they are ridiculously good-looking, younger<br />
than everyone else and are thirsty for risk – that’s<br />
believable. In fact, these qualities are an enjoyable<br />
leap away from the classic Hollywood scientist<br />
who, quoting from Christopher Frayling’s Mad, Bad<br />
and Dangerous: the Scientist and the Cinema, are<br />
almost invariably male and “are dressed in white lab<br />
coats; have frizzy hair or else none at all; they wear<br />
Coke-bottle spectacles; they work alone indoors or<br />
underground in laboratories marked ‘Secret’; they are<br />
middle-aged and not at all physically attractive”. The<br />
Prometheus scientists showed none of these clichés,<br />
which <strong>was</strong> refreshing. The notion that science might<br />
actually be interesting to people with both looks and<br />
brains is a modern idea in movie making.<br />
What <strong>was</strong>n’t so good, however, <strong>was</strong> how clueless<br />
the scientists were about everything, which, as<br />
research scientists on a trip of a lifetime, didn’t make<br />
sense. Worse, they were careless with their loot – the<br />
alien matter. Common to all working scientists I have<br />
met is the care they take over their samples: feeding,<br />
temperature, climate control, transportation, health,<br />
contamination risks and the individual needs of each<br />
precious piece of data. In this film, the scientists<br />
throw the new life forms around as if they’re custard,
Al Smith, winner of the Wellcome Trust Screenwriting Prize. © Wellcome Library, London<br />
contaminating all and sundry and losing their own<br />
value as a research tool in the process. And don’t get<br />
me started on the geologist with the most advanced<br />
mapping tool in the world, who manages to get lost.<br />
In a Wellcome Trust survey of 1600 working<br />
scientists conducted in 1999–2000, findings<br />
indicated that, whereas 70% of respondents accepted<br />
that their work had social and ethical implications<br />
and 73% considered the media to be the most<br />
effective method of communication with the public,<br />
the majority considered themselves to be viewed in a<br />
negative light by the public. Movies can change that.<br />
They may not be a place to learn about science but<br />
they are a place to engage with it.<br />
This is why, in June this year, we launched our<br />
Screenwriting Prize, to get writers to use science as<br />
inspiration for their stories – not necessarily to get<br />
scientifically accurate plotlines, but rather to focus<br />
on originality, innovation and authenticity, to move<br />
science in film out of the confines of science fiction<br />
and historical biopic and into different genres.<br />
The response from the writing world <strong>was</strong> extremely<br />
heartening: 338 established writers submitted an idea<br />
for a feature film. Criteria were strict on eligibility for<br />
Science Fact and Science Fiction<br />
writers, but deliberately open about the nature of science<br />
in the idea. The entries were reviewed by experts from<br />
the British film industry, public engagement specialists<br />
at the Wellcome Trust and a professional scientist,<br />
Allan Pacey from the Department of Reproductive and<br />
Developmental Medicine at Sheffield University.<br />
The winner, Al Smith, <strong>was</strong> a playwright who has<br />
written extensively for theatre and TV, including<br />
Holby City, Casualty and a script for Sir David<br />
Attenborough. Smith won the £20 000 prize for an<br />
idea entitled HalfLife about two teenagers, each with<br />
a neurological condition, who steal a car and go on a<br />
road trip and fall in love. Sam Firth, an experimental<br />
documentary maker, <strong>was</strong> awarded a specially created<br />
runner-up prize. Her film will explore the nature of<br />
reality through the mechanisms of memory and recall.<br />
Both will now go away and develop their idea further<br />
in collaboration with Wellcome Trust scientists.<br />
The Trust hopes that, by nurturing future feature<br />
films from the very beginning with scientific input<br />
and guidance, we will foster films that draw their<br />
inspiration from real science and medicine and hope<br />
that this will mean films that are better because of<br />
and not in spite of the science. ■<br />
Features<br />
December 2012 © Biochemical Society 23