1960: The Time Machine 🇺🇸

Directed by George Pal and based on H.G. Wells' iconic 1895 novel, this film is a cornerstone of cinematic time travel.

A Victorian scientist builds a machine to explore the distant future, arriving in a world where the peaceful Eloi are preyed upon by the subterranean Morlocks. With Oscar-winning effects and thoughtful themes, it remains a genre-defining classic.

1960: 12 to the Moon 🇺🇸

David Bradley directs this international space mission film. A multinational crew lands on the Moon, encountering a faceless alien intelligence that questions humanity's destructive nature. A Cold War-era plea for peace and global cooperation.

1960: Village of the Damned 🇬🇧

Wolf Rilla directed this movie adaptation of John Wyndham's novel The Midwich Cuckoos set in a British village where all inhabitants mysteriously fall unconscious for several hours and months later, every woman of childbearing age is inexplicably pregnant. T he resulting children share eerie physical traits and develop a collective telepathic intelligence. 

Neither the sequel in 1964 nor the remake (same name), by John Carpenter in 1995, achieved the same level of popularity.

1961: Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea 🇺🇸

Irwin Allen's film features the crew of a futuristic submarine racing to prevent a global catastrophe caused by the Van Allen radiation belt. A blend of adventure and speculative science.

1961: The Absent-Minded Professor 🇺🇸

Robert Stevenson directs this comedy where a college professor invents a gravity-defying substance called "Flubber," leading to comedic mishaps and adventures. A lighthearted take on scientific discovery.

Remade in 1997 as Flubber with the beloved Robin Williams.

1961: The Day the Earth Caught Fire 🇬🇧

Val Guest's film portrays simultaneous nuclear tests by the U.S. and USSR tilting the Earth's axis, causing global climate chaos. A journalist uncovers the truth amid societal collapse.

1962: Planeta Bur (Planet of Storms) ☭

Pavel Klushantsev directs this Soviet sci-fi adventure in which three spaceships embark on the first human expedition to Venus, but one is tragically destroyed. The surviving crews press on, facing dangerous alien creatures, mysterious ruins, and life-threatening conditions. A loyal robot sacrifices itself to save the cosmonauts, and a shocking discovery hints at human life on Venus. They escape just in time, returning home as pioneers.

1961: The Phantom Planet 🇺🇸

William Marshall directs this tale of an astronaut who crash-lands on a tiny asteroid-planet, discovering a miniature civilization. He must choose between returning to Earth or staying with them.

1962: Chelovek-Amphibia (The Amphibian Man) ☭

Vladimir Chebotarev directs this tale about a "sea devil" feared by pearl divers in Buenos Aires. The "devil" is Ichthyander, a youth altered by Dr. Salvator’s experiments to breathe underwater. He rescues Guttiere and falls in love, but she is forced into marriage with ruthless Pedro Zurita. After escaping captivity, Ichthyander’s health declines—now trapped in the sea, forever separated from the human world.

1962: This is not a Test 🇺🇸

Fredric Gadette's film follows a small-town sheriff setting up a roadblock during a nuclear crisis, leading to tense interactions among stranded travelers. A claustrophobic exploration of human behavior under duress.

1962: La Jetée 🇫🇷

Chris Marker's short film tells the story of a man from the future sent through time to find a solution for humanity's survival after World War III. Told through still images, it's a meditation on memory and fate. It had a unique narrative style and had a profound influence on later films like 12 Monkeys. 

1962: Panic in the Year Zero! 🇺🇸

Ray Milland directs and stars in this film where a family seeks refuge in the countryside following a nuclear attack on Los Angeles, facing challenges to their morality and survival instincts.

1962: Dr. No 🇬🇧

Terence Young directs this first-ever James Bond film, starring Sean Connery as 007, based on Ian Fleming’s novel.

Bond travels to Jamaica to investigate a missing agent and uncovers Dr. No, a SPECTRE scientist using nuclear-powered tech to disrupt U.S. rockets. Though rooted in espionage, its sci-fi overtones — including a radioactive island base — warrant its place on the fringes of the genre. 

1963: The Mind Benders 🇬🇧

Basil Dearden directs this cerebral, psychological sci-fi film about altered states and loyalty, where a scientist is investigated for treason which leads to his suicide. However, his former colleague believes that the scientist's sensory-deprivation experiments may have led to all his problems. He volunteers to undergo the same tests. 

Direct predecessor of 1980's Altered States.

1963: Mechte Navstrechu (Towards the Dream) ☭

Directed by Mikhail Karyukov and Otar Koberidze. Earthlings were excited by the news of an approaching cosmic body of clearly artificial origin. However, the small ball that fell into the ocean turned out to be a capsule containing the logbook of an alien starship which was heading to Earth but was forced to make an emergency landing on Mars .

To help the aliens, the interstellar ships are launched from Earth.

1963: Ikarie XB-1 🇨🇿

Jindřich Polák directs this film set in the year 2163. The starship Ikarie XB-1 is sent to Alpha Centauri to explore a mysterious "White Planet". Travelling at near-light speed, the journey takes 28 months for the astronauts, but 15 years for Earth, due to relativity. During the flight, the 40-strong multinational crew must adjust to life in space while dealing with various hazards. Eventually the whole crew falls asleep to be awakened at the end of their journey, if they .

1963: The Day of the Triffids 🇬🇧

Steve Sekely's film depicts a meteor shower blinding most of humanity, allowing carnivorous plants called Triffids to prey on the survivors. A classic tale of ecological horror.

1963: Unearthly Stranger 🇬🇧

John Krish's film features a scientist who fears for his life after his predecessor dies mysteriously while working on mind-powered spaceflight. His strange wife Julie is revealed to be an alien sent to kill him, but she vanishes after falling in love. As he warns the world of an alien conspiracy, more extraterrestrial women emerge, signaling a chilling invasion.

1964: Robinson Crusoe on Mars 🇺🇸

Byron Haskin's film is a sci-fi retelling of the classic novel, where a lone astronaut survives on Mars after a crash, eventually helping a fugitive alien escape slavery. A survival story with themes of humanism and freedom. 

1964: The Last Man on Earth 🇺🇸

Ubaldo Ragona and Sidney Salkow direct this adaptation of Richard Matheson's novel, where a plague turns humans into vampiric creatures, and a lone survivor struggles with isolation and the hope of finding others.

1964: The Flesh Eaters 🇺🇸

Jack Curtis directs this low-budget horror/sci-fi thriller where a group stranded on an island encounters a scientist and microscopic creatures that consume flesh. Known for its graphic violence. 

1964: Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb 🇺🇸 🇬🇧

Stanley Kubrick directs this razor-sharp satire starring Peter Sellers in multiple roles.

A paranoid U.S. general launches a nuclear strike on the Soviet Union, triggering a darkly comedic chain of events. With its doomsday devices, war room antics, and chilling plausibility, it’s speculative sci-fi at its most biting and cerebral.

1964: First Men in the Moon 🇬🇧

Nathan Juran directs this adaptation of H.G. Wells' novel, where a Victorian-era expedition to the Moon discovers a subterranean alien civilization. In this version UN astronauts land on the Moon in 1964, only to find evidence of a British expedition from 1899. Arnold Bedford, an elderly man in England, recounts how he and inventor Joseph Cavor traveled there using anti-gravity material and what they discovered.

1964: The Time Travelers 🇺🇸

Ib Melchior's film follows scientists who accidentally open a time portal to a post-apocalyptic future. They find refuge in an underground city, where survivors plan an escape to Alpha Centauri. As hostile mutants attack, they rebuild the portal and return to their era, only to face a new time dilemma, forcing them towards an unknown future.

1965: Alphaville 🇫🇷

Jean-Luc Godard's film features a secret agent entering a dystopian city controlled by a sentient computer, challenging the suppression of emotion and individuality. A fusion of noir and science fiction. Highly esoteric.

1965: The 10th Victim 🇮🇹

Elio Petri's film is set in a future society where murder is legalized as a form of entertainment, and two participants in the deadly game develop unexpected feelings. A satirical look at media and violence.

1965: Planet of the Vampires 🇮🇹

Mario Bava directs this film where spaceship crews investigate a mysterious planet, facing possession by alien entities. Noted for its atmospheric visuals and influence on later sci-fi horror films.

1965: Luna (Moon) ☭

The first part of the film is more of a documentary about the, then, latest achievements of scientists in the field of lunar exploration. The second part of the film is science fiction in as much that it shows how the Moon would be developed by people in the near future.

1965: Dr. Who and the Daleks 🇬🇧

Gordon Flemyng directs this adaptation of the popular British TV series, featuring the Doctor's battle against the Daleks on the planet Skaro. Introduced the iconic villains to a wider audience.

1965: Frankenstein vs. Baragon 🇯🇵 🇺🇸

Released in USA in 1966 as Frankenstein Conquers the World, this kaiju genre film was directed by the famous Ishirō Honda, and was a collaboration between the Japanese Toho Co. Ltd and Henry G. Saperstein.

During WWII the Nazis send Frankenstein's monster's heart to Hiroshima. Many years after the nuclear bomb destroys Hiroshima, a feral boy catches the attention of a scientist.

1966: Wild Wild Planet 🇮🇹

I Criminali della Galassia in Italian, this bizarre but interesting film was directed by Anthony Dawson.

Set in the year 2015 on a space station (HA!), the film was one of the earliest examples of taking the Frankenstein premise to the future in the form of mad scientist with a eugenics program!

1966: Women of the Prehistoric Planet 🇺🇸

In this sci-fi adventure, directed by Arthur Pierce, an interstellar crew rescues Centaurians after their planet’s destruction. A hijacked ship crashes on a prehistoric world, leaving its survivors to face dangerous creatures. When rescuers arrive, they find the descendants of the original crew. A romance blossoms, but fate strands two lovers on a primitive world—revealed in the finale to be Earth.

1966: I diafanoidi vengono da Marte (War of the Planets) 🇮🇹

Antonio Margheriti's film, which literally translates to The Diaphanoids Come From Mars, is set in mid-21st century. A space station mysteriously vanishes after encountering glowing energy beings. As the creatures seize more stations and surround Earth, a Commander uncovers their origin—aliens seeking human hosts. A battle ensues.

1966: Fantastic Voyage 🇺🇸

Richard Fleischer's film involves a team being miniaturized and injected into a scientist's body to perform delicate surgery from within. A journey through the human body with groundbreaking effects. (The 1987 film Innerspace follows a similar plotline, this time concerning a test pilot being miniaturized and injected into a store clerk, although accidentally.)

1966: Fahrenheit 451 🇬🇧

François Truffaut's adaptation of Ray Bradbury's novel depicts a future where books are banned, and a fireman tasked with burning them begins to question his role and seeks knowledge.

This story, while shocking and unthinkable when it first came out, seems to be somewhat prescient in these days when facts are burned at the altar of power!

1966: Cyborg 2087 🇺🇸

This low-budget film directed by Franklin Adreon is definitely worth mentioning being one of the obvious inspirations for one of the most popular scifi movies of the 80's, Terminator. 

In 2087, free thought is illegal and the population is controlled by governments. A small band of free thinkers sends Garth A7, a cyborg, back in time to 1966 to prevent Professor Sigmund Marx from revealing his new discovery.

1966: Destination Inner Space 🇺🇸

Francis D. Lyon directs this film where a research team discovers an alien spacecraft underwater, leading to encounters with a hostile extraterrestrial creature. A blend of sci-fi and horror elements.

Tidbit: James Hong in a supporting role :-)

1966: Thunderbirds Are Go 🇬🇧

David Lane's film, based on the television series, features the International Rescue team facing sabotage during a mission to Mars. Features marionette puppetry and futuristic vehicles.

1967: Quatermass and the Pit 🇬🇧

Roy Ward Baker directs this 3rd Quatermass film where excavation in London uncovers an alien spacecraft, leading to revelations about humanity's origins and latent psychic powers. A mix of science fiction and horror

1967: They Came from Beyond Space 🇬🇧

Directed by Freddie Francis, this British sci-fi thriller is based on Joseph Millard’s novel The Gods Hate Kansas.

A meteor shower brings an alien virus that takes control of scientists in rural England. One man resists, thanks to a steel plate in his head. A low-budget classic.

1967: You Only Live Twice 🇬🇧

Directed by Lewis Gilbert, this fifth Bond film sends 007 to Japan to stop a series of mysterious spacecraft disappearances.

SPECTRE is hijacking space capsules using a custom-built spaceship from a hidden base inside a volcano. With futuristic tech, space-race paranoia, and Cold War tensions, it straddles spy thriller and full-blown sci-fi adventure.

1967: The Terrornauts 🇬🇧

Montgomery Tully helms this Amicus Productions venture, adapted from Murray Leinster’s novel The Wailing Asteroid.

Residents of a radio telescope laboratory are kidnapped when they answer a mysterious signal from outer space. They are taken to a satellite inhabited only by robots, from where they are to defend Earth from an interstellar threat. 

1967: Ego Zvali Robert (We called him Robert) ☭

In his second film, Ilya Olshvanger directs a story about a scientist who creates an advanced humanoid robot, Robert, for deep-space exploration. To test its humanity, it is sent on a date but unexpectedly falls in love with the girl. Taking orders literally, Robert causes chaos leading to  misunderstandings. Scientists conclude that robots are unfit for unpredictable events and that only a human can undertake deep-space missions.

1967: Tumannost Andromedy (The Andromeda Cloud) ☭

Evgeniy Sherstobitov directs this film set in a distant future. A young man takes his oath of adulthood under the guidance of his mentor, recalling past expeditions. Meanwhile, a spaceship encounters a mysterious star, forcing emergency landing on a planet near the star and discovers an ancient alien spacecraft. Meanwhile Earth scientists work on revolutionary technology to bridge the vast distances between civilizations.

1967: Night of the Big Heat 🇬🇧

Terence Fisher directs this blend of mystery and science fiction set on a remote British island.

As the temperature rises inexplicably, residents discover it’s not just the weather — alien beings are behind the heatwave. A slow burn, but with an eerie mood and Christopher Lee and Peter Cushing to anchor it.

1967: Privilege 🇬🇧

Directed by Peter Watkins, this dystopian satire stars Paul Jones and Jean Shrimpton.

In a future Britain, a pop star is used by the government to control the population through music and celebrity worship. Not traditional sci-fi with spaceships, but a bold political allegory still discussed today.

1967: ...4 ...3 ...2 ...1 ...Morte (Mission Stardust) 🇮🇹

Primo Zeglio's film about a Moon mission seeking a powerful radioactive material. However the crew discovers a stranded alien spaceship and an ailing scientist. They travel to Earth for medical help, but a crime lord manipulates the mission, kidnapping the alien Commander to steal the alient technology. 

1968: Barbarella 🇺🇸

Roger Vadim directs this campy classic. Space adventurer Barbarella is sent to the inventor of a deadly weapon, but crash-lands on a planet. She navigates bizarre encounters, including a blind angel, a decadent city ruled by the Black Queen, and a plot involving living energy powered by evil thoughts. After surviving a deadly 'machine', she discovers the inventor’s true ambitions and a rebellion ensues.