Science fiction, of course, doesn't have to be driven by grandes effects, by superstar names and monumental backdrops. It can be cool, dry, colourless even. The hero, in trenchcoat and fedora, traverses a lightless city. There are few others at this time of night. The familiar landmarks of the City of Light become the voice of 𝛼-60, an artificial intelligence that presides over Alphaville.

𝛼-60: “Do you know what illuminates the night?”

Lemmy Caution: “Poetry.”

– 𝛼-60 playing the imitation game with Lemmy Caution

Based on a poem by Paul Éluard, #Godard's Alphaville bears similarities with Jean #Cocteau's Orphée (1950), transported to a mirror world of sorts. It also foreshadows not only our time, but also M. Hulot's, whose #Tativille could be the simulacra of 𝛼-60's simulated, dehumanised world.

“Change your dreams, not the world.”

– Harry

“Clicks, clacks, riding the backs of giraffes for laughs, S'alright for a while, The ego sings of castles and kings, And things that go with a life of style, Wanting to feel, to know what is real, Living is a, is a lie”

– The Monkees, Porpoise Song (1968)

“It isn't Jesus. It's just a fella.”

– Charlie Bostock

In the barn of a remote Lancashire farmhouse, three children stumble upon a stranger. Confused, they conclude that the fellow must be the Second Coming of Christ. In the world of the adults, a man is wanted by the police.

“Good night, Gentle Jesus. Sleep well.”

– Charlie Bostock

Early 60s, Sweden. A social experiment. Six hopelessly criminal juveniles are packed in a guesthouse – cynically named Objectivity – and loosely supervised by social workers and a reverend. The public servants speak of a new lease on life, God's servant of how Jesus forgives; all speak on their own behalf. We follow the young men closely and sense their need to break out, to be young, to be out of that house. We learn that their world, in or out, is eternally equally irrelevant.

“Jesus Christ has promised to forgive you 490 times, whatever you have done… because those were his words. But about the 491st time… He has given no words. None at all.”

– Reverend Mild

Vilgot Sjöman's 491 is an extremely, bleak, aggressive, and hopeless depiction of youth in postwar Sweden. Forgiveness is a tool of power, a method of control. And as empty as a repetitive lecture.

A chance encounter with a blonde drummer during the Holy Week in the village of Calanda leaves a deep impression on Julián (José Luis López Vázquez). When years later he reunites with his childhood friend Pablo, he finds that Pablo is married to bubbly cosmopolitan Elena (Geraldine Chaplin), the spitting image of the elusive drummer. Infatuated he tries to court her, but Elena sees nothing in the drab radiologist. Julián then turns his attention to his shy assistant Ana (also Chaplin) and grooms her into becoming the two unattainable women.

“Things last as long as they last.”

– Pablo

Saura's Peppermint Frappé takes #Hitchcock's Vertigo (1958) – indeed the peppermint green of the drink is an homage – with a twist of #Buñuel and serves it over an anti-#Franco​ist tale of self-doubting machismo obsessing over The Other. Even Elena's car, American instead of a much more obvious European model, dismisses fascist Spain's perceived superiority. Indeed the Generalisimo drove a Cadillac.