Here are some almost perfect sci-fi horror movies that don’t have Alien or The Thing in their titles. While sci-fi and horror used to be regarded as B-movie trash in Hollywood before the 1970s, the arrival of a certain Ridley Scott movie titled Alien changed all that. The original entry was produced simply because Star Wars had become a giant success, and 20th Century Fox wanted to greenlight movies set in space.
In an alternate world, it’s easy to imagine Alien becoming a cheapie Roger Corman horror flick – in fact, this almost became its fate after most studios rejected the original screenplay. Instead, Scott’s painterly eye and the incredible creature design made it a genre landmark, leading to the Alien movie franchise and more “B-movies” made with A-list talent.
This includes the beloved John Carpenter sci-fi horror movie The Thing, which was somehow treated with critical disdain back in 1982. Nowadays, both it and Alien regularly top any list of the greatest sci-fi genre movies, but there are plenty of other gems out there for fans to explore.
7
Event Horizon (1997)
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Event Horizon was a bomb upon release but thanks to being rediscovered on VHS or home viewings, it wormed its way into pop culture. This Paul W.S. Anderson film is almost the dictionary definition of imperfect; the pacing is janky – the result of the film being edited in a rush to meet a release date – and the dialogue can be quite clunky.
What Event Horizon does have in its corner is an incredible, suffocating atmosphere. From the instant Laurence Fishburne’s rescue crew enters the titular ship, a sense of dread hangs over the entire story. It also boasts beautiful, gothic production design, and when the gore hits, it hits REAL hard.
The film has been described as Hellraiser meets Alien, which is apt. In fact, Event Horizon’s original cut was so bloody it caused walkouts during test screenings, leading to sequences being heavily cut down. Despite this, this sci-fi chiller is one of the genre’s must-see efforts.
6
Prince of Darkness (1987)
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The Thing is part of a stealth John Carpenter trilogy, also consisting of 1995’s In the Mouth of Madness and Prince of Darkness. Carpenter dubbed this trio his “Apocalypse Trilogy,” with each dealing with the end of the world in a different way. The Thing is about the death of identity, In the Mouth of Madness is the end of reality, while Prince of Darkness tackles the death of God.
This 1987 gem blends science with religion, as a team of science students examines a mysterious canister said to contain the son of Satan. Pretty soon, the evil residing inside awakens, and the students are in for the night from Hell – quite literally. Following several bad experiences with big movie studios, Carpenter went back to his low-budget roots with Prince of Darkness.
Produced for only $3 million, Carpenter largely confines the action to one locale and builds a sense of impending doom. He also layers on deeply eerie sequences, such as the haunting dream most of the main characters share. This is one of Carpenter’s lesser-praised works, but it’s quietly one of his scariest too.
5
Annihilation (2018)
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Former author Alex Garland has made quite the name for himself as the writer/director of thoughtful sci-fi or horror outings like Ex Machina. With Annihilation, he pays homage to both Andrei Tarkovsky’s Stalker and Carpenter’s The Thing, where an all-female team of scientists enters a strange alien zone dubbed “The Shimmer,” which radically alters the DNA of all living things inside.
Garland uses Annihilation’s lofty sci-fi hook as a way to explore how even seemingly intelligent people self-destruct or self-sabotage themselves, whether through addictions or cheating on their partners. That’s the subtext running throughout, but Garland stages some memorable setpieces too, including the nightmarish screaming bear attack.
For a filmmaker who has yet to helm a dud, Annihilation might be his best work to date. It blends thoughtful sci-fi, cosmic horror, and even has a complex love story.
4
The Fly (1986)
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When movie fans make an argument for remakes, The Thing and David Cronenberg’s The Fly are often cited as examples of redos that surpass the original. That’s certainly the case with Cronenberg’s masterful riff on the original 1958 movie, which sees Jeff Goldblum’s scientist accidentally blending his DNA with a fly during a teleportation experiment.
Cronenberg is deemed the king of body horror, and he could have earned that crown with The Fly alone. At first, Goldblum’s Seth is reinvigorated by his successful experiment – until sores develop all over his body and his teeth start falling out. Cronenberg reimagines the concept as a tragic love story, where Seth’s journalist lover Veronica (Geena Davis) has to watch the man she loves fall apart and become a new lifeform.
The Fly ultimately looks at the tragedy of somebody dying before their time, and Seth’s mutation is coded as a terminal illness. In between the harrowing drama, Cronenberg makes audiences squirm with gross-out effects, ranging from Seth yanking out his fingernails to using his acid vomit on human flesh.
3
Quatermass And The Pit (1967)
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A film adaptation of the cult 1950s BBC series, Quatermass and the Pit sees British scientists unearthing a sentient alien spaceship deep beneath London. This Hammer Horror sci-fi thriller is amongst the best movies the venerable British studio ever produced, and is positively loaded with concepts that many subsequent movies, shows and books stole for themselves.
There’s cosmic horror, social commentary, ancient aliens, psychic warfare and much more. Quatermass and the Pit has its flaws, including some woeful undercooked VFX (which were considered poor even in 1967) and it might be considered “stagey” to modern eyes. That does little to dim its power, and its ideas are just as potent now as they were then.
The finale alone is disturbing in its implications, and the ending suggests that even if the heroes have “won,” the trauma and fallout will linger for decades to come. While there have been attempts to remake Quatermass and the Pit in the years since – including a 1990s version set to star Sean Connery – the titular scientist has yet to mount a comeback.
2
Videodrome (1983)
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Cronenberg is the only filmmaker on this list to get TWO entries, which underlines how totemic he is in the sci-fi horror realm. Videodrome casts James Woods as a slimy (what else?) owner of a small television station, who discovers a pirate signal that may be showing real violence. Things get very trippy from there, as Woods’ Max suffers gory hallucinations and uncovers a whole conspiracy behind the Videodrome show.
This marked Cronenberg’s first crossover with a Hollywood studio following years of low-budget Canadian features. In under 90 minutes, the filmmaker unleashes a flurry of shocking images and concepts, many of which prefigure the rise of the internet, streaming and even social media.
Videodrome has many disturbing practical effects, including Max’s stomach opening up like some fleshy VHS machine. The film did quite poorly during its original run, but it’s up there with some of the Canadian auteur’s best work.
1
The Terminator (1984)
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It may have kicked off the blockbuster Terminator movie franchise and made Arnold Schwarzenegger a movie star, but strip away its action framing, the original is a sci-fi slasher. This saw James Cameron use all his no-budget know-how from his time spent working for Roger Corman, and make a propulsive chase thriller where the slasher happens to be a cyborg shaped like an Austrian bodybuilder.
The Terminator could be pitched as a cyberpunk remake of Halloween, since they’re both about masked killers relentlessly stalking a resourceful young woman. For all of his talents with visuals and action, Cameron is an underrated screenwriter too. This 1984 outing has tons of exposition and world-building to get through, but Cameron always weaves these elements in seamlessly and without slowing the pace.
While Arnie might be easy to parody, it’s easy to forget how menacing he is throughout The Terminator. His unnatural, robotic body language and stilted delivery work wonders, and it’s downright impressive that he never blinks even when firing huge machine guns. In terms of sci-fi horror, Schwarzenegger’s Predator deserves an honorary mention too.
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