Best movies like Watch the Skies!: Science Fiction, the 1950s and Us

When the first manned flight to Venus returns to Earth, the rocket crash-lands in the Mediterranean near a small Italian fishing village. The locals manage to save one of the astronauts Colonel Calder, the mission commander. A young boy also recovers what turns out to be a specimen of an alien creature. Growing at a fantastic rate, it manages to escape and eventually threatens the city of Rome.

The residents of a small town are excited when a flaming meteor lands in the hills, until they discover it is the first of many transport devices from Mars bringing an army of invaders invincible to any man-made weapon, even the atomic bomb.

A television program is interupted by a news network announcing that three meteors have hit the United States, France and China. At first it seems natural but after interviews by scientists and eyewitness seems to suggest that it is not. Three more meteors are coming and the various Earth governments combine forces to stop them.

A rich rocket scientist organizes an expedition to the moon, which they discover is inhabited by nude women.

There’s only one person who so accurately personifies movie magic in the history of film, and that man is special effects maestro Ray Harryhausen. Focusing on the man behind the landmark effects on films like Clash Of The Titans, One Million Years B.C., Jason And The Argonauts and many more, this in-depth film features interviews with the great man himself, and with an array of animators and directors influenced by his work including Guillermo del Toro, Peter Jackson, Nick Park, Terry Gilliam, James Cameron and Steven Spielberg. The film also features unseen footage of tests and experiments recently uncovered.

Astronauts blast off to explore the moon on Rocketship X-M or "Rocketship eXploration Moon". A spacecraft malfunction and some fuel miscalculations cause them to end up landing on Mars. On Mars, evidence of a once powerful civilization is found. The scientists determined that an atomic war destroyed most of the Martians. Those that survived reverted to a caveman like existence.

A strange alien captures Porky Pig and Sylvester's entire campsite as a sample to take back to its planet, but only Sylvester figures out what is really going on.

Atomic scientist/pilot Doug Martin is missing after his plane crashes on an reconnaissance mission after a nuclear test. Miraculously appearing unhurt at the base later, he is given sodium amethol, but authorities are skeptical of his story that he was captured by aliens determined to conquer the Earth with giant monsters and insects. Martin vows to use existing technology to destroy them.

Scientists investigate a huge meteor that crashes into the ocean off Mexico, and encounter a skyscraper-tall, mobile machine which is designed to syphon energy from earth, including any energy directed at it in an effort to destroy it.

A civilian oil rig crew is recruited to conduct a search and rescue effort when a nuclear submarine mysteriously sinks. One diver soon finds himself on a spectacular odyssey 25,000 feet below the ocean's surface where he confronts a mysterious force that has the power to change the world or destroy it.

A scientist and a gang that has kidnapped a rich heiress come up against a beautiful but lethal alien who has crash-landed her spaceship on Earth.

Susan Ivanova discovers a derelict spaceship in hyperspace. They tow it back to Babylon 5, then strange things start happening. People are being telepathically taken over by aliens from another (third)space.

The controlled explosion of an atomic bomb in the Arctic Circle awakens a frozen dinosaur that will wreak havoc in New York City.

A UFO is stranded on earth and impounded by the US government. Its pilot, a cat with a collar that gives it special powers, including the ability to communicate with humans, has eluded the authorities and seeks the help of a scientist in order to reclaim and repair his ship and get back home.

After an encounter with UFOs, an electricity linesman feels undeniably drawn to an isolated area in the wilderness where something spectacular is about to happen.

The Autobots continue to work for NEST, now no longer in secret. But after discovering a strange artifact during a mission in Chernobyl, it becomes apparent to Optimus Prime that the United States government has been less than forthright with them.

A football player and his mates travel to the planet Mongo and find themselves fighting the tyranny of Ming the Merciless to save Earth.

As a result of nuclear testing, gigantic, ferocious mutant ants appear in the American desert southwest, and a father-daughter team of entomologists join forces with the state police officer who first discovers their existence, an FBI agent and, eventually, the US Army to eradicate the menace, before it spreads across the continent, and the world.

Near a small English village, a scientific team is conducting experiments with magnetic fields, the results of which may have military applications but the intensification of which seem to be connected to UFO reports, a series of murders, an enormous insect egg, and a strange visitor with exceptional scientific knowledge.

Secretly engineered and blasted into space by government scientists, a vile monster crash-lands back on Earth and begins killing everyone it encounters. As the death toll rises, veteran cop McLemore bravely steps forward to crush the scary creature.

Astronauts travel to the moon where they discover it is inhabited by attractive young women in black tights.

After witnessing a man's death in a bizzare accident, Father Pergado goes on a spiritual retreat, where he encounters his alien double bent on world conquest.

An alien and a robot land on Earth after World War II and tell mankind to be peaceful or face destruction.

A giant prehistoric praying mantis, recently freed from the Arctic ice, voraciously preys on American military at the DEW Line and works its way south.

After a violent storm, a dense cloud of mist envelops a small Maine town, trapping artist David Drayton and his five-year-old son in a local grocery store with other people. They soon discover that the mist conceals deadly horrors that threaten their lives, and worse, their sanity.

Bound for a remote planet on the far side of the galaxy, the crew of the colony ship 'Covenant' discovers what is thought to be an uncharted paradise, but is actually a dark, dangerous world—which has a sole inhabitant: the 'synthetic', David, survivor of the doomed Prometheus expedition.

Aliens have landed and are hiding on Earth, but need Earth’s scientists to help them fight an inter-planetary war.

An instructional short aimed at school-aged children of the early 1950s that combines animation and live-action footage with voice-over narration to explain what to do to increase their chances of surviving the blast from an atomic bomb.

An alien is left behind on Earth and saved by the 10-year-old Elliot who decides to keep him hidden in his home. While a task force hunts for the extra-terrestrial, Elliot, his brother, and his little sister Gertie form an emotional bond with their new friend, and try to help him find his way home.

The world is delighted when a spacecraft containing a crew made up of the world's astronauts lands on the moon, but are shocked when the astronauts discover an old British flag and a document declaring that the moon is taken for Queen Victoria proving that the astronauts were not the first men on the moon.

When a deadly Nitron ray strikes Earth, Flash Gordon and his friends travel to Mars to battle Ming the Merciless and his new ally Queen Azura.

Set just after the American civil war, businessman and inventor Victor Barbicane invents a new source of power called Power X. He plans to use it to power rockets, and to show its potential he plans to send a projectile to the moon. Joining him for the trip are his assistant Ben Sharpe, Barbicane's arch-rival Stuyvesant Nicholl, and Nicholl's daughter Virginia. Nicholl believes that Power X goes against the will of God and sabotages the projectile so that they cannot return to earth, setting up a suspenseful finale as they battle to repair the projectile.

When Susan Murphy is unwittingly clobbered by a meteor full of outer space gunk on her wedding day, she mysteriously grows to 49-feet-11-inches. The military jumps into action and captures Susan, secreting her away to a covert government compound. She is renamed Ginormica and placed in confinement with a ragtag group of Monsters...

Archival material from the original NASA film footage – much of it seen for the first time – plus interviews with the surviving astronauts, including Jim Lovell, Dave Scott, John Young, Gene Cernan, Mike Collins, Buzz Aldrin, Alan Bean, Edgar Mitchell, Charlie Duke and Harrison Schmitt.

When Earth astronaut Capt. Chuck Baker arrives on Planet 51 -- a world reminiscent of American suburbia circa 1950 -- he tries to avoid capture, recover his spaceship and make it home safely, all with the help of an empathetic little green being.

In the sequel to Paul Verhoeven's loved/reviled sci-fi film, a group of troopers taking refuge in an abandoned outpost after fighting alien bugs, failing to realize that more danger lays in wait.

About a race of alien robots that have conquered Earth and forced humanity underground. After 400 years, a small group of humans develop a plan to defeat the mechanical invaders in the ultimate battle between man and machine.

An ape crash-lands on Earth, which creates a sludge that makes him and a passing lizard grow to giant-size, resulting in a fight for dominance.

Condensed feature version of the 1936 serial Flash Gordon, with altered musical score. The film, which was shown outside the US as simply "Flash Gordon", was re-named Rocket Ship for its 1950 stateside re-release.

When an atomic war on Mars destroys the planet's women, it's up to Martian Princess Marcuzan and her right-hand man Dr. Nadir to travel to earth and kidnap women for new breeding stock. Landing in Puerto Rico, they shoot down a NASA space capsule manned by an android. With his electronic brain damaged, the android terrorizes the island while the Martians raid beaches and pool parties

A high school science teacher takes his students on a field trip to see a UFO sighting. What they didn't expect, was that it was a flying saucer that crashed a farm house, and an alien predator feeds on humans, killing each student one by one!

A massive asteroid impact on the moon begins causing storms on earth due to the sudden changes in ocean tides. But when further examination is conducted it's discovered that the moon's structure is now entirely unstable -- threatening all life on earth. With time running out, a team of scientists turn to one man, demolitions expert John Redding, in effort to find a solution and secure the moon.

Commando Cody, 'Sky Marshal of the Universe', works with American scientists Joan Gilbert and Ted Richards in the development of a flying suit and a rocket to the Moon. When the nation's defences are being sabotaged and destroyed, Cody learns that an atomic-gun is being used and that the men on the moon are the culprits.

Two space smugglers are caught by the government and told if they deliver a crate to a certain location the charges will be forgotten. Turns out the crate is the key to a cover up and other parties want it to.

A scientist enlists the help of the US army to investigate the mysterious disappearance of her father, deep in the Belizean jungle. Caught in the crossfire between a brutal guerrilla army controlled by a mystical warlord, they are also confronted by an even bigger terror giant mutated wasps that are, for some reason, thirsty for blood.

A Martian invader crashes his spaceship conveniently close to the workshop of a scientist who is developing an interplanetary craft. If the extraterrestrial Purple Monster can complete the rocket ship and return to Mars, he will be able to start a full-scale invasion of Earth. Good thing Craig Foster sets out to thwart the Monster's mission!

Mark Kermode brings a tribute to the successful Alien series, featuring interviews with the cast members and directors, including Sigourney Weaver and Ridley Scott. This documentary is featured on the 9th disc of the Alien Quadrilogy DVD set, released in 2003.

In this landmark film Professor Hawking, alongside engineer and radio astronomy expert Professor Danielle George and a former student, Christophe Galfard, join forces to find out if, and how, humans can reach for the stars and relocate to different planets. Travelling the globe, they meet top scientists, technologists and engineers who are working to answer our biggest questions: is there another planet out there that we could call home? How will we travel across the vast distances of space to get there? How will we survive the journey? And how will we set up a new human civilization on an alien world? Taking in the latest advances in astronomy, biology and rocket technology from the Atacama Desert to the wilds of the Arctic, viewers will discover a whole world of cutting edge research. This programme shows that Professor Hawking’s ambition isn’t as fantastical as it sounds - and that science fiction is closer to science fact than we ever thought.

A DNA experiment on a rare breed of spider is taking place on a NASA space shuttle, when a freak meteor shower engulfs the shuttle, causing everything to go horribly wrong. One survivor is found on the ship and watched over in a secret location deep in the California desert. The problem continues, as the survivor isn't alone, as another deadly spiders climbs out of him and goes on a rampage around the ship. Curious reporter Marci Eyre must now survive, escape and warn everyone before the spider reaches outside the desert.

A group of twelve international scientists are the first to land on the moon. In their exploration of the surface, they run into all kinds of trouble, including threatening messages from alien life forms residing on the moon. Just a short nine years before the historic moon landing, this film's understanding of the science of space exploration is fantastically simplistic, but this well-made science fiction film holds interest with a strong cast and intriguingly strange events, photographed with great style by John Alton. Ken Clark, Michi Kobi, Tom Conway, John Wengraf, and Robert Montgomery Jr. portray the intrepid scientists.