Attention keeps drifting. These films hold it anyway.
Fresh off ripping space-time a new one at the end of "Bender's Big Score," the Planet Express crew is back to mend the tear in reality, or (hopefully) at least not make it worse. Beyond the tear, though, lurks a being of inconceivable...tentacularity. What will become of Earth, and indeed, our universe, when faced with the Beast with a Billion Backs?
Short scenes and clear stakes. Your attention doesn't have to stay perfect to keep up.
When 9 first comes to life, he finds himself in a post-apocalyptic world. All humans are gone, and it is only by chance that he discovers a small community of others like him taking refuge from fearsome machines that roam the earth intent on their extinction. Despite being the neophyte of the group, 9 convinces the others that hiding will do them no good.
Short scenes and clear stakes. Your attention doesn't have to stay perfect to keep up.
After a violent storm, a dense cloud of mist envelops a small Maine town, trapping David Drayton and his five-year-old son in a local grocery store with other local residents. They soon discover that the mist conceals deadly horrors that threaten their lives, and worse, their sanity.
Short scenes and clear stakes. Your attention doesn't have to stay perfect to keep up.
Lewis, a brilliant young inventor, is keen on creating a time machine to find his mother, who abandoned him in an orphanage. Things take a turn when he meets Wilbur Robinson and his family.
Short scenes and clear stakes. Your attention doesn't have to stay perfect to keep up.
Spanning over one thousand years, and three parallel stories, The Fountain is a story of love, death, spirituality, and the fragility of our existence in this world.
Short scenes and clear stakes. Your attention doesn't have to stay perfect to keep up.
When focus is a problem, pacing is the solution. These films understand that.
High-concept but clear enough to track with scattered attention.
When Leela is insulted by a group of space-rednecks (like regular rednecks, but in space), she enters the Planet Express ship in a demolition derby. Leela emerges victorious, but when she brings the damaged ship home, and the Professor sees the fuel gauge, he's enraged by the hit he's going to take at the Dark Matter pump. Now the crew have to find a way to break Mom's stranglehold on starship fuel, even if they have to wade through a Lord of the Rings-inspired fantasy-land to do it!
Short scenes and clear stakes. Your attention doesn't have to stay perfect to keep up.
Called in to recover evidence in the aftermath of a horrific explosion on a New Orleans ferry, Federal agent Doug Carlin gets pulled away from the scene and taken to a top-secret government lab that uses a time-shifting surveillance device to help prevent crime.
Short scenes and clear stakes. Your attention doesn't have to stay perfect to keep up.
A military veteran goes on a journey into the future, where he can foresee his death and is left with questions that could save his life and those he loves.
Short scenes and clear stakes. Your attention doesn't have to stay perfect to keep up.
Follows three social outcasts -- two geeks and a cynic -- as they attempt to navigate a time-travel conundrum in the middle of a British pub.
Strong enough momentum to keep pulling you back in, even when your mind wanders.
When their ship crash-lands on a remote planet, the marooned passengers soon learn that escaped convict Riddick isn't the only thing they have to fear. Deadly creatures lurk in the shadows, waiting to attack in the dark, and the planet is rapidly plunging into the utter blackness of a total eclipse. With the body count rising, the doomed survivors are forced to turn to Riddick with his eerie eyes to guide them through the darkness to safety. With time running out, there's only one rule: Stay in the light.
Short scenes and clear stakes. Your attention doesn't have to stay perfect to keep up.
These films work because they match where you actually are, not where you think you should be.