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Not much action in this one, but gosh, when that spaceship landed and that 7-foot giant robot, Gort, emerged, I was absolutely awestruck as a kid. Still am—especially when Gort, in self-defense, begins melting everything in sight with his deadly eye-laser beam. That's the thing about this movie: They weren't hostile aliens, until we trigger-happy Earthlings forced their hand—er, metallic appendages, or whatever. The irony is that Klaatu, the human-looking spaceman who arrives with Gort, has come to warn humans that much of our earthly violence stems from our irrational fears—and when we start shooting at Gort, his point is proven. (One of our movie critics, Todd Hertz, also thinks Gort is one bad dude; read more in his list of the Top 10 Movie Robots of All Time.)

Long before 2004's ridiculous AVP (Alien vs. Predator), we had the original Predator movie. And long before he had any notions of becoming the governor of California, Arnold Schwarzenegger was doing what any good Austrian-turned-American-bodybuilder-turned-action-hero should do: Kick alien hide. And in this case, it was quite a remarkable hide. The fearsome creature had a jammin' Rasta doo and some pretty funky weapons, but his skin—typically reptilian in appearance—had an amazing property: He could turn invisible. If you looked hard enough, you could see him moving, bending the light rays just so, making for a way-cool special effect. The first time I saw this gruesome flick, I was pretty spooked.

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Both versions (technically, the original's title is The Thing from Another World) are worth noting, for entirely different reasons. The original includes some memorable, though sometimes campy, roles, especially the creepy Dr. Carrington (Robert Cornthwaite), who might just be scarier than the alien itself. Speaking of the alien, he's played by none other than James Arness, who just a few years later would be world famous as Marshal Matt Dillon in TV's Gunsmoke. John Carpenter's 1982 remake, starring Kurt Russell, is absolutely terrifying, featuring a shape-shifting alien that can mimic the look of anyone it comes in contact with—OK, anyone it eats. Carpenter's brilliant special effects carry the show, but the script ain't bad either, as it reads almost like a whodunit—which of the guys is The Thing now?

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We all know somebody slightly off-base, somebody who makes you want to ask, Just what planet ARE you from, anyway? We've all wondered, ARE there aliens among us? This movie takes that idea and runs with it. The film's main character, Dr. Miles Bennell, learns that some of his patients are having paranoid delusions that their friends or relatives are impostors. Bennell eventually believes that something weird is indeed afoot, and he seeks to get to the, ahem, root of the problem—which turns out to be these indestructible plant pods that can turn into human clones. Despite the fact that this movie has no monsters, minimal special effects, and little violence, it's a tense horror flick all the way. Culture analysts have speculated about its political agenda: Was it about the fear and loathing of Communists? The mass hysteria of McCarthyism? The spread of germ warfare? The numbing of our minds through comformity? Whatever the underlying message, it's a thriller that'll keep you on edge—and maybe make you take a second, and third, look at that slightly strange neighbor. Is he one of THEM? 

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The new version releasing this week will be hard-pressed to top the original, which gave me nightmares as a kid. I'll never forget those Martian spacecraft, their high-pitched engines and their lethal heat rays, blasting everything in their path—including entire military battalions. Who could save us? Perhaps only God? God certainly came into play in this version. Near the end of the movie, the protagonist, Dr. Clayton Forrester, on the run from the Martians, stumbles into a church to hear the preacher praying: "O Lord, deliver us from the fear which has come upon us—from the evil that draws ever nearer—from the terror that will soon knock upon the very door of this, Thy house. O Lord, we pray Thee, grant us the miracle of Thy divine intervention." The whole time, the Martians are closing in. It's intense—and it's cool to see how God does ultimately intervene.

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