The 10 Most Underrated Classic Science Fiction Films

PJ Media ^ | August 4, 2014 | Pierre Comtois

[EveningStar]

In these days of seemingly weekly science fiction blockbusters (which are usually SF in name only… they're actually just big gun actioners that take place in the future) and the hype that surrounds them, it's easy to forget that once such films were the low man on the totem pole. Stuff fit for kids and juveniles but not serious adult audiences. Thus, in past decades, except for a few A list films like Them and The Day the Earth Stood Still in the 1950s and Planet of the Apes, Soylent Green, and Logan's Run in the '60s and '70s, many SF movies slipped under the radar or were simply shrugged off by the critics...

With the foregoing in mind, we come to our list of the 10 most underrated classic science fiction films which will be rated not strictly from least underrated to most underrated, but from good to best of the bunch. All of them, in any case, are films that never really took the screen world by storm, nor the SF community for that matter, but that offer elements that deserve the attention of any SF film fan. All are solid little films each with surprising angles that will reward the patient viewer willing to look past production values and embrace the singular worlds they bring to life...

[V K Lee]

Another giant...The Black Scorpion That was more than likely about that same time frame, and who was cast. No idea, would need to look it up.

[windsorknot]

Harvest Home

Probably the creepiest book I ever read.

[tet68]

‘Kronos’ is terribly under-rated!!

It kind of makes me wonder if Kubrick was influenced
by Kronos as the black energy absorbing block when it
was under the H-bomb attack?

As far as animal freekouts how about “Night of the Lupis.”.

[OldNewYork]

Agree - Outland was good, worth seeing. I don’t know how I missed its original release.

[yefragetuwrabrumuy]

The Man With X-Ray Eyes is definitely a classic, and could stand an intelligent remake. The original was by Roger Corman, who went for a basic script, but the possibilities are endless. For example:

He could see the microscopic, as well as the telescopic. He might look at the ocean and see its bottom.

And in the original, he thought that in the vastness of space he saw something like God. However, that could be rewritten as the devil, and when he looks at it, it looks back, and starts coming in the direction of Earth.

So many possibilities.

[Rockpile]

I saved that image in Post 66.

Sometimes it feels like They Live is a documentary.

[mrsmith]

Interesting reaction from your grandmother. Older people are pretty generous towards their youthful impressions as a rule. But it is more of a ‘curiousity’ to most people than a good movie- a picture of how people in the 30’s viewed the future.
I watch it as a picture of how people of any time- ncluding ours- view the future.

Good thing it was ‘pre-code’, that’s a lot of it’s charm.

[greene66]

My grandmother continued to love the vast majority of vintage films into her older years, with lots of old favorites dotted along the various decades of the 30s/40s/50s. The exceptions tended to be the early-talkies, films between 1929-33. They seemed to disappoint her when she revisited them. Somehow nostalgia wasn’t enough to acclimatize her back to the older style of that early-talkie “film language,” after many many years of not seeing them.

She also would always speak warmly about silents, yet didn’t really seem to have any desire to watch any of them again, when I offered her some examples to view.

[Ethan Clive Osgoode]

Robinson Crusoe on Mars (1964)

[greene66]

By the way, I think I recall reading somewhere that the surviving print of “Just Imagine” is actually a work print, and not exactly the same cut that was released to the theaters in 1930. It’s been a long time since I’ve seen it, and I really should drag my old vhs tape out again. Isn’t Marjorie White also in it? She’s always a pip. Maybe enough for me to overlook El Brendel. I actually have the recording of the tune “Just Imagine,” as done by Jean Goldkette’s orchestra, in my music-tape rotation, and hear it quite often, as I’m driving down the highway.

[Intolerant in NJ]

Metropolis.....

[PA Engineer]

A "very" underrated, but fantastic movie was Moon. Watch Full Movie: Moon (2009) Online Free | FFilms.org

All the YouTube trailers have spoilers.

[Oztrich Boy]

Sci-fi is more than Gene Rodenberry.

[Lurker]

I remember that one.

[cornelis]

True—at least you’re smart enough to see that.

[cornelis]

Somebody here likes Matrix. O-well. The film, like other propaganda, exudes a hatred for beauty. Why do they hate beautiful things? The true, the good, and the beautiful is not so entertaining? Those elements were not forgotten by Tarkovsky in Solaris.

[class8601_nuke]

That was Time Bandits

[Bloody Sam Roberts]

Mine Enemy

Yoda? Is that you?

I think you meant Enemy Mine

[Tanniker Smith]

Well, none of those titles are ringing a bell with me, although “I Married a Monster from Outer Space” sounds like a typical 50s B movie ... or a parody thereof.

[Swordmaker]

These are the Science Fiction movies I think need more attention:

1. Destination Moon . . . 1950 - Robert Heinlein’s script. (full movie)
2. When Worlds Collide . . . 1951 - Second best end of the world movie (trailer).
3. The Invasion of the Body Snatchers . . . 1956 - The original, very scary to a seven year old boy. (Full movie)
4. The Little Shop of Horrors . . . 1960 - The original Roger Corman movie. (Full movie>
5. Flesh Gordon . . . 1974 - R rated Satirical send up of Flash Gordon and the serials of the 1940s in the same spaceship on a string style. Join Flesh Gordon, Dale Ardor, and Dr. Flexi Jerkoff foil evil Emperor Wang of the planet Porno in his plans to destroy Earth with his sex ray. Hilarious! Great stop action animation. (Trailer contains nudity)
6. Planet of Horror (Galaxy of Terror) . . . 1981 - A great, little known R-Rated SF film by Roger Corman (trailer).
7. Brazil . . . 1985 - The ultimate Liberal dystopia. (Trailer)
8. The Little Shop of Horrors . . . 1986 - The musical remake, hilarious rethinking. (Trailer)
9. Flight of the Navigator . . . 1986 - UFO with good time travel fun. (Trailer)
10. Amazon Women On the Moon . . . 1987 - Send up of TV handling of 1950s SF flicks and late nite commercials. (Trailer)
11. *Batteries Not Included . . . 1987 - Just a nice, little under appreciated SF flick (trailer).
12. Miracle Mile. . . 1988 - Best end of the world movie love story. (Full movie)
13. The Fifth Element . . . 1997 - Oddball Bruce Willis vehicle with great special effects.
14. Deep Impact . . . 1998 - The best of the "Oh my God, rocks from space are gonna kill us all!" movies, realistic treatment. (Trailer)
15. Galaxy Quest . . . 1999 - hilarious satire of Star Trek - both as a show and as reality. (Trailer)
16. The Thirteenth Floor . . . 1999 - movie adaptation of Daniel F. Galouye's novel "Simulacron 3” in which the question is asked "What if we lived in a virtual reality?" (Trailer)
17. Sky Captain And the World of Tomorrow . . . 2004 - Retro animation / live action 1930-40s ArtDeco noir SF done entirely on Mac computers. (Trailer)
18. Zathura: A Space Adventure . . . 2005 - In the vein of Jumanji, with a SF twist. (Trailer)
19. The Last Mimsy . . . 2007 - a nice little film that has almost disappeared without a trace. Sweet. (Trailer)
20. Surrogates . . . 2009 - everyone can be perfect, if you drive your robotic surrogate while you vegetate at home, oblivious, a limp blob connected to its senses. (Trailer)
21. The Adjustment Bureau . . . 2011 - exploration of reality and fate. Who's in charge? (Trailer)