Telepathic dogs, eerily topical pandemics, mass infertility. When it comes to zombies, disease, or mass extinction, these films are the cream of the crop.
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00:00Telepathic dogs, eerily topical pandemics, mass infertility — when it comes to zombies,
00:06disease, or mass extinction, these films are the cream of the crop.
00:11Apocalyptic films are teeming with The Walking Dead nuclear threats and catastrophic plagues,
00:16but only one film on this list sees the world sizzle to a crisp thanks to dragons. Set in the
00:22totally not-apocalyptic year of 2020, where dragons have replaced mankind as the dominant species,
00:29the paltry remnants of the human race must work together to ensure their survival.
00:34Maligned upon its release and criminally underseen,
00:37Reign of Fire is much more interesting, visually stunning, and sophisticated than
00:42its goofy premise suggests. With an all-star cast and some genuinely jaw-dropping creature effects,
00:48it's a must-watch for anyone who wants to see the world burn.
00:53This loose adaptation of Richard Matheson's classic novel follows scientist Robert Neville,
00:57who is, as far as he can tell, one of the last human beings on Earth.
01:01Thanks to an attempt to cure cancer that mutated into a deadly virus,
01:05most humans have become pallid, vampiric creatures. Balancing mind-numbing loneliness
01:11with his attempts to survive and develop a cure, Neville soon finds that he is far
01:16less alone than he initially suspected. Grounded by a heartfelt performance by Will Smith and
01:21featuring more action than the vast majority of films on this list, I Am Legend is a punchy,
01:26big-budget take on an apocalyptic urtext.
01:30"...please say hello to me."
01:33This film tells of a uniquely terrifying plague which only attacks strains of grasses and grains,
01:39including wheat and rice. In the wake of this catastrophe, the world descends into famine and,
01:44consequently, chaos. We follow an upper-middle-class architect named John,
01:48who becomes the de facto patriarch of a group of family, friends, and stragglers as they make
01:53their way to the safe haven of his brother's farm. Pay no attention to the film's middling
01:57Rotten Tomatoes score. What No Blade of Grass lacks in polish and a finer touch,
02:03it more than makes up for in grim, stifling ecological terror. Enduringly relevant and
02:09dystopian, No Blade of Grass is an essential watch for anyone with a taste for the dreary,
02:15hopeless outlook of 1970s science fiction.
02:18Ralph Burton is a miner who's trapped underground while a nuclear holocaust wipes out all of
02:23humanity. Emerging to find New York City deserted, Ralph assumes he's the last man on Earth and
02:28starts acting like it. Eventually, Ralph meets Sarah, a fellow survivor. However, their dynamic
02:34is soon disturbed by the arrival of another survivor. Starring the trailblazing screen star
02:39and activist Harry Belafonte, The World, the Flesh, and the Devil feels like a lost Twilight
02:44Zone episode filtered through the lens of Richard Matheson, tackling its societal themes head-on
02:49and highlighting Belafonte's undeniable screen presence. This film is an unmissable and decidedly
02:55more optimistic entry in apocalyptic cinema.
02:59Sunshine dramatizes a horrific, world-ending scenario. The sun is dying. As the planet is
03:05thrust into colder and colder temperatures, a team of crack astronauts are sent to kickstart
03:10the all-important star by firing a nuclear bomb into its core. Full of incredible visuals and
03:16shocking horror beats, particularly in the third act, Sunshine is an enthralling and atmospheric
03:21slice of science fiction with stakes that don't just threaten humanity, but our whole solar system.
03:27This sci-fi survival horror film and Cloverfield sequel follows Michelle,
03:32a young woman who wakes up in an underground bunker after a violent roadside accident.
03:37Unsettled by her domineering captor Howard, who claims the air outside is toxic and
03:42she cannot leave under any circumstances, resourceful Michelle sets about plotting her escape.
03:47Please just let me go, please. There's nowhere to go, Michelle.
03:52This economically paced and wildly tense single-location thriller boasts numerous
03:58top-shelf performances and a claustrophobic sense of unease. If the world ended,
04:03and you were trapped underground with an overbearing psycho, what would you do?
04:08From its title, you'd be forgiven for mistaking this film for some kind of adorable seaside
04:13romantic comedy. It is, in fact, about an atomic war that wipes out all organic life
04:18in the Northern Hemisphere. A surviving Yankee submarine finds respite in Australia,
04:23which appears to be one of the few safe harbors on Earth. Where many films on this list veer into
04:28action or hard sci-fi territory, On the Beach opts for melodrama. Sure, there's still plenty
04:34of nihilism and social commentary, but on the whole, it feels much more like an existential
04:38soap opera than an explosion-heavy thriller. On the Beach pulls this off by featuring a powerful
04:43ensemble cast full of big-name talent. Adapted from the 1962 French film La Jetée, 12 Monkeys
04:50follows James Cole, a convict from the year 2035 sent through time to find a solution to
04:55the world's dark fate. In 1996, a deadly virus of unknown origin eradicated almost all life on Earth,
05:02forcing those who survived underground. The plan is to send Cole back to the day of the
05:07outbreak to learn how it all went down, but when he's accidentally transported too far back,
05:12his warnings of the end of days land him in a mental hospital. Boasting evocative
05:16production design and expectations-subverting performances from its two male leads,
05:2112 Monkeys is a frantic, doom-filled ride with both style and substance.
05:27A Boy and His Dog takes place in the barren, irradiated wastes of 2024. Our hero is Vic,
05:34a morally suspect teenage boy who wanders from one bombed-out hole in the ground to the next
05:39in search of food and women. Along for the ride is Blood, a telepathic dog full of wry commentary.
05:46"'Charity' is a thing of the past."
05:47This film is bleak, perverse, and offbeat — aka the Holy Trinity of 1970s apocalyptic science
05:54fiction. If you shook your fists at those who held super-spreader house parties during the
05:59COVID-19 pandemic, boy, have we got a film for you. A top-shelf product of Roger Corman and
06:05Vincent Price's yen for Edgar Allan Poe adaptations, The Mask of the Red Death follows Prince
06:10Prospero, a hedonistic Satanist who has resolved to lock himself and his party guests in his
06:16enormous castle to stave off the terrible plague known as the Red Death. Full of cruelty,
06:22scene-chewing, and gorgeous production design realized in jaw-dropping technicolor,
06:28The Mask of the Red Death is a lavish visual feast of gothic delights that overcomes its
06:33budgetary limitations to deliver one of the most striking products of Corman's career.
06:38When animal rights activists unwittingly release a rabies-like virus onto the British public,
06:44the country is catapulted back to the Dark Ages. Four weeks later, a man named Jim wakes up from
06:50a coma and surveys the wreckage of what used to be London. Rescued by a group of survivors,
06:55Jim finds that infected humans now stalk the streets, transformed to frothing homicidal
07:00maniacs. Infusing the zombie genre with kinetic new life, 28 Days Later proved the zombie genre
07:06still had life in it yet. In the aftermath of a top-secret experiment designed to create a
07:12global energy source, a scientist named Zach Hobson awakens to find that he is the last
07:17person alive on Earth — or so he thinks. Soon, Hobson happens upon two other survivors.
07:22As the trio discovers the common cause behind their survival, their emerging love triangle
07:27takes a backseat to Hobson's revelation that the full extent of the experiment's pernicious
07:31effects have yet to reveal themselves. Overwhelmingly cryptic and appropriately
07:36lonely, The Quiet Earth is a gorgeously photographed, low-budget gem grounded by
07:40three soul-wrenching lead performances. Boasting an incredible ensemble cast and an unsettling
07:47degree of plausibility, Contagion details the arrival and fallout of an airborne viral pandemic.
07:52This film's procedural plot makes the spread that much more compelling and terrifying.
07:57We follow the illness as it takes root, spawns conspiracy theories, and destabilizes society.
08:03Contagion makes particularly major use of Soderbergh's talent for depicting catastrophes
08:08and hyper-competence in equal measure. This film was a nerve-wracking watch in 2011,
08:13and has only become more uncanny and unsettling in the wake of the eerily similar COVID-19 pandemic.
08:20This iconic film may not initially read as apocalyptic fission, but brace yourself
08:25for a 60-year-old spoiler. When the plot's larger context is ultimately revealed,
08:30its qualification as end-of-day cinema becomes painfully, ironically obvious.
08:36This film follows George Taylor, an astronaut stranded on a strange planet dominated by
08:41sentient ape-like creatures who use human captives for sport and scientific experiments.
08:46Take your stinking paws off me, you damn dirty ape!
08:52Still one of the bleakest films to come out of Hollywood, Planet of the Apes features a
08:56grounded performance by Roddy McDowall as the benevolent chimp Dr. Cornelius,
09:00and closes with one of the most infamous final shots in all of cinema.
09:04When Curtis begins to experience terrifying hallucinations, he seeks medical help and
09:10counseling. While Curtis' work and family suffer in the wake of his violent outbursts and
09:14horrifying visions of environmental catastrophe, he can't shake the feeling that something truly
09:19terrible is on the horizon. Are these dreams a genuine premonition of an incoming apocalypse,
09:24or are they actually the onset of the inherited schizophrenia he's feared his whole life?
09:30A genuinely gripping portrait of the erosive effects of undiagnosed mental illness,
09:35Take Shelter is a gripping, anxiety-riddled viewing experience
09:38grounded by a gut-wrenching lead performance from Michael Shannon.
09:43Just as Harry is preparing to go on his first date with his dream girl,
09:46he accidentally receives a chilling tip-off that nuclear missiles are going to destroy Los Angeles
09:52in less than an hour. While Harry initially laughs off the information as a cruel joke or
09:56the ravings of a madman, he soon learns that the threat is very real and very imminent.
10:01Balancing endearingly unrelenting romantic idealism with an undeniable sense of hopelessness,
10:06this tangerine-dream-scored, neon-lit terror trip is a love story for the end times.
10:13This genre-defying feature debut follows Biangu, an unemployed conspiracy nut who has convinced
10:19himself that his former employer is an evil alien who intends to take over the planet.
10:24As such, Biangu abducts his boss and tortures him in a subterranean dungeon.
10:28As his paranoia spreads and his alien torture operation grows larger and larger,
10:34the resultant chaos grows ever more intense. Genre-defying and delightfully ridiculous,
10:41there is no film quite like Save the Green Planet, and for that fact alone,
10:46it's well worth seeking out.
10:48Directed by the Australian auteur Peter Weir, The Last Wave follows David Burton,
10:53a taxation lawyer who is hired to act as the defense in a murder case involving the
10:58death of an aboriginal man during a freak rainstorm. When Burton begins to experience
11:02bizarre, watery dreams, he starts to agree with the accused. The strange weather patterns are a
11:09sign of an incoming apocalypse. Ambiguous and lyrical, The Last Wave is steeped in
11:14otherworldly strangeness as reality refuses to sit still.
11:19History may remember Saul Bass for his graphic design, but fans of apocalyptic fiction know
11:24his first and only directorial effort stands toe-to-toe with the kinetic typography of Psycho.
11:29A pair of scientific researchers in the Arizona desert find themselves held captive by the objects
11:35of their study, a colony of ants who have begun acting strangely in the wake of an unprecedented
11:40cosmic event. As the global implications of their ant-imposed lockdown take hold,
11:46driving the pair to nihilism and madness, humankind reveals itself to be an outmatched
11:51and overconfident species. Misanthropic and enormous in its scale,
11:55Phase 4 takes the creature-feature formula and endows it with a desperate sense of fatalism.
12:02When a pair of employees at a medical supply warehouse accidentally
12:05unleash a deadly gas, the malignant vapors begin to raise the dead.
12:10What's more, the warehouse neighbors are a cemetery and a crematorium. In short,
12:14this is a recipe for disaster. As the dead wrench themselves back into the land of the living,
12:20they only have one thing on their minds.
12:26One of the most confident directorial debuts in horror history,
12:29The Return of the Living Dead is a rare breed, a horror comedy that truly delivers on the horror,
12:35both in the gore department and in confronting the existential probability that mankind is
12:40going to pratfall into its own destruction. A seance unleashes a horrifying glimpse of a
12:46long-dead priest and seemingly kills the woman who experiences the vision.
12:50While other cult-leaning women attempt to warn the powers-that-be of the bad vibes,
12:55the seer herself, who is very much alive, is rescued from her grave by a passing journalist.
13:00Together, the pair digs deeper into the vision, uncovering an imminent prophecy of undead
13:05invasion. Arguably one of the gnarliest offerings from Italian gore master Lucio Fulci, City of the
13:13Living Dead boasts unparalleled style and a refusal to dial down any of its apocalyptic
13:18spectacle. The final product is a miraculous and foreboding piece of filmmaking.
13:23Based on Michael Crichton's 1969 novel, The Andromeda Strain begins with a mysterious
13:28catastrophe. The residents of a rural New Mexico town all die after the crash landing of a satellite.
13:34The only survivors are an alcoholic man and a screaming infant. Suspecting the satellite may
13:40have brought a vicious alien organism into Earth's atmosphere, a group of scientists conduct
13:46an investigation in a top-secret lab armed to self-destruct if any infectious agent threatens
13:51to escape. Featuring science fiction harder than a diamond, with a procedural bent that will satisfy
13:57those with a love of 1970s conspiracy thrillers, The Andromeda Strain is the cruel pinnacle of
14:03the killer virus subgenre. Few end-of-day scenarios can contend with the literally
14:09Earth-shattering catastrophe that befell our planet roughly 66 million years ago.
14:13Directed by Don Bluth, the former Disney artist who dominated children's feature animation during
14:18the 1980s, The Land Before Time tells of a group of young dinosaurs who are separated from their
14:24families during unprecedented environmental shifts. As they journey through the wasteland,
14:29the group is hounded by predators and a planet keen to snuff out their young lives.
14:34As dire, ominous, and distressing as any of the adult films on this list, The Land Before Time
14:40is a masterful story of perseverance, devastation, and the difficult necessity of accepting loss.
14:46Even though it's supposed to be the happiest day of her life, Justine is absolutely miserable
14:52throughout her wedding. She's doing her best, but her severe depression shows through the cracks,
14:57much to the embarrassment of her controlling sister, Claire. Meanwhile, an immense blue
15:02planet, Melancholia, is on a collision course with Earth. As the gargantuan celestial object
15:08bears down on our planet, Justine finds elation and peace in the promise of imminent destruction.
15:14Claire, on the other hand, descends further and further into anxiety and panic as her
15:20helplessness gets the better of her. Weaponizing cataclysmic destruction as a metaphor for all
15:25consuming depressive episodes, Melancholia is a masterful, engulfing, necessarily draining watch.
15:33The year is 2027, and humanity has become sterile. As extinction looms, the planet's
15:38populace descends into martial law and total fury. We follow Theo, a former activist who
15:44is recruited by his anti-authority ex-wife to shepherd a very special woman to sanctuary.
15:49No human baby has been born in nearly 20 years, and yet somehow this woman is pregnant. With a
15:55startlingly believable vision of dystopia grounded in impeccably detailed production design and
16:01unforgettable cinematography, Children of Men isn't just one of the best pieces of apocalyptic fiction,
16:06but one of the greatest sci-fi films of the 21st century.
16:11Aliens have invaded Earth, and not as little green men, but as microscopic gelatinous spores
16:17capable of imitating and dissimulating into the populace of prospective victims. Our hero is
16:22Matthew Bennell, a lab scientist who begins to grow wise to the extraterrestrial conspiracy
16:27as the signs of subversive takeover peek through the cracks. The question is, will he be able to
16:33alert the powers that be before it's too late? Who can he confide in when the enemy looks like
16:38a carbon copy of the people he trusts? For our money, it's the fourth entry in the Mad Max
16:43franchise that takes the cake, or more accurately, the can of beans, or the barrel of guzzoline.
16:50In all honesty, there's probably no cake to be found in this apocalypse, but
16:55Mad Max Fury Road is a cut above its predecessors. A feature-length car chase led by a rebellious
17:01imperator attempting to shepherd a warlord's brides to a safe haven, this film is a kinetic
17:06rock opera of dust clouds, skull-embedded wheels, and dogged perseverance. A modern classic with a
17:13wasteland we are keen to revisit time and time again, Mad Max Fury Road is the shiny,
17:19chromatic star of modern apocalyptic cinema.
17:22"...they're coming to get you, Barbara."
17:25For reasons unknown, though radiation from a disintegrating space probe may be to blame,
17:31the dead are rising from their graves. A group of survivors fleeing the rotting hordes find
17:35themselves under one roof, where they're forced to steady their fragile nerves and
17:40work together to keep the flesh-hungry ghouls at bay. A groundbreaking, precedent-setting
17:45contribution to the apocalyptic genre, Night of the Living Dead set the stage for a litany of
17:50zombie films keenly interested in the human response to the end of days. Even more than
17:5550 years past its initial release, Night of the Living Dead refuses to show its age.
18:02The stir-crazy residents of an Antarctic research station find themselves in a Lovecraftian
18:08nightmare when the dog they rescued explodes into a fleshy mass of spider legs and bullwhip
18:13tentacles. This high-stakes murder mystery is less of a whodunit than a who-is-it, which unfolds as
18:20the men are preyed upon by an intergalactic creature capable of imitating organic life.
18:26The gem in the crown of John Carpenter's Apocalypse trilogy, which also contains the
18:30exceptional Prince of Darkness and In the Mouth of Madness, The Thing is a dread-drenched epic.
18:37This is the way the world ends — not with a bang, but with miscommunication and politicians
18:43fighting in the war room. However, there is also a bang for good measure. Simultaneously,
18:47one of the scariest and funniest films ever made, Stanley Kubrick's satirical masterpiece focuses
18:53on a gaggle of politicians, generals, and diplomats attempting to thwart an unintended
18:58nuclear holocaust instigated by an American general maddened by conspiracy theories.
19:03Horrifyingly plausible and undeniably hilarious, Dr. Strangelove is a classic for a reason.
19:10A Guide, known as a stalker in the film, shepherds two curious men through a bizarre area known as
19:16The Zone. Mysterious and forbidden, The Zone is a physics-defying land at the epicenter of an
19:23unspeakable extraterrestrial tragedy. In the core of The Zone lies their destination,
19:28The Room, a mystical space that seems to grant the deepest, darkest wishes of all who enter it.
19:35Directed by the great Soviet filmmaker Andrei Tarkovsky,
19:38Stalker is an evasive yet evocative take on science fiction's deepest questions.