Science fiction does its best at predicting the future. Sometimes it is so far off one cannot help but laugh in hindsight, while other times one wonders if the filmmakers were clairvoyants based on how close they were to emulating the actual future. The following list will show both sides of the coin.
Of course, a few older films which grossly miscalculated the present day still got a few things right, and the ones whose predictions came true maybe presented the idea in a different way. At the end of the day, most of the movies here are great, and their stories say something true about human nature, regardless of how realistic the worlds are.
Hilariously Wrong: 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968)
To its credit, subtler innovations like tablets and video communication were predicted correctly in Stanley Kubrick's opus. However, most of these are overshadowed by the idea of humans achieving convenient commercial space travel by the year 2001. We wonder how Kubrick must have felt by the end of his life when he saw no plans for civilian space shuttles or Lunar colonization.
Eerily Accurate: Darkman (1990)
Sam Raimi's classic Darkman showcased a 3D printer decades before they became reality. In it, the hero uses one to make a face for himself.
The movie was ahead of its time in more ways than one just by virtue of being a successful and beloved super hero movie in the early '90s.
Hilariously Wrong: Running Man (1987)
Modern society still adores violence on television, but we haven't gotten to the point where we force convicts to fight each other to the death for our entertainment.
Society is only at a point where the masses enjoy watching movies about reality shows based on such grizzly games.
Eerily Accurate: Minority Report (2002)
Precogs may be a little far fetched, but Minority Report's world came true in other ways. The personalized ads people encounter, for example, are much like the Facebook ads people see today. Phones listen to our conversations and present products based on what they heard.
Hilariously Wrong: Planet Of The Apes (1968)
It is a good thing this one did not come true. Not that apes don't deserve their own chance at global domination, but we'd hate to see humanity wiped out by a virus.
If it were to start happening slowly, there'd already be intelligent apes in secret laboratories. While it may not be true, it still made for one of the best and most influential science fiction film series of all time.
Eerily Accurate: Lawnmower Man (1992)
Lawnmower Man's near future aesthetic helps keep it grounded. The movie predicted virtual reality technology with some surprising accuracy. The headsets depicted in the film look a lot like modern day VR platforms.
It cannot be used for accelerated learning and making hyper intelligent humans, however.
Hilariously Wrong: Terminator (1984)
Hollywood loves post-apocalypses. Thankfully, they never come true. While artificial intelligence is getting smarter with each ing year, it is unlikely the technology will ever try to overthrow humanity, nor will we ever travel through time like in this franchise.
Eerily Accurate: Woman In The Moon (1929)
Plenty of silent movies predicted space travel, but none of them did it with the same accuracy as Fritz Lang's Woman In The Moon. Mainly, a rocket is used to get the crew onto the Lunar surface.
A few key differences to reality prevent it from getting too creepy, like the rocket being in water and the moon having an atmosphere habitable for humans, but these are forgivable errors considering it came out so long before real space travel.
Hilariously Wrong: Escape From New York (1981)
To be fair, anybody who looked at New York City in the '70s and '80s wouldn't be irrational to predict the entire place going into ruin within the next decade or two.
The city has since cleaned up significantly, however, and while a few rough spots exist, the city is certainly not a prison colony.
Hilariously Wrong: Back To The Future Part II (1989)
Back to the Future Part II's 2015 was a decent effort, but missed the mark on several levels. Hover boards don't exist and self-drying clothing is not commonplace. Additionally, we don't have seventeen Jaws movies or holographic movie billboards.
