Silent Running (1972)

In a future where all flora is extinct on Earth, an astronaut is given orders to destroy the last of Earth's botany, kept in a greenhouse aboard a spacecraft.

Director:

Douglas Trumbull

Writers:

Deric Washburn, Michael Cimino (as Mike Cimino) ,

Stars:

Bruce Dern, Cliff Potts, Ron Rifkin

1 nomination.

Cast

Complete credited cast:
Bruce Dern	...	Freeman Lowell
Cliff Potts	...	John Keenan
Ron Rifkin	...	Marty Barker
Jesse Vint	...	Andy Wolf
Mark Persons	...	Drone
Steven Brown	...	Drone
Cheryl Sparks	...	Drone
Larry Whisenhunt	...	Drone

Storyline

In a future Earth barren of all flora and fauna, the planet's ecosystems exist only in large pods attached to spacecraft. When word comes in that the pods are to be jettisoned into space and destroyed, most of the crew of the Valley Forge rejoice at the prospect of going home. Not so for botanist Freeman Lowell who loves the forest and its creatures. He kills his colleagues taking the ship deep into space. Alone on the craft with his only companions being three small robots, Lowell revels in joys of nature. When colleagues appear to "rescue" him, he realizes he has only one option available to him.

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Plot Keywords:

greenhouse | space | robot | forest | future | 

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Taglines:

Amazing companions on an incredible adventure... that journeys beyond imagination!

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Genres:

Drama | Sci-Fi

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Certificate:

GP

Details

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Release Date:

10 March 1972 (USA)

Also Known As:

Running Silent

Filming Locations:

Aircraft Hanger, Van Nuys Airport - 6590 Hayvenhurst Avenue, Van Nuys, Los Angeles, California, USA

Box Office

Budget:

$1,000,000 (estimated)

Gross:

ESP 21,077,972 (Spain)

Company Credits

Production Co:

Universal Pictures, Trumbull/Gruskoff Productions

Technical Specs

Runtime:

89 min

Sound Mix:

70 mm 6-Track (70 mm prints) Mono (35 mm prints) (Westrex Recording System)

Color:

Color (Technicolor)

Aspect Ratio:

1.85 : 1

Did You Know?

Trivia

External scenes of the ships were also used in the promo for the TV show The Starlost (1973) along with the early instrumental music.

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Goofs

A droid hands Freeman a small gray book, about 5x7 inches, but in a closer scene we see a much larger book.

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Quotes

Freeman Lowell: On Earth, everywhere you go, the temperature is 75 degrees. Everything is the same; all the people are exactly the same. Now what kind of life is that?

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Connections

Referenced in Vision of a Future Passed: The Prophecy of 2001 (2007)

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Soundtracks

Rejoice in the Sun
Lyrics by Diane Lampert
Music by Peter Schickele
Sung by Joan Baez

User Reviews

An amazing, wonderful film

I remember first seeing this film on television I think in 1973 and being mesmerized by it. Even though I found the the premise to be absurd (more on that below), the story and movie triumphs regardless. This is flim making at its most brilliant. With the exception of Terrence Malick's "Badlands," I cannot think of a finer directorial debut. It is one of the tragedies of contemporary cinema, that Douglas Trumbull could not find any work as a director for years afterwards. What a loss! The studio completely blew it.

The movie. Yes, the premise is incoherent and it has to be dealt with. Sometime in the early years of the next century what is left of America's forests are gathered up and put on space freighters and shipped to . . . Saturn. Why is most unclear. Putting the forest domes in orbit around earth would have made perfect sense. Moreover, the film goes to great lengths to show that the robots are fully capable of tending to them alone so the whole bit about the unhappy human crew is unnecessary. But off to Saturn we go (where the light for the plants -- surprise -- is really bad).

I understand that Trumbull was thinking of an alien contact story initially -- I am certain to be going out on a limb on this one -- which seemed to bear some resemblence to the Poul Anderson novella "Southern Cross." The aliens were soon dumped, however. What remained turned out to be an utterly compelling psychological drama of a man alone in space that is unlike any SF movie I have seen (it does bear some similarity to a few Twilight Zone episodes, however).

This is an astonishing technical achievement in movie making. Everything about this film works: music, effects, photography, sets, acting, editing, direction, you name it. Folks, this was done for all of one million dollars and is a hundred times more compelling than films that cost a hundred times as much. This is art. This is literature. Get the DVD. Just sit down an watch it. This is a lovely, timeless, piece of work.

Then weep because they don't make 'em like this anymore. .