The 24 Most Underrated Alien Movies
The figure of the alien is one that has haunted the American imagination for much of the 20th and the 21st centuries. There is something both terrifying and enticing about the idea of beings living out in the reaches of space, far beyond human understanding. Thus, it’s unsurprising to find aliens appearing in a wide range of films, from big-budget sci-fi spectaculars to comedies. While some alien films have become major cultural touchstones – Alien and E.T. come to mind – others have flown a bit under the radar. Despite their relative lack of popularity, however, these films are worth a watch for how they demonstrate the enduring fascination of the alien.
Below, find the 24 most underrated alien movies and vote on your favorite!
- 1376 VOTESPhoto: Universal Pictures
The power of sci-fi as a genre lies in part in its ability to hold up a mirror to society, forcing the viewer to rethink and reconsider what they thought to be true. Though not every film can pull this off, They Live certainly does, and it remains one of the most thought-provoking and downright troubling alien films of the 1980s.
Directed by John Carpenter, They Live focuses on a drifter who comes into possession of a pair of sunglasses which reveal an ugly truth: many humans, particularly the rich and powerful, are actually aliens in disguise. The premise is outlandish, but there is also something plausible about it. The film shows all of the strengths of Carpenter as a director, and it seems to get under one’s skin, forcing an acknowledgment of the nature of power and how it works in the world.
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- 2373 VOTESPhoto: 20th Century Fox
The wonderful thing about aliens is they can find a home in almost any genre, from action to thriller to horror. In Enemy Mine, they fit neatly into the buddy film. In this case, the buddies in question are a human warrior named Will Davidge and a creature known as a Dracs named Jereeba Shigan. When the two are stranded on an inhospitable planet, they have to learn to cooperate to survive. Ultimately, Jereeba dies and leaves behind a child, which Will then has to protect.
It’s the kind of alien film with a heart. Its central message concerning the ability of even the most devout of enemies to find companionship and personhood in the other is one that still resonates. It allows the viewer to really get to know its characters, and while there’s no shortage of special effects, it greatly benefits from this rich and textured character work.
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- 3449 VOTESPhoto: DreamWorks Pictures
Few parodies have been done with as much love as Galaxy Quest, which is an obvious spoof of Star Trek (and its fans). Its story is undeniably silly, focusing on the cast of a fictional TV series who, to their own surprise, become part of an intergalactic war, but therein lies the film’s superpower.
Anchoring the film is a truly spectacular cast, which includes heavy hitters like Tim Allen, Sigourney Weaver (herself a staple of science fiction films), and Alan Rickman. It manages to poke gentle fun at the conventions of the alien film while also making sure to use them in such a way as to highlight why they are so continually appealing. In some ways, it was even a harbinger of things to come, highlighting as it does the power of fandom to envelop and dominate the objects of its devotion.
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- 4327 VOTESPhoto: Miramax Films
The pulp imagination is very much in evidence in The Faculty. The film follows a group of high school students who have to contend with a hostile alien species that has taken over the bodies of the faculty and students of their high school.
In many ways, the film is an interaction of Invasion of the Body Snatchers, which has a similar premise. In fact, part of the pleasure of this film comes from identifying the many references and homages to other science fiction and horror films (a hallmark of the director, Robert Rodriguez). And, like the best alien films, this one is also very much a piece of social commentary, examining everything from the alienation of 1980s youth to the fear of female sexuality and embodiment. If there’s one thing that is likely to be terrifying in an alien movie, it’s a woman with her own sexual agency.
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- 5274 VOTESPhoto: Columbia Pictures
The 1984 sci-fi film Starman is the perfect combination of its star and director, Jeff Bridges and John Carpenter. Bridges plays an alien who comes to Earth and takes on the identity of a human, and he gives such a strong, compelling, and convincing performance he was even nominated for an Academy Award for Best Actor.
As great as Bridges is, he is more than matched by Karen Allen, who plays Jenny Hayden, the love interest for Bridges’s alien character. In less capable hands than Carpenter’s, this film might have become nothing more than just another E.T. clone but, thankfully, it’s much more, becoming a love story crossing galaxies. Starman is ultimately both bittersweet and deeply moving, demonstrating the extent to which even the alien movie genre still has the potential to surprise, delight, and move.
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- 6336 VOTESPhoto: Buena Vista Distribution
While many alien films of the 1980s used extraterrestrials to explore issues of fear, dread, and anxiety, Flight of the Navigator goes in a very different direction. Its story about a boy who is first kidnapped by an alien spaceship and then sent forward in time is one which aims to capture the magic and dreamlike innocence of childhood. It more than accomplishes this, thanks to both its special effects and the performance of Joey Cramer as Max.
There is a remarkable believability to this film, both in terms of the alien and the American family. What’s more, despite its wholesome aesthetic, it never talks down to its audience. Instead, it asks them to simply sit back and enjoy the ride, to let themselves be transported by the intrinsic power of the sci-fi imagination.
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- 7337 VOTESPhoto: Universal Pictures
Though aliens are often figured as a source of threat and terror, they get a very different spin in Batteries Not Included. It's a story about a group of aliens who try to help the residents of an apartment building as they are faced with the schemes of a nefarious property developer.
Of particular note are Hume Cronyn and Jessica Tandy as Frank and Faye, the elderly couple who manage the building. The couple were married in real life, and their on-screen chemistry is truly something to behold. Moreover, the film also has a great deal of warmth and generosity of spirit, and it’s refreshing to see aliens as good guys rather than villains. It’s the type of family-friendly entertainment which is vanishingly rare and, for this reason, it’s worth a watch.
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- 8296 VOTESPhoto: Paramount Pictures
The specter of alien abduction looms large in the cinematic imagination. It is, for example, the central narrative premise of Fire in the Sky, which focuses on a group of men who encounter a UFO, with one of them actually being abducted. Most of the film focuses on their efforts to convince others of the reality of what they saw.
Particularly notable is the experience of Travis Walton, the man who is actually abducted and experimented on by the aliens. The sequence in which he has a flashback to his experience inside of the alien craft is viscerally upsetting, as he has to endure forced experimentation. It is one of the few times in alien cinema where the inside an alien ship actually looks like something from a nonhuman consciousness, and it allows for a vicarious experience of the terror of encountering the absolute other.
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- 9299 VOTES
Evolution’s unique blend of humor and science fiction might not have been to the critics’ liking, but there’s still a lot to enjoy in it. There’s more than a little bit of Ghostbusters to this film, which focuses on a professor and a geologist as they grapple with a meteor strike that is home to rapidly evolving life forms.
Evolution is unabashedly silly, and the plot tends to meander, lacking a truly tight focus. However, there is still much that is enjoyable about it, and it’s worth watching if for no other reason than to see David Duchovny in a comedy (he’s clearly evoking his role as Mulder on The X-Files). Aside from this, the film is quite funny, and it never makes the mistake of taking itself too seriously.
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- 10301 VOTESPhoto: Universal Pictures
Simon Pegg and Nick Frost have been responsible for some truly hilarious films, and they seem to particularly excel at various sorts of speculative fiction and horror. In Paul, they portray a pair of sci-fi lovers who encounter an alien (the character of the title, played by Seth Rogen), who they then help to evade the government.
Like all good parodies, it manages to gently poke fun at its chosen genre (particularly films by Steven Spielberg) and to also obey the very generic conventions of the form. There’s such genuine chemistry between the leads that it’s impossible not to fall under the film’s spell, and, when it comes down to it, who doesn’t want to enjoy a buddy road movie which also happens to feature an alien?
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- 11253 VOTESPhoto: Paramount Pictures
Throughout his career, J.J. Abrams has excelled at tapping into a deep vein of nostalgia in American culture, and Super 8 is one of the best examples of this phenomenon. Though released in 2011, it is very much in the style of so many sci-fi movies of the 1980s, focusing as it does on a group of teens who encounter a mysterious and possibly dangerous presence on their own after a train derails.
There’s something remarkably endearing about Abrams’s nostalgia. The film calls to mind the days when Hollywood was genuinely invested in telling emotionally resonant stories about the magic, mystery, and danger of young adulthood. Like his cinematic forebears (most notably Steven Spielberg), Abrams recognizes the power of movies to enchant audiences rather than simply bludgeon them with action and CGI.
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Tautly woven and terrifically acted, 10 Cloverfield Lane is one of those films that actually leaves the alien out of sight until near the end. Instead, much of the action focuses on a young woman named Michelle, who is taken captive by the troubled Howard and his assistant Emmett. John Goodman is particularly terrifying as the deeply disturbed Howard, and the film excels at immersing the viewer in the claustrophobic environment in which the characters live.
In the end, the revelation of the aliens seems somewhat anticlimactic, but they are still suitably terrifying. Despite their presence and the threat they pose to life on Earth, 10 Cloverfield Lane proposes something truly terrifying: It might be humans who are their own worst enemy, rather than some nefarious being from outer space.
- 13160 VOTESPhoto: MGM/UA Entertainment Co.
Stanley Kubrick’s 2001: A Space Odyssey is truly one of the classics of the genre, as thought-provoking as it is challenging. In 1984, it received a sequel, 2010: The Year We Make Contact, based on Arthur C. Clarke’s novel 2010: Odyssey 2. It is very much a continuation of the former story, giving further insights into the Monoliths and their purposes, as they set about turning Jupiter into a star and creating a new planet capable of sustaining life.
Like its predecessor, it asks some fascinating and perplexing questions about the nature of life and sentience in the universe. What’s more, it also features some top-notch performances from some of the greatest actors of their generation, including both Helen Mirren and John Lithgow. It might not hit the same operatic heights as Kubrick’s film, but this is still a compelling piece of science fiction.
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- 14164 VOTESPhoto: Optimum Releasing
Before he became internationally famous as Finn in the sequel trilogy of Star Wars films, John Boyega made a name for himself in Attack the Block. This film, a skilled blend of horror and comedy, focuses on a gang fighting back against a group of alien invaders. It’s also a remarkable piece of social commentary, using its genre trappings to critically examine British society.
What makes the film particularly remarkable is just how effective it was at using its relatively small-scale production to maximum effect. As such, it’s a reminder of how these types of films don’t have to be bombastic and filled with Hollywood special effects in order to be effective. If nothing else, the film is worth watching for the extraordinary performances from both John Boyega and Jodie Whittaker, both of whom would go on to attain even more fame as a result of their roles in Star Wars and Doctor Who, respectively.
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- 15298 VOTESPhoto: Universal Pictures
Sometimes a film’s plot is revealed right in the title, and this is certainly the case with Cowboys & Aliens. Based on the graphic novel of the same name, it features a heavy-hitting cast, including both Daniel Craig and Harrison Ford. The plot centers on their characters, Jake Lonergan and Colonel Woodrow Dolarhyde, as they try to rescue a group of townspeople kidnapped by aliens.
At first glance, it might not seem like a mash-up of Western and alien movies would work, but somehow it does. Director Jon Favreau has a keen eye for giving characters motivation, and of course, both Craig and Ford are excellent both on their own terms and together. More than anything else, the film is quite simply fun to watch, and for a film that combines two incongruous genres, this is more than enough to make it worthwhile.
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- 16143 VOTESPhoto: Cannon Film Distributors
Many alien movies aim for the lowest common denominator, aiming to frighten and terrify the viewer without necessarily asking them to think about what they’re seeing. This isn’t the case with Lifeforce, however, which manages to be both utterly strange and yet compellingly thought-provoking at the same time. Its story about a group of space vampires who invade Earth is, to put it mildly, quite bizarre, but somehow it works.
There’s more than a little H.P. Lovecraft in this film’s creative DNA, which is precisely what grants it its eldritch appeal. It’s the kind of film which very often veers dangerously close to being totally ridiculous but, because it commits itself so completely to the brazenness of its own story, it exerts a pull on the imagination that is ultimately as impossible to resist as its central vampire characters.
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- 17138 VOTESPhoto: Columbia Pictures
There’s something endearingly absurd about My Stepmother is an Alien which, as the title implies, focuses on Celeste, an alien sent to Earth who ends up falling in love with a human. Predictably enough, much of the film’s humor comes from Celeste’s attempts to live like a human (and more often than not failing).
Kim Basinger is quite good in the film, demonstrating her talents as a comedic actress. While Dan Aykroyd is not usually seen in the role of a romantic lead, he is more than capable and endearing as Steven Mills, the man with whom Celeste falls in love. It might be more than a little predictable and silly, but there’s a lot of warmth, heart, and humor in My Stepmother is an Alien.
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- 18123 VOTESPhoto: New Line Cinema
As a direct sequel to Critters, it might seem like Critters 2 could never measure up. However, somehow it manages to be an even more disturbing - and often distressingly funny - iteration of the alien film. Like its predecessor, it focuses on the malicious creatures of the title, who hatch from eggs and begin to terrorize an American town.
One of the most disturbing moments in the film sees the Critters devouring a man dressed in an Easter Bunny costume. The incongruity of the cute costume and the visceral horror going on beneath it is one that is remarkably effective, particularly because it is also, in a macabre way, quite funny. Scenes like this one are potent reminders of how comedy and horror can often coexist within the same scene, heightening the effect of each.
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- 19103 VOTESPhoto: New Line Cinema
The 1980s was a decade particularly fascinated by the alien, and it produced both major and minor entries in the genre. While The Hidden hasn’t experienced the same level of appreciation and engagement as many alien films from the decade, it’s still well worth a watch. What begins as a bank robbery film soon becomes something far more dangerous and chilling, once it’s revealed the robber is an alien, which soon begins to take over several subsequent bodies.
Much of the action concerns human cop Thomas Beck (played by Michael Nouri) and alien-disguised-as-a-human FBI agent Lloyd Gallagher (played by Kyle MacLachlan). Though an alien film, it is also very much a thriller, and its propulsive pace keeps the viewer engaged from the first moment to the last. It’s a film that is remarkably light on its feet, thanks to the strong lead performances, as well as some leavening humor.
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Though it was widely derided by critics, there’s still much to enjoy about The Fourth Kind, particularly for those who like a film that plays with the boundary between fiction and reality. This is, indeed, the central conceit of The Fourth Kind, which purports to be a documentary about a series of alien abductions in Alaska.
While the film’s claims regarding the truth of what happens might have been distasteful to some, this is precisely what grants it its potency. The mockumentary style - evocative of The Blair Witch Project and Paranormal Activity – allows the viewer to suspend their disbelief just long enough to think (and to fear) that the actions depicted in the film might have actually happened.
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- 21135 VOTESPhoto: A24
Scarlett Johansson gives an extraordinary performance in Under the Skin, in which she plays a mysterious (and alien) woman who devours the men she encounters. It’s a haunting and beautiful film, one which is much more about the experience of the other than it is about a traditional narrative, and for this reason, it can sometimes be difficult to watch.
There’s no question Johansson is the anchor of the film, the focal point about which everything else revolves. She manages to be both of this world and yet out of it, her every gesture capturing the sense of a creature trying to make sense of its new environment and its new body. Her natural beauty and grace accentuate the alien being’s fundamental danger, and the iciness of her demeanor makes her both terrifying and alluring. This is the type of film that raises more questions than it answers but, rather than being frustrating, this is what makes it so compelling.
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- 22100 VOTESPhoto: Axion Films
The found-footage film has become an increasingly popular genre in recent years, but they have a long history. The 1989 film The McPherson Tape (also known as UFO Abduction) is a strong example of this phenomenon, focusing as it does on a family whose birthday celebrations are interrupted by the arrival of a trio of aliens.
Its found-footage nature gives the film a breathless sense of immediacy, and it immerses the viewer in the midst of the chaos of the family’s lives before they are disrupted. Indeed, the roughness of the film’s aesthetic gives it a unique realism, so one can actually suspend disbelief and think this is a true story of an alien encounter. The final line of the film, which informs the viewer of the family’s continued disappearance, is a chillingly perfect conclusion.
- 2383 VOTESPhoto: Open Road Films
Though Stephanie Meyer is most famous for writing the Twilight series, she also made a foray into the world of alien fiction with The Host, which was adapted into a film of the same name in 2013. As with the book, the film revolves around Melanie, who becomes infected with a parasitic alien form known as “Soul.”
While it might lack a great deal of dramatic tension, there is nevertheless something compelling about the idea of a young woman trying to fight back against a presence invading her very bodily autonomy. Furthermore, whatever the shortcomings of the script itself, there’s no doubt Saoirse Ronan gives a strong performance, hinting at the many great roles that are in store for her in the future.
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- 2475 VOTES
Based on Witley Stieber’s book of the same name, Communion is a haunting horror film about an alien abduction and the way it changes the lives of a writer and his family. Christopher Walken gives a terrific performance in the role of Whitley Strieber, a man who has to grapple with his fears of his own insanity as well as the terrifying family legacy involving the aliens.
This engagement with familial legacy is, in fact, the very thing that sets this alien film apart from other abduction narratives. While there’s no question the aliens are a source of horror and fascination, they are also a conduit connecting one generation of a family to another. Their narrative importance dovetails with Walken’s performance, creating a powerful reflection on the prison of family destiny.
