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Best Sci-Fi Movies of the 1970s, Ranked by IMDb, Rotten Tomatoes, Metacritic and TMDB
81 sci-fi films from the 1970s are in our catalog; the 50 best are ranked below. Top of the list is Star Wars (1977), at 8.6 on IMDb. The average IMDb score across this list is 6.9. Biggest split between audiences and critics: The Boys from Brazil, 7.0 on IMDb against 40 on Metacritic.
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| # | Movie | Genre | IMDb | Tomato | Meta | TMDB | Director |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Star Wars '1977 | Action / Sci-Fi | 8.6 | 93% | 90 | 8.2 | George Lucas |
| 2 | Alien '1979 | Horror / Sci-Fi | 8.4 | 93% | 89 | 8.2 | Ridley Scott |
| 3 | A Clockwork Orange '1971 | Sci-Fi / Crime | 8.2 | 83% | 77 | 8.2 | Stanley Kubrick |
| 4 | Stalker '1979 | Sci-Fi / Drama | 8.0 | 100% | 85 | 8.1 | Andrei Tarkovsky |
| 5 | Solaris '1972 | Drama / Sci-Fi / Mystery | 7.9 | 92% | 93 | 7.8 | Andrei Tarkovsky |
| 6 | Ivan Vasilyevich Changes His Profession '1973 | Comedy / Sci-Fi | 8.2 | - | - | 7.9 | Leonid Gaidai |
| 7 | Dawn of the Dead '1978 | Horror / Sci-Fi | 7.8 | 92% | 71 | 7.5 | George A. Romero |
| 8 | Close Encounters of the Third Kind '1977 | Sci-Fi / Drama | 7.6 | 91% | 90 | 7.3 | Steven Spielberg |
| 9 | Fantastic Planet '1973 | Animation / Sci-Fi | 7.6 | 91% | 73 | 7.6 | René Laloux |
| 10 | The Rocky Horror Picture Show '1975 | Comedy / Sci-Fi / Horror | 7.4 | 82% | 65 | 7.4 | Jim Sharman |
| 11 | Superman '1978 | Sci-Fi / Action | 7.4 | 87% | 82 | 7.2 | Richard Donner |
| 12 | Invasion of the Body Snatchers '1978 | Sci-Fi / Horror | 7.4 | 93% | 75 | 7.2 | Philip Kaufman |
| 13 | The Andromeda Strain '1971 | Sci-Fi / Thriller / Drama | 7.2 | 68% | 60 | 7.0 | Robert Wise |
| 14 | Eraserhead '1977 | Horror / Sci-Fi | 7.2 | 87% | 87 | 7.3 | David Lynch |
| 15 | Sleeper '1973 | Comedy / Sci-Fi | 7.1 | 100% | 77 | 6.8 | Woody Allen |
| 16 | Colossus: The Forbin Project '1970 | Sci-Fi / Thriller | 7.1 | 90% | - | 6.9 | Joseph Sargent |
| 17 | Soylent Green '1973 | Sci-Fi / Crime / Mystery | 7.0 | 73% | 66 | 6.9 | Richard Fleischer |
| 18 | The Bugs Bunny/Road Runner Movie '1979 | Animation / Comedy / Musical / Sci-Fi | 7.3 | 100% | - | 7.4 | Chuck Jones |
| 19 | Time After Time '1979 | Drama / Comedy / Sci-Fi / Thriller | 7.0 | 88% | 69 | 6.8 | Nicholas Meyer |
| 20 | Westworld '1973 | Sci-Fi / Western | 6.9 | 83% | 77 | 6.8 | Michael Crichton |
| 21 | The Stepford Wives '1975 | Sci-Fi / Horror / Thriller | 6.9 | 55% | 54 | 6.7 | Bryan Forbes |
| 22 | The Boys from Brazil '1978 | Drama / Mystery / Sci-Fi | 7.0 | 72% | 40 | 6.7 | Franklin J. Schaffner |
| 23 | Slaughterhouse-Five '1972 | Drama / Sci-Fi / War | 6.8 | 82% | 66 | 6.5 | George Roy Hill |
| 24 | The Incredible Hulk '1977 | Action / Sci-Fi / Drama | 6.9 | 63% | - | 6.5 | Kenneth Johnson |
| 25 | The Living Dead at Manchester Morgue '1974 | Horror / Sci-Fi / Drama | 6.7 | 86% | - | 6.4 | Jorge Grau |
| 26 | Logan's Run '1976 | Action / Sci-Fi | 6.8 | 58% | 53 | 6.6 | Michael Anderson |
| 27 | The Brood '1979 | Horror / Sci-Fi | 6.8 | 84% | 63 | 6.7 | David Cronenberg |
| 28 | Willard '1971 | Horror / Sci-Fi | 6.2 | 50% | 49 | 6.1 | Daniel Mann |
| 29 | Capricorn One '1977 | Drama / Action / Thriller / Sci-Fi | 6.8 | 61% | 38 | 6.8 | Peter Hyams |
| 30 | Mad Max '1979 | Action / Thriller / Sci-Fi | 6.8 | 89% | 73 | 6.7 | George Miller |
| 31 | The Medusa Touch '1978 | Horror / Thriller / Sci-Fi / Mystery | 6.9 | - | 49 | 6.8 | Jack Gold |
| 32 | Godzilla vs. Hedorah '1971 | Sci-Fi / Action / Horror | 6.1 | 67% | - | 6.8 | Yoshimitsu Banno |
| 33 | God Told Me To '1976 | Thriller / Sci-Fi / Crime / Horror / Mystery | 6.3 | 81% | 55 | 5.9 | Larry Cohen |
| 34 | Battlestar Galactica '1978 | Sci-Fi | 6.8 | 35% | - | 6.9 | Richard A. Colla |
| 35 | The Man Who Fell to Earth '1976 | Sci-Fi / Drama / Fantasy | 6.6 | 79% | 81 | 6.5 | Nicolas Roeg |
| 36 | THX 1138 '1971 | Sci-Fi / Drama | 6.6 | 72% | 75 | 6.4 | George Lucas |
| 37 | The Sheriff and the Satellite Kid '1979 | Comedy / Sci-Fi / Action | 6.1 | - | - | 6.4 | Michele Lupo |
| 38 | Phase IV '1974 | Horror / Sci-Fi | 6.4 | 50% | 49 | 6.3 | Saul Bass |
| 39 | Silent Running '1972 | Sci-Fi / Drama | 6.6 | 71% | 67 | 6.4 | Douglas Trumbull |
| 40 | Phantasm '1979 | Horror / Sci-Fi | 6.6 | 72% | 72 | 6.5 | Don Coscarelli |
| 41 | The Gendarme and the Creatures from Outer Space '1979 | Comedy / Sci-Fi | 6.3 | - | - | 6.1 | Jean Girault |
| 42 | The Crazies '1973 | Sci-Fi / Horror / Action | 6.1 | 68% | 63 | 6.1 | George A. Romero |
| 43 | Godzilla vs. Mechagodzilla '1974 | Action / Sci-Fi | 6.2 | 86% | - | 6.9 | Jun Fukuda |
| 44 | Demon Seed '1977 | Horror / Sci-Fi | 6.3 | 57% | 55 | 5.9 | Donald Cammell |
| 45 | The Omega Man '1971 | Sci-Fi / Action / Drama / Thriller | 6.4 | 65% | 56 | 6.2 | Boris Sagal |
| 46 | Rollerball '1975 | Sci-Fi | 6.5 | 55% | 56 | 6.3 | Norman Jewison |
| 47 | Black Moon '1975 | Fantasy / Horror / Sci-Fi | 6.1 | 42% | - | 6.0 | Louis Malle |
| 48 | Terror of Mechagodzilla '1975 | Sci-Fi / Action / Drama | 6.1 | 43% | - | 6.8 | Ishirō Honda |
| 49 | Escape to Witch Mountain '1975 | Fantasy / Sci-Fi | 6.3 | 87% | 60 | 6.4 | John Hough |
| 50 | A Boy and His Dog '1975 | Drama / Sci-Fi / Comedy | 6.4 | 80% | 68 | 6.3 | L.Q. Jones |
Our catalog covers roughly the 8,800 most-rated films on TMDB, so lesser-known titles may be missing. Order uses a confidence-weighted IMDb score so a perfect score from a handful of votes does not beat a well-established classic; the scores shown are the raw ones.
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Other genres in the 1970s
Action of the 1970s Animation of the 1970s Comedy of the 1970s Crime of the 1970s Drama of the 1970s Fantasy of the 1970s Horror of the 1970s Mystery of the 1970s Romance of the 1970s Thriller of the 1970s War of the 1970s Western of the 1970s
Directors on this list
George Lucas Ridley Scott Stanley Kubrick Andrei Tarkovsky Leonid Gaidai George A. Romero Steven Spielberg Richard Donner Philip Kaufman Robert Wise David Lynch Woody Allen
Actors on this list
Mark Hamill Harrison Ford Tom Skerritt Sigourney Weaver Malcolm McDowell Richard Dreyfuss Tim Curry Susan Sarandon Christopher Reeve Donald Sutherland David Wayne Woody Allen