Lots of great movies on this list, but what about Battle Los Angeles? It doesn’t have any great philosophical meaning. There is no delving into the aliens’ motivations (they need water?). It’s just a fun-to-watch movie about a group of Marines tackling an unfathomable situation. I get sucked in every time.
Get Out has brain transplants. That Sci-Fi-ish. Sex slave!!!
I will list some, with only the top one ranked. It’s one of the best movies of the past 23 years regardless of genre.
Inception
The others I have liked a lot are:
Serenity
Predestination
Mad Max 4
Blade Runner 2049
Knowing
Edge of Tomorrow
Minority Report
The Martian
Everything Everywhere All At Once
It’s his son’s movie and I thought it was weird, but not quite great. I think the same of his latest movie Infinity Pool, which is better than Possessor, but just short of being his son’s first great movie.
Did you see Infinity Pool? Streams on Hulu in the US.
I’m waiting for part 2, but I still like the Scifi-channel one more as of now. But all the best stuff is in the second half of the book…
I am not a huge science fiction guy, but there have been a few since 2000 that I thought were outstanding:
- Moon
- District 9
- The Martian
- Get Out (I guess we’re allowing it?)
- Inception
And, if I may, one that I absolutely loathed:
- Don’t Look Up
Finally, this thread is making me want to see Arrival, which looks like it is available on The Net Flicks.
mmm
Yes, Get Out is allowed.
I did see it. It’s also very good but I just didn’t like it as much as Possessor.
In alphabetical order because I had a hard enough time picking ten without trying to rank them:
The Adjustment Bureau
Arrival
Avengers: Endgame
Children of Men
Coherence
Ex Machina
Inception
Looper
The Martian
Primer
No commentary.
In no particular order:
The Matrix Reloaded (Shut up, I enjoyed it)
Gravity
The Martian
Ex-Machina
Interstellar
Arrival
Edge of Tomrrow
A Quiet Place
Everything Everywhere
Predestination
It’s kind of underrated. Despite the boring third movie, I do think they delivered with the second movie, especially once they got out of Zion and re-entered the Matrix.
I think the Wachowski’s primary error when they went into the third movie was to assume that we would care about a bit CGI battle involving the survival of humanity. I mean, that’s important…but we really didn’t know all the characters very well and it fell mostly flat.
Everything with Neo was fine. Everything else was a dud.
I’m glad how many have mentioned this. I saw it on a screener DVD before it had gone widespread and am glad others saw and liked it. I don’t know how it holds up to multiple viewings, but I definitely enjoyed the time I saw it.
It often helps when you have no expectations. I must have stumbled across it on a streaming service and rolled the dice. If I watched it again I’d probably start seeing the flaws, but I might just for Sarah Snook of Succession fame.
I saw Predestination knowing nothing other than the title. I also saw The Sixth Sense in the theater knowing nothing other than “Bruce Willis” and its title.
Best way to see some movies.
-
Moon
-
Her
-
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind
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Arrival
-
Ex Machina
-
Blade Runner 2049
-
Edge of Tomorrow
-
Dredd
-
The Prestige
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The Incredibles (would have been the Iron Giant, but didn’t make the cut)
Dune
Arrival
Everything Everywhere All At Once
The Martian
Attack The Block
The World’s End
Dredd
Big Hero 6
Avatar
Hellboy
Arrival and Everything Everywhere All at Once are smack dab at the top of my list: they’re brilliant and do what science fiction does best, using some weird science idea to explore what it means to be human. I adored them.
Nope comes next. Not gonna spoil it, but in terms of the SF tropes it deals in, it deals with them better than any other movie I can think of. Also doesn’t stint on the characters.
Then Fury Road. Not nearly as thematically rich as the first three, in my opinion, but you don’t get more fun than Fury Road.
After that there’s a dropoff for me. I’d probably round my list out with movies I enjoyed but that didn’t really stick with me as much:
Interstellar
Eternal Sunshine
Get Out
The Shape of Water
Children of Men
Dune
I could mix and match some other runners-up–all great movies, but not in my top tier.
My favorites, more or less in ranked order:
District 9
10 Cloverfield Lane
Bird Box
Arrival
Primer
Vanilla Sky
Inception
A Quiet Place
Avatar
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind
Dark City & 13th Floor should be on the list but didn’t quite make the 2000 cut off.
Arrival - Thoughtful first contact movie with some cool twists
Spiderman: Into the Spiderverse - Cool multiverse story, with trippy animation
Guardians of the Galaxy 2 - Scifi action with a good amount of humor
Dune - Solid adaptation of (part 1 of) my favorite scifi book
Star Wars Rogue One - Best SW of this century, just ahead of Solo
The Martian - Suspenseful sci fi adventure
The Prestige - Nonlinear storytelling involving two dueling magicians and Nicolai Tesla
Europa Report - Suspenseful thriller involving a mission to Jupiter
A Scanner Darkly - A story of identity amid a near-future dystopia
Here are the results so far.
The top ten
Arrival - 13 votes
Edge of Tomorrow - 10 votes
The Martian - 8 votes
Children of Men - 7 votes
Dune - 7 votes
Everything Everywhere All At Once - 6 votes
Inception - 6 votes
Ex Machina - 5 votes
Gravity - 5 votes
Mad Max: Fury Road - 5 votes
Four votes each
Blade Runner 2049
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind
Her
Looper
Moon
The Prestige
Three votes each
Avatar
District 9
Get Out
The Incredibles
Interstellar
Minority Report
Predestination
Primer
Rogue One
Serenity
Two votes each
Cloverfield
Dredd
Hellboy
Knowing
A Quiet Place
A Scanner Darkly
Spiderman: Into the Spiderverse
Under the Skin
Wall-e
War of the Worlds
One vote each
The Adjustment Bureau
Alienoid
Appleseed
After Yang
Asteroid City
Attack The Block
Avengers: Endgame
Avengers: Infinity War
Battle: Los Angeles
Big Hero 6
Bird Box
Border
Chronicle
Coherence
Computer Chess
The Congress
Day Watch
Europa Report
The Shape of Water
Godzilla, Mothra and King Ghidorah: Giant Monsters All-Out Attack
Guardians of the Galaxy
Guardians of the Galaxy 2
Immortel
Iron Man
Let the Right One in
Logan
The Lost Skeleton of Cadavra
The Matrix Reloaded
Midnight Special
The Mist
Nope
Outlander
Paul
Possessor
Prey
Ready Player One
Real Steel
Returner
Safety Not Guaranteed
Sean of the Dead
Settlers
The Shape of Water
Shin Godzilla
Sunshine
Super-8
Surrogates
10 Cloverfield Lane
Terminator Genisys
Terminator 3
Tron Legacy
Upgrade
V for Vendetta
Vanilla Sky
Watchmen
The World’s End