Jiu Jitsu (2020)
The action film has largely died off in the 2010s. This is very much a throwback with a set-up reminiscent of Predator about an action team fighting an alien in the jungle
Science Fiction
Jodorowsky’s Dune (2013)
A fascinating documentary about one of the most amazing films never made – director Alejandro Jodorowsky’s planned adaptation of Dune in the mid-1970s
John Carter (2012)
While the film bombed, it emerges as a fairly good and faithful, lavishly produced adaptation of Edgar Rice Burroughs’ swashbuckling planetary adventure
John Dies at the End (2012)
Phantasm series director Don Coscarelli makes a mind-expanding effort that seems a conceptual collision between Donnie Darko, Limitless, a slacker version of Supernatural and Dr Strange
Johnny English (2003)
Spy movie parody with Rowan Atkinson as an inept agent who is constantly tripping over his own feet. It is Austin Powers reconceived as a Mr Bean film but offering little that is funny.
Johnny English Reborn (2011)
Rowan Atkinson is a very funny man but try as I might I cannot get into these Johnny English films – they seem at best lame Austin Powers castoffs with gags designed for the single digit age range
Johnny English Strikes Again (2018)
Rowan Atkinson in his third outing as the inept spy. Atkinson is a talented comic but these Johnny English films, which are like less sophisticated versions of Peter Sellers’ Inspector Closeau, are the least of his comedy incarnations
Johnny Mnemonic (1995)
The first attempt to film the works of cult Cyberpunk author William Gibson met with very mixed success, nevertheless is a modest effort that does mainline the essence of Gibson’s world
Joker (2012)
Bollywood SF film that is like a version of Shyamalan’s aliens film Signs with a few dashes of The Mouse That Roared, all played as a comic farce with much singing and dancing
Jonathan (2018)
A smart and intelligent SF film where two brothers both inhabit the same body and then both fall for the same woman. Great acting from Ansel Elgort in the titles role(s)
Josh Kirby … Time Warrior! Eggs from 70 Million B.C. (1996)
The fourth of the Josh Kirby juveniles and the point the series started to become quite well made. This takes a visit to Azabeth’s homeworld of warrior people.
Josh Kirby … Time Warrior! Journey to the Magic Cavern (1996)
The fifth of the Josh Kirby juvenile adventures where the young time-travelling hero sets out on a quest to the Magic Cavern to find the Shroom People
Josh Kirby … Time Warrior! Last Battle for the Universe (1996)
The sixth and last of the Josh Kirby time-travelling juvenile adventures produced by Charles Band and the best of the series, which takes a trip into Josh’s past
Josh Kirby … Time Warrior! Planet of the Dino-Knights (1995)
This was the first and one of the weaker of the generally quite likeable films from Charles Band about the time-travelling adventures of a juvenile hero
Josh Kirby … Time Warrior! The Human Pets (1995)
This was the second and weakest of the Josh Kirby juvenile time travel adventures that takes the young hero and companions to a future where they are enslaved by giants
Josh Kirby … Time Warrior! Trapped on Toyworld (1996)
This was the third of the Josh Kirby juvenile time travelling adventures from Charles Band that takes Josh and his companions to a planet of living toys
Josie and the Pussycats (2001)
A live-action film based on the animated tv series about a girl rock band who originally appeared in Archie comics, this gets buried under its own efforts to be cutely ironic
Journey 2: The Mysterious Island (2012)
Sequel to Journey to the Center of the Earth, a supposed adaptation of Jules Verne’s Mysterious Island and a consistently silly, nonsensical film that operates at the level of a children’s cartoon
Journey to the Beginning of Time (1955)
One of his earlier efforts from the great Karel Zeman wherein four boys journey through prehistory. Not the equal of Zeman’s later work, it feels more like an illustrated museum tour than a dramatic film
Journey to the Center of the Earth 3D (2008)
This family friendly adaptation of the classic Jules Verne novel was made to highlight the 3D process and throws most of the book out to essentially become Jules Verne the theme park ride
Journey to the Center of the Earth (1959)
The success of Disney’s 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea created a spate of Jules Verne’s adaptation. Here Verne’s tale of explorers in an underground realm has been turned into an absurdly colourful adventure
Journey to the Center of the Earth (1988)
Ostensibly as a teen version of the Jules Verne novel made by Cannon Films. However, this started under one director and finished under another with totally incomprehensible results
Journey to the Center of the Earth (1999)
Hallmark TV mini-series version of the Jules Verne novel that keeps faith to the book for the most part before heading off on some colourfully exotic adventures
Journey to the Center of the Earth (2008)
A mockbusters from The Asylum made to coincide with the big-budget Brendan Fraser film. Resemblance to the Jules Verne book fairly much ends at the title
Journey to the Center of Time (1967)
A very cheaply made film (actually a remake of The Time Travelers) about a research laboratory propelled through time. Most of the historical scenes are represented by stock footage
Journey to the Seventh Planet (1962)
A low-budget SF film that prefigures Solaris and displays some imagination as astronauts land on a planet to find familiar things recreated from their memories
Judge Dredd (1995)
The film adaptation of the cult comic-book looks great in terms of design but misses the comic’s satiric sense of humour and simply becomes a thudding Sylvester Stallone action vehicle
Judgment Day (1998)
Coming out the same year as Deep Impact and Armageddon, this was another oncoming asteroid collision film – one that has been bizarrely crosshatched with a ‘hood drama
Jules (2023)
Likeable comedy variant on E.T. – The Extra-Terrestrial in which senior citizen Ben Kingsley befriends an alien visitor after its UFO crashes in his backyard. Few films are made with such an acute awareness of aging
Jules Verne’s Rocket to the Moon (1967)
This jumps aboard the 1960s fad for Jules Verne film adaptations but it has nothing to do with Verne and is instead a slapstick caper film about the building of a rocket during the Victorian era
Jumper (2008)
Doug Liman makes a film that has a great concept – a secret world of people with the mental ability to teleport anywhere – that emerges as no more than a slickly polished effort that does nothing with its premise
Jung_E (2023)
Train to Busan director Yeon Sang-ho turns his hand to making an SF film about the attempts to perfect an android soldier and the fight to complete and control it
Junior (1994)
Arnold Schwarzenegger, Danny DeVito and director Ivan Reitman set out to repeat the success of their hit Twins in this amiable comedy with Schwarzenegger as a pregnant man
Jupiter Ascending (2015)
The Wachowskis set out to make a space opera adventure in the Star Wars vein. As always, the elevate every genre they take on and the film is packed with astonishing action sequences and wild, mind-expanding ideas
Jurassic Park III (2001)
Steven Spielberg handed the directorial reins of the series over to Joe Johnston and this emerges as a better film than The Lost World was, even if it is only ever arranged around a series of effects set-pieces
Jurassic Park (1993)
An enormous hit for Steven Spielberg who took new emergent CGI technologies and wowed audiences with dinosaurs brought to life in dazzlingly realistic detail. It doesn’t hurt that he delivers a relentlessly suspenseful film too
Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom (2018)
Fifth of the Jurassic Park films. Industrial Light and Magic do their usual excellent job but this time the film is just recycling the same thing as before with minimal change
Jurassic World: Rebirth (2025)
The seventh of the Jurassic Park/World films, this receives a creative shot in the arm from Gareth Edwards, director of Monsters and The Creator
Jurassic Predator (2018)
Rather good British-made low-budget take on Jurassic Park, which conducts its variation with an undeniable sense of humour. One of the better films from low-budget director Andrew Jones
Jurassic School (2017)
The Asylum offer up their own mockbuster copy of the Jurassic World films, an amiable children’s film where a young boy hatches a dinosaur egg he finds
Jurassic Shark (2012)
A killer shark film concerning a prehistoric megalodon prowling the waters of a lake. This once had the distinction of being the lowest rated film on the IMDB
Jurassic World (2015)
After two ho-hum sequels, this finally delivers a solid follow-up to Jurassic Park. Rather than more scenes with dinosaurs chasing people, this comes with some fascinating ideas about seeing the park in operation
Jurassic World: Dominion (2022)
This was the sixth film in the Jurassic Park/World franchise and offers very much a return to the familiar. It at least also shakes several familiar things up
Just Imagine (1930)
This was one of the first US films to depict the future. It is essentially Metropolis having been remade as a Broadway musical with an emphasis on comedy
Justice League (2017)
Zack Snyder completes his run through DC superheroes with mixed results. The introduction of the characters works well but Snyder too readily throws established continuity out the window, while the visual dourness becomes tedious
Justice League: Crisis on Infinite Earths Part One (2024)
An animated film adaptation of Crisis on Infinite Earths, one of the classic DC Comics titles of all time. With superhero films now obsessed with multiverses, this seems the perfect time to bring it to the screen
Justice League: Crisis on Infinite Earths Part Three (2024)
The third and final part of the adaptation of DC Comics’ classic title Crisis on Infinite Earths featuring an epic battle to prevent the destruction of the multiverse
Justice League: Crisis on Infinite Earths Part Two (2024)
The second part of the epic three film animated adaptation of the classic DC Comics title Crisis on Infinite Earths concerning a battle across the DC multiverse
Justice League: Crisis on Two Earths (2010)
Second of the Bruce Timm animated films based on DC’s Justice League, this has been construed as a Mirror Universe take that pits the Justice League up against villainous versions of themselves
Justice League Dark: Apokolips War (2020)
The DC Comics animated version of an Avengers film where they put every superhero under their roof on screen at once, including Justice League Dark, the regular Justice League, Suicide Squad and Teen Titans
Justice League: Doom (2012)
A relative disappointment among the mostly excellent animated DC superhero films, this pits each member of the Justice League with a matching super-villain only who seemingly kills them off
Justice League: Gods and Monsters (2015)
An alternate world take on DC Comics characters, who are much more morally ambiguous – Superman is General Zod’s son and Batman’s role is taken by Man-Bat and is an actual vampire
Justice League of America (1997)
Painfully bad attempt to incarnate the comic-book team as live-action tv pilot where the characters are played for comedy in an attempt to mimic the then success of Friends
Justice League: The Flashpoint Paradox (2013)
A strong, intelligent DC Universe animated film set in an alternate timeline where the histories of various familiar DC characters have turned out radically different
Justice League: The New Frontier (2008)
Animated Justice League film, which adapts a comic-book storyline that reconceived the various DC superheroes as they were back in the era of their original creation
Justice League: Throne of Atlantis (2015)
Not so much a Justice League film as an Aquaman origin film, which at least conducts a character oft regard as a DC laughing stock with suitable dignity
Justice League vs the Fatal Five (2019)
A DC Universe Original Animated Movie that introduces the Legion of Superheroes, their nemeses The Fatal Five and an assortment of new Justice League members to widen diversity
Justice League: War (2014)
Another of the DC Universe Animated Films that rewrites the Justice League into DC’s New 52 continuity reboot. This changes the character’s origins and designs to little point
Justice League: Warworld (2023)
Another of the animated DC Comics films in which various of their regular characters find themselves incarnated in simulated combat arenas
Justice Society: World War II (2021)
The Justice Society of American was the first comic-book superhero team, bringing together all the heroes at DC Comics of the day. This is an animated film devoted to them
K-PAX (2001)
Kevin Spacey is a mysterious patient in a psychiatric institution who makes possibly true claims to be an alien. An uncredited ripoff of the far superior Man Facing Southeast
Kaboom (2010)
Gregg Araki film that centres around sexually conflicted university student Thomas Dekker and his various liaisons amid witches, a doomsday weapon, cults and premonitions
Kafka (1991)
Steven Soderbergh’s second film was this flop pseudo-biopic that places Franz Kafka (Jeremy Irons) alongside mad scientist elements and German Expressionist homages but fails to find much of Kafka’s paranoid mood
Kamikaze (1986)
An early film written/produced by Luc Besson concerning a scientist driven crazy by tv announcers who invents a device that can kill people as they appear live on tv
Kamikaze 1989 (1982)
A detective thriller set in a near-future Germany. Arthouse director Rainer Werner Fassbinder plays the detective. This came out three weeks before Blade Runner prefigures what was later called Cyberpunk
Karate Cop (1993)
A really cheap and unconvincing post-apocalyptic action film starring forgotten martial arts star Ron Marchini as a lawman fighting off mutant crazies to obtain a power crystal
The Karate Killers (1967)
One of the appealingly colourful theatrical films edited together from the tv series The Man from U.N.C.L.E. – although surprisingly given the title this is not a martial arts film
Kate & Leopold (2001)
Lightweight and likeable Meg Ryan romcom in which she is romanced by a chivalrous and perfectly mannered Hugh Jackman travelled through time from the 19th Century
Kids in the Hall: Brain Candy (1996)
A film spun off from the popular Canadian comedy troupe Kids in the Hall. The loose plot concerns a happiness drug but is mostly there to feature the regulars playing multiple character
Kids vs Aliens (2022)
The director of Hobo with a Shotgun returns with a film about a group of kids caught up in the midst as aliens invade a party put on while their parents are away
Kill and Kill Again (1981)
From they heyday of the 1970s martial arts film, karate champion James Ryan must reunite the old gang to take on a super-villain who wants to enslave the world with a mind control drug derived from potatoes
Kill Command (2016)
Modest British film about a unit of soldiers on an exercise who become hunted by killer robots. With effects that easily rival those of bigger-budgeted Hollywood films, this produces a very intensive little film
Kill Switch (2017)
Dutch film involving action between this and a parallel Earth. Much of this is shot First Person Shooter perspective, while the director provides an accomplished level of mass destruction CGI effects all by himself
Killdozer (1974)
This tv movie’s premise – “a killer bulldozer” – has had it slotted into bad movie stakes. It was clearly intended as a copy of Duel and its killer truck premise but lacks Steven Spielberg as director
The Killer Eye (1998)
A David DeCoteau film about a giant alien eyeball that causes people to become erotically aroused. The chessiness of the premise is hijacked by DeCoteau’s typical homo-erotic predilections
Killer Klowns from Outer Space (1988)
Killer clown film directed by the Chiodo Brothers best known for their makeup effects who come up with an appealing arsenal of sinister clown figures. On the other hand, the film is a one-note joke
Killer Mountain (2011)
You would not be mistaken for thinking this a regular mountaineering drama – and that’s how half of the film transpires. Then it gets weird and introduces everything from monsters to Ancient Astronauts
Killer Tomatoes Eat France (1992)
Fourth and final of the Killer Tomatoes films by which time the slight appeal of the original concept has been well and truly worn out
Killer Tomatoes Strike Back! (1991)
This was the third of the Attack of the Killer Tomatoes films. This hits an appealingly silly and wilfully ridiculous note that makes it the best of the sequels.
Killers from Space (1953)
A cheesily bad alien invader film from the 1950s that seems to be trying to throw every element in SF of the era into the mix from mind controlling aliens to atomic monsters
The Killing Machine (1994)
Action film with Jeff Wincott as a resurrected hitman who makes the discovery that AIDS has been artificially manufactured
King Charles III (2017)
A near future film that with eviscerates the royals with biting savagery as it depicts Prince Charles becoming the King of England and clashing with the government of the day
King Cohen (2017)
A documentary about cult director Larry Cohen, best known for It’s Alive and other works. This is filled with hilariously entertaining stories of his guerrilla film-making methods
King Dinosaur (1955)
The first film from Bert I. Gordon, known for his cheap giant animal films through the 1950s. This concerns a space expedition to a planet inhabited by dinosaurs – cue Gordon’s usual cheap effects
King Kong (1933)
Perhaps the greatest of all monster movies, one that has attained iconic status. A masterpiece of stop-motion animation, it imbues Kong with character and attains a delicate fairytale-like atmosphere
King Kong (1976)
The infamous miscalculated Dino de Laurentiis remake of King Kong where the stop-motion is replaced by Rick Baker in an ape suit, while the fairytale romance is replaced by Jessica Lange as a flower child who cracks jokes
King Kong (2005)
Peter Jackson’s dream project, a remake of the 1933 film, and his finest work as a filmmaker. Jackson builds the original out considerably and his command of the effects gives us something quite dazzling
King Kong Escapes (1967)
Toho Films obtained the rights to King Kong to pit him against Godzilla in King Kong Vs Godzilla and then made this entertainingly silly sequel where Kong fights a robot copy of himself
King Kong Lives (1986)
Everybody hated the 1976 remake of King Kong but Dino de Laurentiis has the chutzpah to produce a sequel and the results are absolutely awful, full of scenes guaranteed to have an audience rolling in the aisle
King Kong Vs. Godzilla (1962)
The third of the Godzilla films wherein Toho managed to obtain a coup in leasing copyright to pit Godzilla against a rather tatty-looking King Kong for one of the great title bouts of the century
King of the Rocket Men (1949)
Twelve chapter serial that introduced the character of the Rocket Man who appeared in several subsequent adventures. This has an enthusiastic pulp naivete but ends up mostly routine
King Ralph (1991)
A comedy where the Royal Family is wiped out and vulgar American nightclub singer John Goodman inherits the crown. Much comedic play between American vulgarity and British ceremony ensues.
Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes (2024)
A fourth entry in the Planet of the Apes reboot saga. The previous two entries hit incredible heights in terms of motion capture performances but this still a solid entry that holds up well
Kingsman: The Golden Circle (2017)
Kingsman with its parody of gentlemanliness and action movie sensibilities, was the smartest of the modern spy movie parodies. This sequel has gone to the excesses of the Roger Moore Bond films in the space of one film
Kingsman: The Secret Service (2015)
This rescues the spy film from the silliness of Austin Powers. The film’s sly mocking of its Englishness, with Colin Firth going into action as an impeccably mannered gentleman, along with explosive action sequences is irresistible
Kiss Meets the Phantom of the Park (1978)
A Hanna-Barbera film based around 70s rock group Kiss where they are cast as superheroes fighting a mad scientist who operates from an amusement park with an army of android duplicates
Kite (2014)
English language adaptation of an anime. The original was controversial for its copious sex and violence; here we get an anodyne action movie that is no more than The Punisher cast with a teenage girl
A Knight in Camelot (1998)
A modernised version of Mark Twain’s A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court with Whoopi Goldberg as a physicist who time travels back to Camelot
Knights (1993)
Another of Albert Pyun’s post-apocalyptic kickboxing cyborg films. The film consists of almost nothing but action scenes as pint-size Kathy Long and a cyborg Kris Kristofferson battle warlord Lance Henriksen
Knowing (2009)
Alex Proyas seemed a promising genre director during the 1990s. Here Nicolas Cage finds a time capsule that predicts a series of disasters, before the film tangents off into a strange Biblical End of the World scenario