Sci-Fi films from the 1960s that are still worth watching

By Joshua Tyler and Drew Dietsch | Updated 1 hour ago

The sixties were a turning point in American culture and in science fiction.

For those who love science fiction films, it is now remembered as the decade that brought us the seminal work of Stanley Kubrick. 2001: A Space Odysseythe beloved adaptation of HG Wells’ The Time Machineand one of the biggest twists ever Planet of the Apes.

Unfortunately, many other great sci-fi films of the decade have not stuck around with modern audiences and are slowly being forgotten. Not if there’s anything we can do about it!

Let’s jump into our time machine and go back to a time when the ideas were bigger and better than most of the special effects they could pull off but still left their mark on film history. Here are the science fiction films of the 1960s that are still worth watching.

Dr. Who and the Daleks (1965)

You know Doctor Who as a TV show, but in 1965 the good Doctor got a big screen feature film called Who and the Daleks. This was the first time the Doctor had ever been seen in colour.

Best of all, The Doctor is played by Star Wars’ own Grand Moff Tarkin, Peter Cushing.

The film is an adaptation of one of the earliest Doctor Who series, “The Daleks.” It includes Dr. Who and his three young companions travel to the planet Skaro to face the evil Daleks.

In this continuity – always intended to be separate from what was shown – the Doctor is actually called Dr. Who. And he’s not a time lord, he’s a human inventor who builds the TARDIS rather than steals it. Most of the other changes are cosmetic in nature, but this is still a unique piece of sci-fi history that any fan will want to check out.

The Last Man on Earth (1964)

Before Richard Matheson’s landmark novel I am a legend turned into a hit with Will Smith and the cheesy delight of Charlton Heston, the legendary Vincent Price starred in the original adaptation, The Last Man on Earth. After a plague turns the population into vampiric undead, Robert Morgan burrows up and tries to survive after the world has changed.

The Last Man on Earth is a small, bleak film that is surprisingly effective in its serious tone, thanks to an anchor performance from the always excellent Price. It would go on to inspire George Romero’s game changer Night of the Living Deadso if you want to see where that footage came from, The Last Man on Earth is a must watch chiller.

barbarella (1968)

Barbarella isn’t the film space babe steamy its reputation would lead you to believe.

Sure, the film contains a moderate amount of nudity, but it’s done in such a naive and innocent way that you almost don’t notice at times.

Barbarella which stars Jane Fonda as a lone space pilot traveling the cosmos in a distant future where Earth has moved past the need for barbaric things like violence and war. They have also removed sex, replacing it with a pill.

With that context, Barbarella is sent to find a galactic villain with plans to bring back violence and warfare. Early on in her journey, she discovers that this sex thing that humans don’t do anymore is pretty good. It’s also helpful, because whenever she does it, the man she couples with is often inspired to greater heights. Barbarella literally helps an angel get his wings by making love to him.

That sounds pretty sleazy, doesn’t it? But take a look at what one of those sex scenes looks like, completely uncensored, in the video at the top of the article.

All the sex happens off-camera, and what you’re actually watching is a series of beautifully constructed sci-fi set pieces where actors of various abilities don loving costumes and totally unusual. It is clear that their aim here was to create something more than a space film. They were trying to create a very 60s visual art form of free love.

Do they succeed? You will decide that but we can say for sure that there is no other film like it Barbarella and it’s a staple of the decade for a reason.

Planet of the Vampires (1965)

Italian genre maestro Mario Bava made one of the biggest impacts on science fiction cinema with Planet of the Vampires. The story revolves around a spaceship crew responding to a distress signal on an unexplored planet where they find the remains of a long-dead giant. alien species.

Sure sounds like another sci-fi horror movie you might know, doesn’t it? Planet of the Vampires certainly inspired Alien but it’s more of an alien zombie movie than a vampire one. Mario Bava’s usual colorful design and poppy mood make it a fun and important piece of science fiction cinema history.

First Men in the Moon (1964)

Just before humans landed on the moon and discovered what it’s really like, Hollywood produced this HG Wells adaptation that uses a nifty framing device to hold it all together.

Imagine if Neil Armstrong took his one small step, and then found a note written by someone from 1899 telling him he wasn’t the first.

First Men in the Moon it soon flashes back to that original, secret mission from 1899 and explores what it might have been like for a man to go to the moon during the Victorian era. The answer is that they may have ended up underground and encountered a secret moon interior full of Ray Harryhausen’s incredible stop-motion monsters. Oh, who doesn’t love some of Ray Harryhausen’s stop-motion monsters?

The film was never a huge success at the box office, but soon became something of a cult success. It is now considered one of the best adaptations of HG Wells’ work. George Pal The Time Machine gets a ton of well-deserved love and attention, but First Men in the Moon is another 60’s adaptation of a sci-fi classic you won’t want to miss.

Fantastic Voyage (1966)

Long before Ms. Frizzle took the Magic School Bus into one of her students and the Futurama the crew traveled into Fry’s bowels, Fantastic Cruise explore the interior of a Soviet defector. The film won numerous awards, has an all-star cast, and has provided the visual language for every movie or TV show you’ve seen that goes inside the circulatory system.

Released in 1966, Fantastic Cruise was a technical marvel of its day. The film’s original trailer billed it as “a new kind of moviegoing experience,” and for once, that wasn’t hyperbole. It was a fact.

Isaac Asimov, one of the best sci-fi writers ever, he wrote the novelization of the film, which came out before the film.

today, Fantastic Cruise stands out as a turning point in sci-fi films by exploring a brand new location that had never been done on this scale before. It is still a technical breakthrough and a great adventure.

Robinson Crusoe on Mars (1964)

Imagine Matt Damon The Martian if it had been filmed in the 1960s and joined by a suitably spaced monkey. You would have Robinson Crusoe on Mars.

Robinson Crusoe isn’t the main character of the film, but other than that, it’s a pretty straight forward adaptation of Daniel Dafoe’s classic novel, if it took place in space.

Most of Robinson Crusoe on Mars was filmed in Death Valley, but you’d never know. The production design is excellent for the period, and does its best to find a level of realism consistent with science’s very limited knowledge of what it might be like on Mars. And even the unrealistic parts are actually fun.

Check out the crazy way these alien spaceships move in the video. I love it.

As a bonus, Adam West makes a brief appearance in the film as a cozy astronaut. He’s there long enough to make you wonder why he wasn’t cast as the film’s lead. Still, Robinson Crusoe on Mars notable enough to be restored and released by the Criterion Collection. That should tell you it’s a worthy watch.

Seconds (1966)

In Secondsscreen icon Rock Hudson gives one of the best performances of his career as an aging stoic who is lured by a secret company that can change his identity and make him younger, as a means of finding happiness without responsibilities.

In his new identity, he soon falls in with a group of naked hippies and finds himself entangled with a troubled woman who has also fled her boring life. And he’s still not happy.

Seconds adapted from a novel by David Ely and directed by legendary Hollywood pioneer John Frankenheimer, who set out to use endless compositions to give his film an unsettling feel and he definitely succeeded.

Seconds plays out as a particularly good episode of The Twilight Zoneand it’s always worth watching The Twilight Zone. Seconds is no different.

X: The Man with the X-Ray Eyes (1963)

Roger Corman is responsible for tons of sci-fi flicks over the years, and one of his best ever is X: The Man with the X-Ray Eyes. Ray Milland plays a scientist who wants to experiment with expanding the powers of human vision. He develops eye drops that give him x-ray vision which he can control at first. But soon, he can’t sleep because he can see through his eyelids and things get worse from there.

Thanks to Milland’s full commitment and the nightmarish descent into which the film turns, X: The Man with the X-Ray Eyes takes what could be a horrible gag premise and treats it with serious sci-fi scrutiny and horror.

Professor Nut (1963)

Steve Urkel tried to copy it.

Eddie Murphy try to crown him.

But Jerry Lewis’ original 1963 version of the classic nerd mad science story is still the best version.

Lewis plays a geek who does everything in his power to stop being a geek. He even tries to work out. It gets so bad that his doctor tells him to stop.

But a man of science never gives up. He finds a chemical formula that transforms him into the confident person he has always wanted to be. Unfortunately, all that confidence quickly turns him into a total jerk.

Jerry Lewis co-wrote and directed the film. He used video playback after each scene to evaluate in detail what he had done. That’s commonly used now, but it was one of the first to do it back in 1963.

The result was an instant hit. Professor Nutty now considered one of Lewis’ best films and one of the greatest comedies of the decade. Not a bad way to spend less than two hours.

Quatermass and the Pool (1967)

Released as Five Million Years to Earth in the United States, Quatermass and the Pool is actually part of a series of sci-fi horror classics involving the character of Professor Bernard Quatermass, but this is the best of the bunch.

An ancient Martian spaceship is unveiled in London and inside are insect-like bodies aliens. Discoveries about the history of human evolution are revealed and by the end, the spirit of Martian psychic energy drives civilization into an apocalyptic frenzy. It’s one of the most amazing and influential sci-fi stories to ever hit the screen, and if it’s more stuff than you might be used to, just wait until that jaw-dropping finale. You won’t regret it.

Do you have any favorite sci-fi films from the 1960s? Leave your picks in the comments and be sure to subscribe to the YouTube channel for even more videos from us here at Giant Freakin Robot.

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