It’s a cool sensation when we look back at films made in the pre-2000s era as they attempt to theorize how rapidly we’ll advance. Sure, in the past there was this romanticized view of “the year 2000” that bore implications of the next millennium future technology that would come with it. This included things like flying cars, highly sophisticated AI or robots, laser guns, time travel, and commercialized space travel.
What was far-reaching is that some of these film creators were assuming so much would happen in such a narrow scope of time. What’s even wilder is that some of them hit the nail on the head with their predictions, and our modern-day technology has completely fulfilled the prophecy of some of these movies. In some cases, they’ve even exceeded those predictions.
1. Voice-activated AI Assistants
We all know Apple’s voice companion and assistant, Siri, or even Microsoft’s Cortana. Although limited in their functionality, they are still capable of a ton of things, including day planning, reporting the weather, and writing and sending messages. It’s not unlike the AI assistants we saw in Stanley Kubrick’s 2001: A Space Odyssey. The popularization of Siri didn’t properly show up until about 10 years after the events of the film in 2011, but it wasn’t far off, that’s for sure! If you fast forward a little further into the future, in 2018, we saw the first iteration of OpenAI’s GPT-1 when AI reasoning skills truly began to shine.
2. 3D Printing
You might recall the famous “replicator” from 1987’s Star Trek. The voice-activated device was used to assemble particles into anything the user wanted. It was just a bit more functional of a riff on the 3D printers we have today. Although the replicator would simply materialize all dimensions of the object at once, 3D printing is a more methodical process. So sure, 3D printing is not entirely representative of the replicator, but it is awfully similar in spirit.
But more closely in tune with the 3D printers of today, we saw 3D printers in 2001’s Jurassic Park III, a 3D printer capable of printing a velociraptor’s larynx. The print was used to synthesize the raptor’s audible expressions. 3D printing still has a long way to go to create objects that are robust. Nevertheless, the tech is already an employed (and debated over) method for printing things like prosthetics in modern health. Fairly soon, we’ll likely see wholly functional organ alternatives being 3D printed, as was illustrated in Jurassic Park III.
3. Self-driving Vehicles
In the 1990 film, Total Recall, we see the use of self-driving vehicles driving around the surface of Mars. It’s a technology we’re still working toward, but with each year, it grows closer to becoming a reality.
Even newer films like 2004’s iRobot saw the application of fully autonomous self-driving cars. These vehicles would accelerate, brake, lane-change, and even store themselves away, all without a driver. This not only gave us a peek into the future we’re hoping for, but predicted the “now,” where people are beginning to trust automatic driving as a valid supplement to their own driving.
4. Digital Billboards
Then there was the use of digitized billboards in Blade Runner from 1982. A simple prediction, but a true one, nonetheless. We absolutely have digital billboards today. The only caveat is that Blade Runner estimated flying cars would be the normal mode of transportation by 2019. We’ve sadly not reached that point yet.
5. Holograms
Then, of course, there was the brilliant use of holograms as a communication form used in 1977’s Star Wars. Seemingly beyond our reach at the time, we’ve managed to break ground on holograms in modern-day use. Today, you can see holograms used in airports and certain government buildings largely to display signage.
The advanced use of holograms, as we see in Star Wars, isn’t quite there yet for us, as it’s not been adapted to live recordings of people’s motion able to be played back with audio, but you can probably anticipate it will happen in the next decade or two.
6. Virtual Reality
We saw a glimpse of virtual reality being used by Marty in Back to the Future II, hinting at the technology we would find ourselves using today. In today’s era, VR headsets are practically commonplace within households, and it’s only growing ever more prevalent with the advent of the metaverse on our doorstep.
7. Smart Homes
It feels unjust to stop there with how many ways the Back to the Future films hinted at the technology we would actualize to some capacity in the future. We shouldn’t forget the presence of the “smart home,” which we so cleverly emulate today with all of the ways we’re able to automate features. We’ve equipped our homes to be capable of turning on and off lights, arming security systems, enabling and disabling heat and cooling, and monitoring the area around the structure with cameras.
What’s Next?
There are so many ways that films from the past fifty years have nailed it when predicting the future. However, there’s a lot of ways they’ve fallen completely flat and missed the mark. However, those ideas are still being incubated. It’s only a matter of time before flying cars are as common as regular cars are today.