The Entity (1982)
Film that is supposedly based on a true story which Barbara Hershey are her family are harassed by a poltergeist. This contains the notorious scene where Hershey is raped by the entity
Congo (1995)
Following the success of Jurassic Park, a host of other Michael Crichton books were filmed, including this not entirely successful but not uninteresting work where Crichton attempts to modernise the lost world adventure
A.I. (Artificial Intelligence) (2001)
Steven Spielberg directs an unfinished Stanley Kubrick project about an android boy’s quest. The result is a beautiful and intelligent SF film where the sensibilities of either director merge with magnificent results
Planet of the Apes (2001)
Tim Burton’s much disliked remake. Certainly, the ape makeups are superb. While Burton touches many points with the original, he has dropped the biting satire in favour of adventure, while the ending left everyone scratching their heads
Tourist Trap (1979)
An early Charles Band film with Chuck Connors psychically bringing a collection mannequins to life. A fine little film that develops a eerie strangeness all of its own
Uzumaki (2000)
Surreal Japanese horror film in which the world is taken over by spiral patterns. A strange and trippy film.
The Terror of Dr Hichcock (1962)
Influential if possibly overrated work in the Italian Gothic cycle of the 1960s. There’s the haunted figure of Barbara Steele and rich atmosphere, even if the plot doesn’t make much sense
The Body (2001)
Thriller in which Antonio Banderas is a Catholic priest dispatched to Jerusalem to deal with the apparent archaeological discovery of Jesus Christ’s body
Haunted (1995)
An old fashioned Victorian ghost story based on a James Herbert novel, this suffers a very laidback pace but is redeemed by its left field twist ending. Produced by Francis Ford Coppola
The Vampire Lovers (1970)
The first in Hammer’s trilogy of lesbian vampire films, an adaptation of the classic story Carmilla. Unfortunately in Hammer’’s hands, the story’s subtlety is killed by an emphasis on softcore titillation
Dr. Dolittle 2 (2001)
A sequel to the Eddie Murphy Dr Dolittle remake. This is still an insult to the original stories but under director Steve Carr at least proves a more amiable comedy than the first film did
Interview with the Vampire: The Vampire Chronicles (1994)
Most of the attention this drew at the time was over the controversy of casting Tom Cruise as the vampire Lestat; otherwise Neil Jordan conducts an excellent adaptation of the Anne Rice novel
Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956)
The finest film to come out of 1950s SF cinema, concerning an invasion of pods that replicate people but for their emotions. The sense of paranoia and psychological tension is unsurpassed
Vampires and Other Stereotypes (1994)
Low-budget independently made film that manages to effectively use a singe warehouse location to suggest a gateway to Hell
Scissors (1991)
Impressive psycho-thriller from Frank De Felitta that plays out with the silent logic of a nightmare as a young unknown Sharon Stone finds herself a prisoner in an apartment
Scared to Death (1947)
Bela Lugosi poverty row cheapie where he plays a sinister hypnotist. The only film Lugosi made in colour
It’s Alive! (1969)
Larry Buchanan is a director on a par with Edward D. Wood Jr. This, not to be confused with the 1974 killer baby film, is his best film. Buchanan creates a perverse obsessiveness that is fascinating to watch
Habit (1997)
Larry Fessenden film in which he also plays a man who gets into a relationship with a vampire woman. Low key and with an emphasis on kitchen sink realism, leading to some quite striking scenes
Flowers in the Attic (1987)
Film adaptation of Virginia C. Andrews’ popular Gothic potboiler about a brother and sister who develop an incestuous relationship after being locked in the attic by their mother. Andrews’ turgid melodrama gets the screen adaptation it deserves
Addicted to Murder (1995)
Strong and intelligent low-budget vampire film from Kevin J. Lindenmuth that plays with a fascinating ambiguity in the story of a man obsessed with a mystery woman who is making him kill
Nightmare (2000)
Resembling a supernatural version of I Know What You Did Last Summer, this South Korean ghost story delivers considerable spookiness
Lara Croft, Tomb Raider (2001)
The first film adaptation of the popular videogame is a film largely premised around the personality of Angelina Jolie. Outside of that, the film is a half-baked series of plot ends and action scenes taken from better films
Atlantis: The Lost Empire (2001)
One of the less successful films of the Disney renaissance of the 90s/00s. Disney has never done well with animated SF. That aside, this a very nicely animated Steampunk adventure
A Stranger is Watching (1982)
The film that Sean S. Cunningham went on to direct after the huge hit of Friday the 13th. Though sold as a horror film, this is more of a kidnap thriller
The Creature Wasn’t Nice (1981)
A not very funny science-fiction spoof that has been intended in the vein of Airplane/Flying High but sending up Alien – one where the creature also gets to sing.
Captain Sindbad (1963)
A cheaply made Arabian Nights fantasy adventure that came out seeking to copy ride the coattails of the success of Ray Harryhausen’s The 7th Voyage of Sinbad
The Angry Red Planet (1959)
1950s B movie about an expedition to Mars that encounters exotic and hostile lifeforms there. Not much happens before the aliens pronounce judgement on humanity
Evolution (2001)
Ivan Reitman comedy that is essentially a rehash of his earlier hit Ghostbusters but where instead of ghosts he has a team investigating rapidly alien lifeforms at a meteor crash site
Shadows and Fog (1991)
One of the not-quite-rans in Woody Allen’s oeuvre, a homage to Franz Kafka and German Expressionism with Allen as a mousy clerk caught up in the hunt for a strangler
The Bed Sitting Room (1969)
Richard Lester adapts an absurdist Spike Milligan play set in the aftermath of the nuclear holocaust where the survivors are mutating into animals and items of furniture. A film with a really bizarre sense of humour that most at the time did not get
The Chairman (1969)
Big-budgeted spy thriller with Gregory Peck as a scientist who poses as a defector to Communist China. This never enervates much as a thriller but its recreations of Communist China are amazing
Child’s Play (1988)
The very first of the Chucky films. At the time, this seemed a very silly and at times ridiculous killer doll film and not the basis of an ongoing series of sequels that have lasted more than three decades
The Crazies (1973)
George Romero’s most underrated film, filled with disturbing images of the population of a town driven crazy by a bio-weapon spill. The first and best film on the theme of an outbreak of mass insanity
Dawn of the Dead (1978)
George Romero’s successor to his cult hit of Night of the Living Dead. Romero creates a very different film, one that takes place in a mall and comes with a level of droll satire. A bigger budget allows him to push things to gore-drenched extremes
Inseminoid (1981)
Fairly trashy low-budget British copy of Alien with several well-known actors running around a series of caves after Judy Geeson becomes impregnated by an alien embryo
The Deceivers (1988)
Little seen Merchant Ivory film directed by Nicholas Meyer set during the British Raj in India with Pierce Brosnan as a British officer who goes undercover to investigate the Thuggee cults
Addicted to Murder: Tainted Blood (1998)
This was the second in Kevin J. Lindenmuth’s trilogy of modern vampire films, which comes with much subtle effect and a strong character-driven story, a kitchen sink tale about a newborn vampire
The Monster Maker (1944)
Mad scientist film from poverty row studio PRC with George Zucco in a Bela Lugosi role as a madman injecting his enemies with doses of acromegaly
Man in the Attic (1953)
The fourth film version of The Lodger with Jack Palance as a boarder that a family believe might be Jack the Ripper. This has neither the style or melodrama of the previous versions
Lost Horizon (1937)
Hugely successful and probably overrated classic from Frank Capra about the discovery of a lost valley in the Himalayas that offers the secret of immortality
Care Bears Movie 2: A New Generation (1986)
The second of the Care Bears films, light, insubstantial and rather sweet as pre-adolescent creatures of indeterminate gender romp around in their cloud kingdom banishing bad feelings
The Man Who Fell to Earth (1976)
Nicolas Roeg’s film featuring David Bowie as an alienated alien visitor to Earth, a film that is equal amounts brilliance and pretentious distractions
The Animal (2001)
One-gag comedy where Rob Schneider receives transplants of various animal parts and ends up exhibiting animal behaviours – usually at the most inopportune time
Dark at Noon (1992)
Incomprehensible surrealism from director Raul Ruiz about a doctor sent to investigate a village where miracles occur with commonplace regularity
Species II (1998)
Sequel to Species that this time offers up the male of the species. The film feels put together as an exercise in makeup effects but their physiological absurdity causes the film to topple into silliness
Monty Python’s The Meaning of Life (1983)
The third and last of the Monty Python films, a variety of skits that are variously outrageous and frequently leave behind all good taste
Bill and Ted’s Bogus Journey (1991)
The sequel to Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure where the first film’s humour gets lost amid repetition and blown up by a big-budget. William Sadler’s Death however proves a scene-stealer
The Wizard of Baghdad (1960)
A majorly unfunny variant on the Arabian Nights comedy featuring Dick Shawn as a demoted genie. The Thief of Bagdad as shabby flying carpet burlesque
The Gospel According to Philip K. Dick (2000)
Low-budget but fascinating documentary about cult SF writer Philip K. Dick in particular focusing around the bizarre series of hallucinations he had during the 1970s
The Toxic Avenger (1984)
The film that launched the name of Troma Films. The world’s first superhero splatter film, this readily dives into bad taste just to see what kind of offence it can get away with
With a Friend Like Harry (2000)
French psycho-thriller where Sergi Lopez gives an unnervingly charming performance as a psychopathic schoolfriend who inserts himself into Laurent Lucas’s life
From Beyond (1986)
After the cult success of Re-Animator, Stuart Gordon, Jeffrey Combs and most of the principals returned with a further H.P. Lovecraft adaptation. More outrageously over-the-top splatter effects but this is somewhat the lesser
Sometimes They Come Back … For More (1998)
The third film adapted from the Stephen King short story, which dispenses with connection to the other films and now concerns occult forces in an Arctic base
Watchers (1988)
Dean R. Koontz adaptation in which Corey Haim adopts an unusually intelligent dog unaware it is part of a genetically engineered killing machine. Produced by Roger Corman who spun out a series of sequels.
Tarantula (1955)
Them! had created the 1950s fad for giant atomically enlarged insects. Here Jack Arnold, one of the most celebrated genre directors of the 1950s, makes a giant spider film and much better than most of the era’s other giant bug films
Conan the Barbarian (1982)
Adaptation of Robert E. Howard’s pulp adventure stories and the film that made Arnold Schwarzenegger a star. The script from Oliver Stone takes unevenly from Howard but director John Milius gives the film a brutal, primal majesty
The Mummy’s Ghost (1944)
This was the fourth and second to last of Universal’s Mummy films with Lon Chaney Jr in the role of Kharis. By now the series has been reduced to a well-worn formula
Conan the Destroyer (1984)
This sequel to Conan the Barbarian makes the mistake of watering the primal brutalism down to a PG rating and what results ends up being a pedestrian comic-book adventure
It Happened Here (1965)
This was the first film to depict an alternate history scenario. With stark and powerful effect, this shows in documentary-like fashion a 1960s England after it had been conquered by Nazis
I Married a Witch (1942)
Charming and delightful film starring Veronica Lake as a witch burned at the stake who returns to life in the present to make life miserable for her judge’s descendant Frederic March
Invaders from Mars (1953)
Classic of the 1950s alien invader genre in which a young boy discovers that the adults around him are being taken over by Martian invaders. Director William Cameron Menzies makes striking use of sets to further a sense of alienation
The Empty Mirror (1997)
A bizarre film that features Adolf Hitler sitting around in the afterlife joined by Sigmund Freud and others as he reflects on his image
Day of the Animals (1977)
A cheap 1970s Nature’s Revenge film that blatantly borrows all the essentials of The Birds in the story of a group of trampers in the High Sierras coming under attack by wildlife due to an ozone hole.
Highlander III: The Sorceror (1994)
The third Highlander film is better than the abysmal second one was. It comes with slick visuals but an often absurd plot that strains to spin the concept out any further
Street Fighter (1994)
Based on the popular videogame, you cannot complain that this is exactly what you expect – wall-to-wall action, comic-book heroes and villains. The complaint might be that the action is never particularly enervated and the film lacks anything beyond that
Wild at Heart (1990)
One of David Lynch’s finest films, with lovers Nicolas Cage and Laura Dern on the run in a road movie that travels through deranged places of the mind and explodes with crazy energy
Simon Magus (1999)
Film set in a small 19th Century Orthodox Jewish village struggling to deal with the modern world, featuring Noah Taylor as a fool troubled by visions of The Devil
Ed and His Dead Mother (1993)
A very eccentric comedy in which momma’s boy Steve Buscemi accepts a deal from a strange salesman to resurrect his beloved mother (Miriam Margolyes) from the dead
Shrek (2001)
Before this was spun out into a series of ho-hum sequels, the original was an animated film that burst with a freshness and a series of winning voice characterisations
Marquis (1989)
Hilariously adult and filthy minded retelling of the Marquis de Sade story using puppets. Quills crossbred with Meet the Feebles if you like.
Coma (1978)
Flush from the success of The Andromeda Strain and Westworld, Michael Crichton directed this medical conspiracy thriller, which returns to the fear of science themes that runs throughout his work
Miracle on 34th Street (1947)
Classic Christmas film with Edmund Gwenn as a man who is placed on trial after he insists he is the real Santa Claus
The Alien Agenda: Under the Skin (1997)
The third and least satisfying of the otherwise above average compilation films on the theme of alien invasion from Kevin J. Lindenmuth and other directors
The Alien Agenda: Out of the Darkness (1996)
The first of the Kevin J. Lindenmuth’s compilation films that bring together several short films under the umbrella of an alien invasion. Lindenmuth’s Worm segment in particular is standout
The Alien Agenda: Endangered Species (1997)
The second of Kevin J. Kindenmuth’s surprisingly good compilations of video shorts around the loose theme of alien invasion and takeover
Conquest of the Planet of the Apes (1972)
The fourth of the original Planet of the Apes films, this cuts back on the humour and makes a stark parable for the Civil Rights movement with the apes rebelling against humanity in a revolution
Once Bitten (1985)
One of several vampire comedies that came out in the 1980s , an unfunny effort with a young unknown Jim Carrey as a teen looking to lose his virginity being seduced by vampire countess Lauren Hutton
The Honeymoon Killers (1970)
A film based on true-life killers Martha Beck-Raymond Fernandez who lured and killed women from Lonely Hearts ads. This comes with an incredible rawness and an unforgettable performance from Shirley Stoler
It Lives Again (1978)
This was the first of Larry Cohen’s sequels to his killer mutant baby film It’s Alive. Here Cohen uses the occasion to expand the themes in richer depth and makes a work that stands up as well as the original
Full Moon High (1982)
Werewolf films were all the thing around 1980-1 with hits like The Howling and An American Werewolf in London. This is cult director Larry Cohen’s often extremely silly but not entirely unamusing comedy take
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
Escape from the Planet of the Apes (1971)
Third of the original Planet of the Apes films. This is an enjoyable take that brings the talking apes back in time to the present-day and where the emphasis is more on comedy
Two Thousand Maniacs! (1964)
One of the better of Herschell Gordon Lewis’s cheap splatter films, set in a Confederate town that exists in a timewarp and slaughters all outsiders
Pleasurecraft (1999)
Softcore erotic film set aboard a space mission where a crew have to deliver an assignment of empathic alien women
Duel to the Death (1983)
An early entry in the Wu Xia genre, filled with wildly over-the-top martial arts and swordplay sequences. One of the first films from Ching Siu-Tung, later a major Hong Kong action choreographer.
Zapped! (1982)
A psychic powers film like Carrie having been reduced to the crass high school comedy of something like Porky’s
Puppetmaster (1989)
The first in a series of killer doll films from Charles Band, which has generated some ten sequels. The original has an undeniable atmosphere
Whispers (1990)
Dean R. Koontz adaptation in which Victoria Tennant kills an attacker only for him to be found alive again and return to attack her, involving her in a complex web involving Satanism, vampirism and twins
The Raven (1935)
An entertainingly madcap screen pairing of Boris Karloff and Bela Lugosi with the latter as a Poe-obsessed surgeon who has built a house of Poe-inspired torture devices
Colossus: The Forbin Project (1969)
Produced not long after 2001: A Space Odyssey, this is one of the smartest and best of the super-computer takes over the world films, directed with a tight economy and written with a snappy wit
The Price of Milk (2000)
Quirkily eccentric and surreal New Zealand made comedy about a couple living on a farm
The Magic Crane (1993)
Another entry in the Wu Xia cycle. By this time most of the moves of the genre have been used so this goes to wild extremes to find some type of originality
The American Nightmare (2000)
Interesting and worthwhile documentary that focuses on the six key and most influential horror films of the 1970s and interviews their makers in depth
Communion (1989)
Film adaptation of writer Whitley Strieber’s true-life claims to have been abducted by aliens. I am not sure if the film convinces us of Strieber’s claims but what is interesting is the thoughtful way it examines the phenomenon
Sea of Love (1989)
Standout thriller with great scripting and performances where detective Al Pacino goes undercover in the dating scene to track a killer and comes up against a sultry Ellen Barkin
X – The Man With X-Ray Eyes (1963)
Great Roger Corman film in which Ray Milland is a scientist who invents a serum that allows him x-ray vision with disastrous consequences
The Devils (1971)
Ken Russell makes an historical work about the Catholic Church’s persecution of a supposed outbreak of possession at a convent in 17th Century France. As to be expected of Russell, this is shocking and outrageous. Oliver Reed gives one of his best performance
The Irrefutable Truth About Demons (2000)
A New Zealand-made horror film with Karl Urban as an anthropology lecturer who debunks the occult who is targeted and forced to go on the run from a Satanist cult
Who Framed Roger Rabbit? (1988)
Groundbreaking film that hilariously imagines an alternate world where cartoon characters live alongside humans. The energy and creativity of the film is superlative
Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde (1941)
Version of the Jekyll/Hyde story starring Spencer Tracy and with Ingrid Bergman as the dancehall girl he liaises with. This has been made in the vogue for Freudian psychology so the transformation is tricked out with dubious symbolism