Top 35 Sci-Fi Movies Of All Time (List Updated March 2024)
by John94 | created - 03 Jan 2023 | updated - 1 month ago | PublicThe list contains my top 35 movies from my favorite genre of film-making in no particular order
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1. Blade Runner (1982)
R | 117 min | Action, Drama, Sci-Fi
A blade runner must pursue and terminate four replicants who stole a ship in space and have returned to Earth to find their creator.
Director: Ridley Scott | Stars: Harrison Ford, Rutger Hauer, Sean Young, Edward James Olmos
Votes: 823,389 | Gross: $32.87M
2. Blade Runner 2049 (2017)
R | 164 min | Action, Drama, Mystery
Young Blade Runner K's discovery of a long-buried secret leads him to track down former Blade Runner Rick Deckard, who's been missing for thirty years.
Director: Denis Villeneuve | Stars: Harrison Ford, Ryan Gosling, Ana de Armas, Dave Bautista
Votes: 665,708 | Gross: $92.05M
3. 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968)
G | 149 min | Adventure, Sci-Fi
After uncovering a mysterious artifact buried beneath the Lunar surface, a spacecraft is sent to Jupiter to find its origins: a spacecraft manned by two men and the supercomputer HAL 9000.
Director: Stanley Kubrick | Stars: Keir Dullea, Gary Lockwood, William Sylvester, Daniel Richter
Votes: 719,852 | Gross: $56.95M
4. The Matrix (1999)
R | 136 min | Action, Sci-Fi
When a beautiful stranger leads computer hacker Neo to a forbidding underworld, he discovers the shocking truth--the life he knows is the elaborate deception of an evil cyber-intelligence.
Directors: Lana Wachowski, Lilly Wachowski | Stars: Keanu Reeves, Laurence Fishburne, Carrie-Anne Moss, Hugo Weaving
Votes: 2,054,227 | Gross: $171.48M
5. Terminator 2: Judgment Day (1991)
R | 137 min | Action, Adventure, Sci-Fi
A cyborg, identical to the one who failed to kill Sarah Connor, must now protect her ten year old son John from an even more advanced and powerful cyborg.
Director: James Cameron | Stars: Arnold Schwarzenegger, Linda Hamilton, Edward Furlong, Robert Patrick
Votes: 1,174,593 | Gross: $204.84M
6. Alien (1979)
R | 117 min | Horror, Sci-Fi
The crew of a commercial spacecraft encounters a deadly lifeform after investigating a mysterious transmission of unknown origin.
Director: Ridley Scott | Stars: Sigourney Weaver, Tom Skerritt, John Hurt, Veronica Cartwright
Votes: 951,365 | Gross: $78.90M
7. Aliens (1986)
R | 137 min | Action, Adventure, Sci-Fi
Decades after surviving the Nostromo incident, Ellen Ripley is sent out to re-establish contact with a terraforming colony but finds herself battling the Alien Queen and her offspring.
Director: James Cameron | Stars: Sigourney Weaver, Michael Biehn, Carrie Henn, Paul Reiser
Votes: 763,396 | Gross: $85.16M
8. Mad Max: Fury Road (2015)
R | 120 min | Action, Adventure, Sci-Fi
In a post-apocalyptic wasteland, a woman rebels against a tyrannical ruler in search for her homeland with the aid of a group of female prisoners, a psychotic worshiper and a drifter named Max.
Director: George Miller | Stars: Tom Hardy, Charlize Theron, Nicholas Hoult, Zoë Kravitz
Votes: 1,086,995 | Gross: $154.06M
9. Dune (2021)
PG-13 | 155 min | Action, Adventure, Drama
A noble family becomes embroiled in a war for control over the galaxy's most valuable asset while its heir becomes troubled by visions of a dark future.
Director: Denis Villeneuve | Stars: Timothée Chalamet, Rebecca Ferguson, Zendaya, Oscar Isaac
Votes: 857,480 | Gross: $108.33M
10. Dune: Part Two (2024)
PG-13 | 166 min | Action, Adventure, Drama
Paul Atreides unites with Chani and the Fremen while seeking revenge against the conspirators who destroyed his family.
Director: Denis Villeneuve | Stars: Timothée Chalamet, Zendaya, Rebecca Ferguson, Javier Bardem
Votes: 382,118
11. Dark City (1998)
R | 100 min | Fantasy, Mystery, Sci-Fi
A man struggles with memories of his past, which include a wife he cannot remember and a nightmarish world no one else ever seems to wake up from.
Director: Alex Proyas | Stars: Rufus Sewell, Kiefer Sutherland, Jennifer Connelly, William Hurt
Votes: 212,361 | Gross: $14.38M
12. Minority Report (2002)
PG-13 | 145 min | Action, Crime, Mystery
John works with the PreCrime police which stop crimes before they take place, with the help of three 'PreCogs' who can foresee crimes. Events ensue when John finds himself framed for a future murder.
Director: Steven Spielberg | Stars: Tom Cruise, Colin Farrell, Samantha Morton, Max von Sydow
Votes: 584,558 | Gross: $132.07M
13. Gattaca (1997)
PG-13 | 106 min | Drama, Sci-Fi, Thriller
A genetically inferior man assumes the identity of a superior one in order to pursue his lifelong dream of space travel.
Director: Andrew Niccol | Stars: Ethan Hawke, Uma Thurman, Jude Law, Gore Vidal
Votes: 323,336 | Gross: $12.34M
14. Equilibrium (2002)
R | 107 min | Action, Drama, Sci-Fi
In an oppressive future where all forms of feeling are illegal, a man in charge of enforcing the law rises to overthrow the system and state.
Director: Kurt Wimmer | Stars: Christian Bale, Sean Bean, Emily Watson, Taye Diggs
Votes: 347,117 | Gross: $1.20M
15. The Thing (1982)
R | 109 min | Horror, Mystery, Sci-Fi
A research team in Antarctica is hunted by a shape-shifting alien that assumes the appearance of its victims.
Director: John Carpenter | Stars: Kurt Russell, Wilford Brimley, Keith David, Richard Masur
Votes: 466,898 | Gross: $13.78M
16. A Clockwork Orange (1971)
R | 136 min | Crime, Sci-Fi
In the future, a sadistic gang leader is imprisoned and volunteers for a conduct-aversion experiment, but it doesn't go as planned.
Director: Stanley Kubrick | Stars: Malcolm McDowell, Patrick Magee, Michael Bates, Warren Clarke
Votes: 881,579 | Gross: $6.21M
17. Interstellar (2014)
PG-13 | 169 min | Adventure, Drama, Sci-Fi
When Earth becomes uninhabitable in the future, a farmer and ex-NASA pilot, Joseph Cooper, is tasked to pilot a spacecraft, along with a team of researchers, to find a new planet for humans.
Director: Christopher Nolan | Stars: Matthew McConaughey, Anne Hathaway, Jessica Chastain, Mackenzie Foy
Votes: 2,101,673 | Gross: $188.02M
18. Jurassic Park (1993)
PG-13 | 127 min | Action, Adventure, Sci-Fi
A pragmatic paleontologist touring an almost complete theme park on an island in Central America is tasked with protecting a couple of kids after a power failure causes the park's cloned dinosaurs to run loose.
Director: Steven Spielberg | Stars: Sam Neill, Laura Dern, Jeff Goldblum, Richard Attenborough
Votes: 1,067,617 | Gross: $402.45M
19. Upgrade (2018)
R | 100 min | Action, Sci-Fi, Thriller
Set in the near-future, technology controls nearly all aspects of life. But when the world of Grey, a self-labeled technophobe, is turned upside down, his only hope for revenge is an experimental computer chip implant.
Director: Leigh Whannell | Stars: Logan Marshall-Green, Melanie Vallejo, Steve Danielsen, Abby Craden
Votes: 206,880 | Gross: $11.98M
20. 12 Monkeys (1995)
R | 129 min | Mystery, Sci-Fi, Thriller
In a future world devastated by disease, a convict is sent back in time to gather information about the man-made virus that wiped out most of the human population on the planet.
Director: Terry Gilliam | Stars: Bruce Willis, Madeleine Stowe, Brad Pitt, Joseph Melito
Votes: 646,874 | Gross: $57.14M
21. Inception (2010)
PG-13 | 148 min | Action, Adventure, Sci-Fi
A thief who steals corporate secrets through the use of dream-sharing technology is given the inverse task of planting an idea into the mind of a C.E.O., but his tragic past may doom the project and his team to disaster.
Director: Christopher Nolan | Stars: Leonardo DiCaprio, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Elliot Page, Ken Watanabe
Votes: 2,552,044 | Gross: $292.58M
22. Children of Men (2006)
R | 109 min | Action, Drama, Sci-Fi
In 2027, in a chaotic world in which women have somehow become infertile, a former activist agrees to help transport a miraculously pregnant woman to a sanctuary at sea.
Director: Alfonso Cuarón | Stars: Julianne Moore, Clive Owen, Chiwetel Ejiofor, Michael Caine
Votes: 529,558 | Gross: $35.55M
23. Ex Machina (2014)
R | 108 min | Drama, Sci-Fi, Thriller
A young programmer is selected to participate in a ground-breaking experiment in synthetic intelligence by evaluating the human qualities of a highly advanced humanoid A.I.
Director: Alex Garland | Stars: Alicia Vikander, Domhnall Gleeson, Oscar Isaac, Sonoya Mizuno
Votes: 589,985 | Gross: $25.44M
24. Arrival (II) (2016)
PG-13 | 116 min | Drama, Mystery, Sci-Fi
A linguist works with the military to communicate with alien lifeforms after twelve mysterious spacecraft appear around the world.
Director: Denis Villeneuve | Stars: Amy Adams, Jeremy Renner, Forest Whitaker, Michael Stuhlbarg
Votes: 771,652 | Gross: $100.55M
25. Star Wars: Episode III - Revenge of the Sith (2005)
PG-13 | 140 min | Action, Adventure, Fantasy
Three years into the Clone Wars, Obi-Wan Kenobi pursues a new threat, while Anakin Skywalker is lured by Chancellor Palpatine into a sinister plot to rule the galaxy.
Director: George Lucas | Stars: Hayden Christensen, Natalie Portman, Ewan McGregor, Samuel L. Jackson
Votes: 845,774 | Gross: $380.26M
26. Moon (2009)
R | 97 min | Drama, Mystery, Sci-Fi
Astronaut Sam Bell has a quintessentially personal encounter toward the end of his three-year stint on the Moon, where he, working alongside his computer, GERTY, sends back to Earth parcels of a resource that has helped diminish our planet's power problems.
Director: Duncan Jones | Stars: Sam Rockwell, Kevin Spacey, Dominique McElligott, Rosie Shaw
Votes: 376,799 | Gross: $5.01M
27. Back to the Future (1985)
PG | 116 min | Adventure, Comedy, Sci-Fi
Marty McFly, a 17-year-old high school student, is accidentally sent 30 years into the past in a time-traveling DeLorean invented by his close friend, the maverick scientist Doc Brown.
Director: Robert Zemeckis | Stars: Michael J. Fox, Christopher Lloyd, Lea Thompson, Crispin Glover
Votes: 1,307,459 | Gross: $210.61M
28. Total Recall (1990)
R | 113 min | Action, Adventure, Sci-Fi
When a man goes in to have virtual vacation memories of the planet Mars implanted in his mind, an unexpected and harrowing series of events forces him to go to the planet for real - or is he?
Director: Paul Verhoeven | Stars: Arnold Schwarzenegger, Sharon Stone, Michael Ironside, Rachel Ticotin
Votes: 354,715 | Gross: $119.39M
29. Edge of Tomorrow (2014)
PG-13 | 113 min | Action, Adventure, Sci-Fi
A soldier fighting aliens gets to relive the same day over and over again, the day restarting every time he dies.
Director: Doug Liman | Stars: Tom Cruise, Emily Blunt, Bill Paxton, Brendan Gleeson
Votes: 737,295 | Gross: $100.21M
30. War for the Planet of the Apes (2017)
PG-13 | 140 min | Action, Adventure, Drama
After the apes suffer unimaginable losses, Caesar wrestles with his darker instincts and begins his own mythic quest to avenge his kind.
Director: Matt Reeves | Stars: Andy Serkis, Woody Harrelson, Steve Zahn, Karin Konoval
Votes: 283,568 | Gross: $146.88M
31. Dawn of the Planet of the Apes (2014)
PG-13 | 130 min | Action, Adventure, Drama
The fragile peace between apes and humans is threatened as mistrust and betrayal threaten to plunge both tribes into a war for dominance over the Earth.
Director: Matt Reeves | Stars: Gary Oldman, Keri Russell, Andy Serkis, Kodi Smit-McPhee
Votes: 469,545 | Gross: $208.55M
32. The Matrix Reloaded (2003)
R | 138 min | Action, Sci-Fi
Freedom fighters Neo, Trinity and Morpheus continue to lead the revolt against the Machine Army, unleashing their arsenal of extraordinary skills and weaponry against the systematic forces of repression and exploitation.
Directors: Lana Wachowski, Lilly Wachowski | Stars: Keanu Reeves, Laurence Fishburne, Carrie-Anne Moss, Hugo Weaving
Votes: 630,865 | Gross: $281.49M
33. The Prestige (2006)
PG-13 | 130 min | Drama, Mystery, Sci-Fi
After a tragic accident, two stage magicians in 1890s London engage in a battle to create the ultimate illusion while sacrificing everything they have to outwit each other.
Director: Christopher Nolan | Stars: Christian Bale, Hugh Jackman, Scarlett Johansson, Michael Caine
Votes: 1,441,792 | Gross: $53.09M
34. The Terminator (1984)
R | 107 min | Action, Adventure, Sci-Fi
A human soldier is sent from 2029 to 1984 to stop an almost indestructible cyborg killing machine, sent from the same year, which has been programmed to execute a young woman whose unborn son is the key to humanity's future salvation.
Director: James Cameron | Stars: Arnold Schwarzenegger, Linda Hamilton, Michael Biehn, Paul Winfield
Votes: 924,570 | Gross: $38.40M
35. Source Code (2011)
PG-13 | 93 min | Action, Drama, Mystery
A soldier wakes up in someone else's body and discovers he's part of an experimental government program to find the bomber of a commuter train within 8 minutes.
Director: Duncan Jones | Stars: Jake Gyllenhaal, Michelle Monaghan, Vera Farmiga, Jeffrey Wright
Votes: 549,948 | Gross: $54.71M
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