Bokeh (2017)
A rehash of the The Quiet Earth with two American tourists waking up to find themselves in a deserted Iceland. There seem few more prettily photographed places for the End of the World to take place
Science Fiction
The Book of Eli (2010)
Denzel Washington as an enigmatic Man With No Name wandering the post-holocaust apocalyptic landscape. This follows the cliches of the genre before it bizarrely morphs into a Biblical allegory partway through
Borderlands (2024)
Eli Roth adapts the popular videogame and corrals a surprisingly high-profile cast in a knockabout planetary adventure. Alas, that met a very mixed reception and was widely regarded as a bad movie
Borealis (2013)
A pilot for a tv series that never went ahead set in a future where Global Warming has turned the Arctic into a thawed-out tundra where various countries seek to claim the new territory
The Borrower (1991)
The film that Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer director John McNaughton chose to make next – about an an alien criminal sentenced to Earth who is forced to ‘borrow’ people’s heads to replace its own
Boss Level (2020)
You don’t think the mix of cartoonishly over-the-top action and a Groundhog Day timeloop scenario would work but this proves your assumptions wrong in highly entertaining ways
Bounty Killer (2013)
A film about post-apocalyptic bounty hunters pursuing bankers, this was an Occupy Movement era film and hits a deliriously unserious comic-book tone
The Bourne Legacy (2012)
A reboot of the Jason Bourne series with Jeremy Renner replacing Matt Damon. The exhiliratingly kinetic action scenes are watered down, while the plot lacks the same focus. The first of the series to enter genre territory however
The Box (2009)
Donnie Darko director Richard Kelly adapts a Richard Matheson story about a couple who are offered a terrible choice by a stranger but delivers a bafflingly incomprehensible film
Box: Metaphor (2023)
Australian film about a future where people are imprisoned inside shipping containers, this suggests it is going to be something like another Cube
A Boy and His Dog (1975)
This adaptation of a Harlan Ellison story is a B-budget delight that zings with witty dialogue and a young, unknown Don Johnson giving a very funny performance as the titular boy roaming the post-apocalyptic landscape with his dog
The Boy Who Turned Yellow (1972)
Michael Powell was one of the greatest and most underrated post-War British directors. This was his last film, a bizarre children’s film about a boy being turned yellow and visited by an alien
The Boys From Brazil (1978)
Big-budget thrillers with Nazi villains were popular in the 70s. This pits acting legends Laurence Olivier and Gregory Peck on opposite sides in a conceptually ingenious plot about the attempts to clone Hitler
The Brain (1988)
Mad psychologist creates a giant brain about the size of a small car that controls minds and is hungry to devour people. A deliriously entertaining film that seems to embody the essence of the cheesy makeup effects driven 1980s horror film
Brain Dead (2007)
Not to be confused with the Peter Jackson Braindead, although the similarity of titles only emphasizes how weak and unfunny this 1980s splatter homage comedy is in comparison
The Brain Eaters (1958)
A B budget variant on the 1950s an alien body snatchers film uncreditedly based on Robert Heinlein’s The Puppet Masters. Other films in this niche created great paranoid atmosphere but here the results only look cheap and tatty
The Brain from Planet Arous (1957)
B movie in which John Agar is possessed by a glowing alien brain, this unfortunately fails to live up to either its lurid vigour or its bad movie reputation
Brainjacked (2009)
A low-budget film wherein a teenager falls under the influence of a mad scientist who drills open heads to implant mind control chips. This makes a beeline for gory splatter effects
Brainscan (1994)
One of the many virtual reality films that came out after The Lawnmower Man with Edward Furlong dealing with a figure from a horror videogame who turns his life upside down, urging him to become a killer
Brainstorm (1983)
Highly ambitious film for its day, this concerns a memory-recording device that manages to accidentally record the experience of someone dying. Well worth seeing today, including being one of the first films to depict the internet
BrainWaves (1982)
Ulli Lommel film in which Suzanne Love undergoes experimental brain surgery only to start receiving memories from the donor, a woman who was murdered
Branded (2012)
An ambitious film in its depiction of a near-future Russia and satire on the media. The latter half has the hero undergo a mystical experience and discover that advertising brands are living entities that feed on human need
Brave New World (1998)
TV movie adaptation that conducts a hatchet job on Aldous Huxley’s dystopian novel where his vision of a conditioned class structure is turned into an allegory about a media-saturated world
Brave New World (2020)
TV mini-series adaptation of Aldous Huxley’s classic dystopian novel. Developed by Grant Morrison, this freely adapts the novel but does a strong and intelligent job of reimagining it in contemporary terms
Brazil (1985)
Terry Gilliam’s satire on Nineteen Eighty-Four is a darkly brilliant work – it is a madly out of control film but is filled moments of wild imagination and black-than-black humour than make it an unnerving ride
Breach (2020)
Another of the last films made by Bruce Willis, before his retirement. Here Bruce is on form and gives a decent performance. The film is an Alien copy with the crew of a space mission under attack by a parasitic lifeform
Breakfast of Champions (1999)
Disappointing adaptation of the Kurt Vonnegut novel from Adam Rudolph that substitutes Vonnegut’s satire for clumsy, ham-fisted farce that never gives us any clear idea what it is satirising
The Breakthrough (1994)
A film about the scientific efforts to explore the afterlife, this suffers from too many good ideas and not enough of the effects needed to convey its journey
Breathe (2024)
Film set in a harsh future as people struggle to survive in a world where oxygen supplies have been reduced to near zero. An okay film that suffers from an implausible premise
Breeders (1986)
All over New York City, virgins are being molested by aliens that lurk in the subway tunnels and seek them for breeding purposes. One of the worst genre films of the 1980s
Brian and Charles (2022)
At contrast to all the serious films being made about A.I, and androids, this is a wonderfully charming and really quite eccentric comedy where a man builds a robot out of junk
Brick Mansions (2014)
The English-language remake of the Luc Besson-produced Banlieue 13. The electrifying parkour scenes of the original now seem routine and the film’s social set-up so thinly sketched as to be negligible as science-fiction
The Brides of Fu Manchu (1966)
The second film with Christopher Lee as the Chinese super-villain Fu Manchu. Not quite up with its predecessor The Face of Fu Manchu but still an exciting blend of pulp melodrama, super-science and Yellow Peril
Brightburn (2019)
The rather interesting idea of Superman retold as a horror movie featuring a character that is Superman in all but name who goes over to the dark side instead of becoming a paragon of truth, justice and the American way
Britannia Hospital (1982)
The third in a trilogy of satirical films from director Lindsay Anderson and star Malcolm McDowell, this takes a biting crosscut of British society as a hospital prepares for a royal visit
Broken Arrow (1995)
John Woo’s second Hollywood film, an action film about nuclear hijacking. Woo’s unique stylistics promptly get buried under the machinery of big-budget action filmmaking
Bronx Warriors II (1983)
Enzo G. Castellari’s sequel to his Escape from New York ripoff 1990: The Bronx Warriors and a most more polished and entertaining B action movie
The Brother from Another Planet (1984)
John Sayles responded to E.T. – The Extra-Terrestrial and its suburban middle-class fantasy with this wry comedy in which a mute Black alien visitor (Joe Morton) arrives in Manhattan
Bubble (2022)
Anime in which Tokyo is covered by a mysterious energy bubble of alien origin and of a group of defiant youths who live on in its midst until the appearance of a mystery girl
Buck Rogers in the 25th Century (1979)
In the aftermath of Star Wars, the comic-book/serial hero was revived in this heavily Star Wars influenced remake that was released theatrically and then served as the pilot of a tv series
Bug! (1975)
William Castle production about the discovery of a species of insects that can start fires. Easily dismissable as a schlock film but it has an intelligence and eerie insect photography that make it more than that
Bugonia (2025)
Yorgos Lanthimos has become a director of acclaim in recent years. Here he remakes the Korean film Save the Green Planet where crazy conspiracy theorist Jesse Plemons abducts CEO Emma Stone insisting she is an alien
Bulk (2025)
Ben Wheatley has gained a cult following in recent years with films like Kill List and High Rise. Here he sets out to make a deliberately low-tech multiverse film that becomes a real head-scratcher
The Bulldog Breed (1960)
In the 1960s, a number of popular comics made films about the Space Race. This was a vehicle for Norman Wisdom, a minor British comic of the era, and has him enrolled in the Navy and launched into orbit
Bullshot (1983)
A parody of British boys adventure stories like Biggles and Bulldog Drummond. This is made with a manic silliness that eventually becomes rather entertaining.
BumbleBee (2018)
Spinoff from the Transformers films. As though all it took was a change of director, this is a small sweet film that has more in common with E.T. as opposed to Michael Bay’s mass destruction spectaculars
The Bumblebee Flies Anyway (1999)
This feels like a weepie Disease of the Week drama where Elijah Wood is an amnesiac placed in a hospital ward of terminal patients before the film arrives at an SF conceptual twist
Bunker Palace Hotel (1989)
The first film from Enki Bilal set in a decaying luxury bunker where the elite of the future take shelter from a civil war. A film that creates a fascinating world – in which nothing interesting ends up happening
Burndown (1989)
Obscure and little seen thriller where a Florida sheriff deals with a series of radioactive murder victims where all clues seem to lead to an abandoned nuclear power plant
Bus (1987)
Obscure Japanese film set in a computer-controlled dystopia where a simple bus driver makes a defiant stand against against conformity
The Butterfly Effect (2004)
This was dismissed at the time because of its star Ashton Kutcher but is a surprisingly good film in which Kutcher finds the ability to travel back in time and alter his past
The Butterfly Effect 2 (2006)
The Butterfly Effect was not a film set up for a sequel but we get one here anyway with a different person flipping back in time to change his rather dull and uninteresting life
Buzz Lightyear of Star Command: The Adventure Begins (2000)
Video-released spinoff of the Toy Story films featuring Buzz Lightyear in an adventure. Although released under the Pixar name, the animation is all cheaply produced by a Chinese studio
By Dawn’s Early Light (1990)
The last gasp of the Cold War nuclear film. A tv movie that features Martin Landau is the US President who tries to stop an accidental Russian nuclear release escalating into full-out war
Cafe Flesh (1982)
An adult film that gained a critical respectability when it came out, an avant garde work set in a future where the populace has become impotent and the handful unaffected perform sex in clubs for paying audiences
The Call Up (2016)
This has the interesting idea of a group of people selected to take place in a live-action videogame only to find themselves trapped in a The Belko Experiment scenario.
The Caller (1987)
Unexpectedly good film with Madolyn Smith as a woman living alone in a cabin in the woods and Malcolm McDowell as a caller where the two engage in a series of cat and mouse games where nothing is what it seems
Canadian Bacon (1995)
The one and only fiction film made by documentary-maker Michael Moore of Fahrenheit 9/11 fame, a broad farce concerning an imaginary war declared on Canada by the USA for political purposes
Candy (1968)
A bad movie classic. Ewa Aulin is an alien innocent who passes through a series of sexual encounters. Based on a satirical novel, this mostly serves as the opportunity for several name stars to give embarrassingly bad performances
Candy Stripers (2006)
Throwback to the 1950s SF film where alien body snatchers take over the nurses of a hospital. This fails to find the right cheesily absurd tone needed
The Cape Canaveral Monsters (1960)
The one other SF film made by Phil Tucker, the director of Robot Monster. An alien invader effort made to capitalise on the Space Race with aliens trying to sabotage rocket launches
Capricorn One (1978)
The film that launched a host of conspiracy theories in which NASA decides to fake a Mars mission using tv transmissions. A clever and well written thriller that becomes an elegy to the loss of the ideals of the Space Mission.
Capsule (2016)
Buried in a space capsule. A one-man show that takes place entirely in an orbiting space capsule with the stranded British astronaut alternately seeking aid and about to be shot down by both the US and Soviets
Captain America (1990)
Cheap and fairly terrible adaptation of the Marvel Comics superhero from low-budget director Albert Pyun. The superheroics look impoverished and Matt Salinger makes a dopey-looking Steve Rogers
Captain America II (1979)
Another of the mostly disastrous Marvel tv adaptations of the 1970s. Captain America is sidelined for much of the show. This does conduct the coup of casting Christopher Lee as the villain but criminally gives him nothing to do
Captain America (1944)
Captain America’s first screen appearance was this 15 chapter serial, although about the only common element with the comic is the costume. On the plus side, the action and cliffhangers are good, while Lionel Atwill chews scenery in grand style as the villain
Captain America (1979)
Laughably cheap and dull tv pilot version of comic-book superhero, which emerges less the Captain America of Marvel Comics fame than Captain America imagined as Evel Knievel superhero
Captain America: Brave New World (2025)
The fourth Captain America film, where Anthony Mackie now takes over the shield and costume. And you really need to have been following MCU continuity to make sense of much of what is going on
Captain America: Civil War (2016)
Less Captain America 3 than The Avengers 3 – the entire film has been conceived as a massive superheroic punch-up. The results move with an exhilarating pace, but the Russo Brothers haven’t yet mastered Joss Whedon’s hand with character humour
Captain America: The First Avenger (2011)
One of the more disappointing of the Marvel Comics adaptations. Despite all the elements assembled, this never comes to life in director Joe Johnston’s hands and takes forever to get into action
Captain America: The Winter Soldier (2014)
Captain America’s second solo outing feels more like a Mission: Impossible film or an episode of 24 than a superhero film. Lots of Marvel continuity and fanservice and you are taken aback at how political it is prepared to be
Captain Marvel (2019)
The MCU offers up their first superheroine with very unexceptional results. A competent enough effort but DC’s Wonder Woman easily blows everything this tries to do out of the water
Captain Nemo and the Underwater City (1969)
Amid the fad for Jules Verne adaptations in the 1960s, Captain Nemo was spun off in this original adventure. By now Verne’s brooding inventor has become an absurdly larger-than-life comic-book character
Captain Nova (2021)
An appealing Danish-made film in which a pilot travels back in time from the future to save the world from environmental disaster but finds she is now stuck in her twelve year-old body
The Captains (2011)
Documentary where William Shatner interviews the actors who played the captains in the other incarnations of Star Trek. The entire show is hijacked by the Shatner ego as he constantly overrides his interview subjects
Captive State (2019)
A highly politicised films that takes place several years after an alien invasion and concerns the resistance against them. However, the aliens feature very little and the film resembles more of a ‘hood drama
The Car: Road to Revenge (2019)
The Car concerning a possessed car is one of the forgotten films of the 1970s. Why it has produced a sequel 42 years later is a scratch of the head. Not that the two films even resemble one another
Cargo (2009)
Fine Swiss-made SF film where cryogenic sleepers are awoken aboard a deep space mission to find someone is killing the crew and even that the very purpose of their mission may be a lie
Carnosaur (1993)
A Roger Corman produced cheapie about genetically engineered dinosaurs that was quickly rushed out to exploit the success of Jurassic Park. Corman went on to make two sequels
The Carrier (2015)
Interesting and well-made variant on the plague outbreak drama set aboard an airliner as a handful of people flee a pandemic sweeping the world only to have to deal with infection on board and the need to land to refuel
Carriers (2009)
Set in the midst of a deadly infection that has wiped most of the country out, the film is extremely well written, focusing on harsh moral choices that the characters must make. Chris Pine is cast as a less-than-heroic lead
Carry On Spying (1964)
This was the eighth of the Carry On films. The popular British comedy series turn their bawdy sights to conducting a spoof the James Bond film during the height of the spy movie fad
The Cars That Ate Paris (1974)
The first film from Peter Weir, a deadpan black comedy in which a man comes around from a car crash to find himself in a small town that subsists by creating car crashes
Casino Royale (1967)
During the James Bond craze of the 1960s, the only Ian Fleming novel not owned by Albert R. Broccoli was turned into a giant farce. The film has five directors, a host of stars (including three playing Bond) and is an incoherent mess
The Cassandra Crossing (1976)
From the heyday of the disaster movie, an all-star cast head up a big scale drama about a train where a passenger is carrying a deadly plague, only for the train to be shunted all across Europe
Casshern (2004)
Live-action film based on an anime series where the original is built out with a series of of extraordinarily gorgeous over-ornamented visuals set in a strange retro-future world
Castle of Evil (1966)
At initial face value, this appears to be a 1960s revival of the Old Dark House film with a hooded figure killing a cast assembled at gloomy old mansion, but then takes a turn for the bizarre with an unexpected science-fiction twist mid-film
The Castle of Fu Manchu (1969)
The fifth and final of the Fu Manchu films with Christopher Lee as the super-villain Fu Manchu. The last two were made by exploitation director Jess Franco and only worth watching for Lee’s icily autocratic presence
The Cat (1992)
This is a completely demented Hong Kong film about alien body snatchers who are hiding in an apartment building on Earth
The Cat from Outer Space (1978)
From the era of Disney live-action comedies, this involves assorted slapstick tomfoolery as various parties try to aid or capture a telepathic alien cat that is stranded on Earth
Cat-Women of the Moon (1953)
Classic bad movie in which astronauts land on The Moon and encounter an all-female society. Some really datedly war of the sexes politics play out amid the laughably impoverished sets and effects
Category 6: Day of Destruction (2004)
A disaster tv mini-series about the most powerful storm in recorded history descending on Chicago just as a hacker disables the power grid. Most of this plays by the cliches of the genre.
Category 7: The End of the World (2005)
Sequel to the tv mini-series Category 6: Day of Destruction ups the scale of the super-storm but is also better constructed as a disaster movie
Cavegirl (1985)
Witless and inane comedy in which nerdy high school student Daniel Roebuck is thrown back in time to the Stone Age where he romances cavegirl Cindy Ann Thompson
Caveman (1981)
A comedy spoof of One Million Years B.C. and the whole sub-genre of caveman vs dinosaurs films This proves amiably goofy where Ringo Starr seems perfectly cast as the lead caveman
Cell Count (2012)
People are locked in a facility and undergoing biological meltdowns. A film that is driven by a series of wild effects at regular intervals but falls down when it comes to its poorly constructed mystery
Cerebrum (2022)
A young man recuperates from a brain injury while tended by his father. As he tries to piece together what happened, we discover we are in the midst of a Frankenstein-type film
Chain of Command (2000)
Halfway reasonable action film in which US President Roy Scheider is taken hostage by Taiwanese terrorists who want to use the nuclear launch codes against China. The surprise about the film is how political it is willing to get
The Chain Reaction (1980)
An Australian film from many of the people behind Mad Max about the cover-up of a nuclear accident. Essentially The China Syndrome with the addition of car chases
Chain Reaction (1996)
Thriller with Keanu Reeves wrongfully accused and on the run from authorities in the quest for a process that creates cheap energy from water. A rehash of director Andrew Davis’s The Fugitive mostly construed around its set-pieces