The Science Fiction Horror and Fantasy Film Review
Advanced Weaponry refers to any of the weaponry that regularly appears in genre cinema. In science-fiction, this can range all the way from the ever-popular handheld lasers, blasters and phasers to larger ship-mounted versions of these, or the likes of lightsabres. At the opposite end of the spectrum, there are world-destroying Doomsday Weapons such as the Death Star.
Serials and Spy Films are filled with scientists creating death rays and various weapons. In genre cinema, exotic phenomena such as antimatter and wormholes, even control of the weather, can be employed as weapons. Secret Government Agencies, Sinister Military and Sinister Corporations are frequently seeking to find weapons application of aliens, monsters, psychic powers, genetic engineering and crashed alien ships.
There are also the more exotic weapons such as ones that are built-in to Cyborgs, while Robots can often be built for military use where they have a frequent habit of going amok. One weaponised use of the robot is the Transformer or Mecha. There is also a whole body of films given over to creating Super-Soldiers.
In fantasy, weapons usually consist of magically empowered swords, sometimes bows and/or arrows or maybe a suit of armour.
A spinoff film from The Mandalorian tv series, this is the best film set in the Star Wars universe this side of the 2000s for the simple reason that it has invested in characters rather than slavish fanboy callbacks
Another of the DC Original Animated Movies. This deals with both the Legion of Super-Heroes and Supergirl, bringing them together in a mutual adventure
One of the most intensive and exciting action films of recent with humanity engaged in a furious battle with plants and killer robots
The fourth of Marvel’s Thor films, where director Taika Waititi gets the balance of humour down much more successfully than he did in the previous film
Daniel Craig’s swansong as James Bond but it no longer seems a Bond that Ian Fleming would recognise leading to the question of whether James Bond still has any relevance in 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
Another among the shoddy last films Bruce Willis-made before retirement, an SF film about a rogue military team that decide to declare war on aliens. This is laughable in terms of military tactics
South Korean space opera about a crew of space junk collectors. If the Star Wars series wanted to find a director to create fresh and exhilarating effects scenes, they need look no further than here
This has been conceived as the ultimate modern exploitation film featuring Nazi zombie piloting flying sharks. Think Iron Sky by way of Sharknado. The results are highly entertaining
After delays, Christopher Nolan’s unique time travel film is with us, a dense challenging work that plays like an intellectual version of a James Bond film
The Asylum’s mockbuster version of Moonfall. This plays a ridiculous premise with an ingenious absurdity and proves far more entertaining than its bigger budgeted model
Prolific bad movie director Mark Polonia offers his own no-budget take on the Transformers films where the Transformers are two men in bulky costume who wrestle one another
The live-action adaptation of a popular anime and manga, this takes place in an alternate history version of Japan where samurai fight following an alien invasion
A Russian attempt to create their own equivalent of an Avengers film. The results emerge surprisingly better than you expect and with some standout effects
An extraordinary anime adapted from Project Itoh, a conceptually challenging work concerning a villain who can manipulate language to drive populations to genocide
A Syfy Channel disaster movie. Between the formula dramatics and cheap effects, this is better than expected, having a sense of humour and a more original hero than most of its kind
Syfy Channel disaster movie about the efforts to dispose of a container of antimatter being carried on board a tanker, where things proceed to go wrong
Another Gonzo Japanese Splatter Film about a Yakuza heir who is blown apart by rivals and then rebuilt with cyborg attachments
Very low-budget film about an impending asteroid collision. Possibly the first LGBT disaster movie depending on which version you see
A low-budget spy/action film with entertainingly bizarre elements including a cryogenically frozen Hitler and the hero going into action accompanied by a baboon
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
From the director of the original Inglorious Bastards, an action film with Erik Estrada as a cop pursuing a blackmailing scientist who has a powerful laser weapon
The great William Friedkin, the director of The Exorcist and other works, had a flop with this unfunny Chevy Chase and Sigourney Weaver comedy about arms dealing and the efforts to obtain a robot plane
Fourth of the Peter Sellers Pink Panther films, this lets all restraints go and becomes completely madcap
An entry amid the 1960s spy fad that suffers a pedestrian dullness. A stocky Richard Egan seems miscast as a playboy spy up against a bikini designer villain who seeks a powerful laser weapon
An excruciating copy of the James Bond films, the second of the Matt Helm films starring Dean Martin as a drunken lounge lizard spy
A film from the heyday of Cold War hysteria made not long after the launch of the first ICBM about a mysterious hypersonic missile of possibly alien origin that terrorises the US
From the early days of Hammer Films, one of several films based on Dick Barton, a popular radio hero. A progenitor of the spy movie with the title hero trying to prevent foreign agents unleashing a deadly sonic ray
One of a series of Hollywood films based on popular British adventurer hero Bulldog Drummond. This throws Drummond into the midst of a plot to obtain a raygun
This is a standout serial based on the famous comic-book detective, featuring some of the best of all serial cliffhangers and action set-pieces, not to mention wonderfully creative super-science inventions