In the ‘90s, moviegoers had plenty of opportunities to watch everything from little green men
to big, scary space monsters. To that end, here's a list of '90s alien movies that should
be required viewing.
The year is sometime in the 23rd century, and in its quest for interplanetary colonization,
humankind has stumbled across a hostile alien species of giant insects known as "bugs."
"Bugs! Bugs!"
When it's reported that the bugs have destroyed Buenos Aires with an asteroid, killing millions
in the process, a bunch of sexy young people enlist in the military to go kick some arthropod
butt. Awesome action, lessons in leadership, and more than one topless scene ensue.
This is the plot of 1997's Starship Troopers. Directed by the legendary filmmaker Paul Verhoeven,
who graced us with such genre gems as Basic Instinct, Showgirls, and of course, Robocop,
the movie gives us as much as you're willing to get out of it. If you're looking for a
B-movie filled with hot actors hooking up and fighting aliens in spectacular battles,
you'll get it by the truck, ahem, starship-load. And if you're looking for a bit of depth,
there's actually a surprisingly subversive critique of fascist power structures hidden
among all the special effects and steamy scenes.
Starship Troopers is a hilarious, thrilling romp that has a healthy dose of smarts. It
does, however, have a string of straight-to-video sequels of significantly diminished quality
that you can feel free to skip.
It was one of the most quoted movies of 1996, and possibly even the entire decade. What
child of the '90s hasn't shouted "Welcome to Earth" at least once? It's Independence
Day, and it's one explosive thrill ride.
Let's set the scene. When dozens of 15-mile-wide alien spaceships descend upon the earth and
simultaneously wipe out major cities with massive laser beams, things are looking grim
for humankind. As the ships reposition to destroy more cities, it becomes a race against
time to figure out their weaknesses and fight back.
Boasting an absolutely stacked cast featuring the likes of Will Smith, Jeff Goldblum, Bill
Pullman, and many more, Independence Day was a smash hit, raking in $817.4 million at the
box office, which made it not only the highest grossing film of 1996 but the second-highest
grossing film ever at the time.
"Today, we celebrate our Independence Day!"
Of course, 20 years later, we got the release of Independence Day: Resurgence, which nobody
asked for and nobody wanted to see. Without leading man Will Smith, the sequel was doomed
to fail from the get-go, and in the end, it got bad reviews and flopped at the box office.
So by all means, watch Independence Day, but don't feel bad if you decide to stop there.
In 1979, Alien set the standard for modern sci-fi movies and catapulted lead Sigourney
Weaver to superstardom. In 1986, Aliens upped the ante by expanding the "woman vs. mysterious
alien" premise to "people vs. tons of aliens plus loads of guns," with thrilling results.
Then, in 1992, Alien 3 confounded its filmmakers and audiences alike by throwing way too many
cooks into the kitchen, resulting in a movie that, at the time, was panned for its questionable
script, disjointed pacing and storytelling, and general lack of excitement.
"Don't be afraid. I'm part of the family."
All of that being said, retrospective reappraisals have found much to appreciate in Alien 3,
largely because the extended cut that came out some years later proved that the movie
director David Fincher wanted to make was much better than anyone understood at the
time.
Narratively speaking, Alien 3 was pretty straightforward. Weaver's character, Ripley, crashes on a remote
prison planet where it turns out that her escape pod had a stowaway Xenomorph egg inside.
Said egg impregnates a dog, resulting in a neat canine-alien hybrid that forces the prisoners
to band together and fight for their lives. Pretty cool, right?
Unfortunately, the movie was plagued by production problems, cycling through screenwriters, cinematographers,
and directors like a game of musical chairs. When now-renowned director David Fincher finally
got a hold of it, he did everything he could to right the course. Behind-the-scenes meddling,
however, took its toll. But Alien 3 turns out to be an interesting tonal shift for the
series, taking on an almost gothic feel. And many of the plot choices are genuinely daring.
The fact that it introduced the world to the great David Fincher is in itself reason enough
to put it on your list.
After arriving on Earth, the first order of business for our alien visitors is to vaporize
the U.S. congress before attempting to take over the entire planet. This might sound like
the plot of a horror movie, but Mars Attacks! is anything but scary. In fact, it's an outright
ridiculous romp.
"Ack ack! Ack!"
Released in 1996, Mars Attacks! was director Tim Burton's attempt at making a '50s-style
sci-fi B-movie in the vein of The Day the Earth Stood Still or Plan 9 from Outer Space,
and it leaned hard into that B-movie distinction. Mars Attacks! is absurd to the extreme, weaving
together a range of unlikely subplots about people, who are almost always doomed due to
their own idiocy, attempting to survive the extraterrestrial-induced chaos.
The cast is incredible, boasting A-list names that include Jack Nicholson, Glenn Close,
Annette Bening, Pierce Brosnan, Martin Short, Michael J. Fox, Natalie Portman, and more.
But even with all that star power, the film was a flop. Critics scorned it, and it holds
a mere 54% on Rotten Tomatoes. It didn't perform any better at the box office, bringing home
just $101 million worldwide on its $80 million budget.
But don't let any of that deter you. Mars Attacks! is a must-see, if for no other reason
than to experience one of the weirdest watches of the '90s.
In 1975, loggers in rural Arizona panic and flee when their coworker is blasted by a ray
of light from an unidentified flying object. Upon returning to the scene, said coworker
is nowhere to be found, and when the loggers report the incident to the local police, they
are, of course, the primary suspects in the man's disappearance. He reappears a few days
later, incoherent and clothing-less, eventually relating in extreme detail that he'd been
abducted by aliens.
"Travis, can we have your autograph?"
"Autograph?"
"Yeah, you're famous, you've been to space."
This was the story of the infamous Walton Incident, which alleged abductee Travis Walton
detailed in a book that, in 1993, was made into the film Fire in the Sky. In a decade
full of alien and sci-fi blockbusters, Fire in the Sky was a relatively small movie with
its $15 million budget, and it was nothing short of a box office flop, bringing in just
$19.8 million worldwide. Reviews at the time were mixed, and today, it has a mere 42% on
Rotten Tomatoes.
So what about Fire in the Sky makes it so necessary to watch if it so completely underperformed?
It's simple, the intense alien abduction flashback! After the abductee returns and recovers his
senses, he relates in extreme detail his experience on the alien examination table as his captors
perform various experiments. While the rest of the movie is admittedly a bit lukewarm,
it's definitely worth it to check out this one squirm-worthy scene.
It's a sleek, silly, over-the-top sci-fi romp that inspired orange-haired, revealing Halloween
costumes for decades to come. It won awards at both the prestigious Cannes Film Festival
and the Golden Raspberry Awards. Its creator, Luc Besson, began writing it when he was just
16 years old, and it opened as the number one movie in the U.S. more than 20 years later.
It's The Fifth Element, and there's no other movie quite like it.
Set some 200 years in the future, The Fifth Element tells the story of Korben Dallas,
an ex-soldier and down-on-his-luck flying taxi driver who's thrust into adventure when
a young, mysterious woman named Leeloo literally falls into his life. Dallas comes to learn
that Leeloo is the key to stopping an evil force that threatens to destroy Earth, and
they set off on a ridiculous quest to save the planet.
And we're not exaggerating when we use the word "ridiculous." On one hand, The Fifth
Element is an exciting space thriller, but on the other, it's a slapstick comedy à la
the Three Stooges. Gary Oldman plays one of the most (purposely) laughable villains in
movie history, and Chris Tucker takes absurdity to new heights as the shrieking, flamboyantly
wisecracking intergalactic talk show host Ruby Rhod.
"This boy is fueled like fire, so start melting ladies cuz the boy is hotter than hot he's
hot, hot, hot!"
As the director explained himself, it's not a, quote, "big theme movie." Instead, the
point is more or less to offer adventure for the sake of adventure, with plenty of jokes
on top.
The Fifth Element delivers, which is why it still has a devoted fan base more than 20
years after its release.
No matter what decade it happens to be, the buddy cop concept generally turns out to be
a winner. You know the formula. A pair of mismatched lawmen get paired up, one of whom
is the straight-laced square, and the other is the quirky risk-taker. Along the way, they
learn to appreciate one another while saving the day.
In 1997, Men in Black took this recipe and spiced it up by turning the cops into a duo
of secret government agents and by pitting them against, you guessed it, aliens.
"You sold a reverberating carbonizer with mutate capacity to an unlicensed cephalopoid,
Jeebs, you piece of-"
"He looked alright to me."
It starred Tommy Lee Jones as the straight man and Will Smith as the loose cannon, and
the result couldn't have been more perfect. The premise was pretty simple. New to the
Men in Black secret agency, Smith is partnered up with Jones, and the pair are tasked with
finding a mysterious device called the "Galaxy" before it falls into the wrong alien hands.
Or tentacles. Or whatever. The adventure that ensues is as hilarious as it is thrilling.
Men in Black was a massive success, earning universally positive reviews and raking in
the bucks at the box office. This success resulted in a sequel that was as panned by
critics as the first installment was praised. And while the third attempt was an improvement
on the sequel, the fourth go-round was just plain bad. All three of the sequels were released
in the 2000s and 2010s, though, so maybe Men in Black was a '90s only sort of thing?
What happens when the fans of your science fiction TV series take it too seriously? While
this is an issue that many a Star Trek alumnus has had to grapple with, it's unlikely that
William Shatner or Leonard Nimoy ever had to deal with extraterrestrial obsession. But
that's exactly what happens to the crew of the Protector, in 1999's Galaxy Quest.
"You guys came. Who wants the grand tour?"
When the washed-up cast from a once-popular sci-fi show is mistaken for the real deal
by an alien species that confused television for reality, the actors are plucked from their
lives and taken aboard an actual spaceship. Their outer space audience has amicably abducted
them, hoping for their help in fighting off a terrifying foe, and soon, the cast is embroiled
in an authentic intergalactic adventure.
While Galaxy Quest parodies sci-fi series like Star Trek, it was widely acclaimed by
Trekkies and non-Trekkies alike. In addition to lead star Tim Allen, the cast was stacked
with talent like Sigourney Weaver, Alan Rickman, Sam Rockwell, Daryl Mitchell, and Tony Shalhoub.
Simultaneously smart, hilarious, and exciting, it was a critical and box office success,
and so embraced was it by Star Trek aficionados that they voted it the seventh best Star Trek
movie of all time.
No one likes high school, but for the kids in The Faculty, high school truly is a killer.
"I think something's taking over our school."
"Body Snatchers is just a story somebody made up, dingus, it's located in the fiction section
of the library."
"Yeah, but so is Schindler's List."
The premise is simple. After discovering a strange, unidentified parasite, a handful
of students at Herrington High begin to notice that their teachers and classmates aren't
acting like themselves. It turns out that they aren't themselves, as their bodies are
gradually being taken over by an invading alien force. It's Invasion of the Body Snatchers
but for teens. Armed only with an unnamed drug manufactured by one of the students that
kills the aliens for some reason, these students have to save their school, and the world,
before it's too late.
Released in 1998, The Faculty performed well at the box office, but it was hit or miss
with both critics and audiences alike, roughly half of which leveled the charge that the
movie was too cliché. But for many viewers, that was also its strength, paying homage
to a tradition of sci-fi horror thrillers that didn't take themselves too seriously.
Admittedly, The Faculty isn't brilliant, nor is it all that original. But it's an undeniably
fun watch. And, hey, Jon Stewart makes a cameo! It also has the distinction of being among
the earliest films by now-renowned director Robert Rodriguez.
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