Those let down by Joel Edgerton‘s The Gift were probably expecting another movie entirely. While the movie is totally terrifying and will make you leap ten feet off of your seat at least once, this is not the trashy slasher flick the movie’s trailer and marketing would have you believe. It’s much better than that: The Gift is a stalker suspense-thriller with a wicked edge, a thematically rich tale of revenge and domination that engages the mind as it gives you the willies. In short, this movie is legit as hell; pay no mind to the misleading TV spots and ridiculous, punny movie posters.

Edgerton, an Australian screen vet who’s also done his share of screenwriting, makes his directorial debut with The Gift, and it goes swimmingly. In addition to writing and directing, he also stars as Gordo, a socially awkward nerd type who wears ill-fitting pedophile attire. He knows Simon (Jason Bateman) from high school. Simon and his wife Robyn (Rebecca Hall) have just moved back to Simon’s hometown of Los Angeles from Chicago, and Gordo recognizes him at a department store. After a quick bit of uncomfortable small-talk, the couple find they’ve made a new friend as Gordo starts visiting their new home periodically, dropping off little presents for them as housewarming gifts, often when they aren’t home.

Gordo’s infiltration of Simon and Robyn’s life is a slow burn; it starts off as innocuously as Gordo joining them for dinner, but gradually gets out of hand as he starts popping up unexpectedly and peering through their windows. Simon’s creeped out by Gordo’s clingy behavior (though he seems to enjoy making fun of him a little too much), and as his patience grows thin and tensions rise between the old “friends,” Robyn starts to suspect that there’s more to their history than Simon’s letting on. As she slowly uncovers the truth about their past, she begins to realize Simon might not be the man she thought he was. Maybe that’s exactly what Gordo wants. Maybe not.

Like I eluded to before, Edgerton’s film doesn’t rack up a high kill count or even spill much blood. But the danger’s still there; in this story, the truth is sharper than any blade, deadlier than any elaborate Jigsaw contraption. Edgerton keeps the story’s big secret from us for a good long while, and when we finally learn the truth, he blindsides us with an even more devastating blow that’ll make your head spin. Without spoiling too much, I will say that the film bears a strong comparison to Alexandra’s Project, a 2003 psychological thriller from Australia by Rolf de Heer. If you’ve never seen it, give it a go; then you’ll catch my drift.

To talk about the movie’s primary theme would actually spoil a lot, so I’ll just say that Edgerton takes age-old ideas of male ego and explores them elegantly and thoughtfully. Marital trust and honesty colors the story as well, and Bateman and Hall cover all of these themes in one magnificently conceived kitchen scene, a scene that elevates the entire picture above what I could have ever expected. Bateman is brilliantly cast as Simon, a character whose layers get peeled back scene by scene in a steady cascade into madness. Hall and Edgerton are great too, but Bateman gets to flex muscles we rarely get to see in his typical comedic roles, and it’s a pleasant surprise. He’s got an interesting mean streak as an actor that I don’t think has been explored quite as well as Edgerton does here.

The visuals and sound design work in concert to create nail-biting suspense that doesn’t give you room to breathe. The fact that it’s a stalker story actually has an interesting effect on our experience cinematically, as we’re always scanning the frame for Gordo, constantly aware of the characters’ surroundings and the little bumps in the night (and day) that may or may not signal an impending attack. There’s one cheap scare in the whole movie, and it’s delightful. You see it coming from a mile away, but the filmmaking is so good that I guarantee at least a handful of people in the theater will drop their popcorn. This is as solid a debut as a director could hope for, and I eagerly anticipate what Edgerton will cook up next.

When you think sci-fi movies, you might think of the low, swirling drone of a lightsaber. You might think of a DeLorean barreling through a parking lot at 88mph and vanishing into thin air as it leaves a trail of fire in its wake. You might think of Sigourney Weaver going toe to toe with an Alien Queen in a badass power-loader. You might even think of “Khaaaaaaan!” or “I know Kung-Fu.”

We don’t. We’re Way…Too…sophisticated for that (buh-dum-psh!)

All joking aside, we love sci-fi movies of all shapes and sizes, including big-budget ones. The problem is, since the advent of CGI, it feels like it’s a requirement for every sci-fi film to cram a mind-numbing amount of digital effects into every frame. Transformers and the Star Wars prequels, for example, abuse CGI so egregiously that they feel like half-films. They’re hardly ‘filming’ anything and—more importantly—they’re missing the point.

Science fiction at its core is about exploring the dangers and consequences of abusing science. It’s about peering into another world and learning from it so as to better our own. It’s about sparking philosophical discussion—Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? It’s about scientific allegories, not data—‘the force’ is about faith, not ‘midi-chlorians.’

These ten films get it. Their directors have created incredible works of sci-fi, and they’ve achieved it without spending exorbitant amounts of cash on lasers and explosions and spaceships and frivolous bullshit. These films aren’t extravagant or shiny—they’re gritty, tethered to reality. Tethered to our reality. They tackle subjects like self-identity, discrimination, envy, and regret through the power of blow-your-freakin’-mind science.

Some might view a ‘low-budget’ as a disadvantage, but these filmmakers used their meager funds as a catalyst for innovation. These films are every bit as good as their bloated-budget brothers. They prove that Monsters we barely see can be just as fascinating as blue-skinned, long-limbed, cat-faced, Disney-eyed cartoon characters. No offense, Mr. Cameron. T2 was the shit. You don’t need expensive special effects and costumes to tell an amazing science fiction story—all you need is a great idea and the talent and imagination to represent it on screen. Without further ado, here are our Top 10 Indie Sci-fi Films.

Top 10 Indie Sci-fi Films

#10 – Akira

When people hear the word Anime most people run away. They are, unfortunately, missing out on some really exciting films. Akira is one such film. It’s easy to see where the film gets its influences from, but boy oh boy is it very good at showing them off. Akira is that film that has everything a Sci-Fi fan will love; absurdly high buildings, fast vehicles and loads of violence. I’ve seen the film countless times now and honestly I don’t know if I could tell what all actually happens in Akira, but what I will say is that this is one film that has to be seen to be believed. Akira features some of the best imagery in sci-fi for me and it’s all set to a pulsating score that drives the film into a final 30 minutes that will quite literally blow your mind. [Blake]

#9 – Another Earth

Another Earth is a fantastic indie sci-fi film about the discovery of a planet close to ours called Earth 2. However, instead of traveling down the path that most films would attempt to go, Another Earth wisely chooses not to exploit the concept and instead only explores the idea of a second chance in another life. The final scene in the film is one of the most shocking and eerie endings that I have seen in years. The film serves as a great reminder that it is possible to create a terrific sci-fi film without a ton of effects and a large budget. [Dustin]

#8 – Primer

Shane Carruth is a name that is being circulated at high speed this last year due to his recent Sundance success Upstream Color. Primer is the prime example of how to make an independent film with little to no budget– it was so perfect in its visual storytelling that the dialogue did not have to play a key part but just added to the aesthetic and the illusion of two men hooked on physics that happen to accidently create a time machine. Primer is a very intense and an incredibly well put together intellectual indie sci-fi. [Amy]

#7 – Being John Malkovich

It may come as a bit of a shock that Being John Malkovich could be considered an “indie” film based on it’s commercial success and big named cast list, but the film was made for just thirteen million dollars and despite being nominated for the huge award shows such as the Oscars and Golden Globes, the film also qualified for the Independent Spirit Awards that year. This wild fantasy science fiction film was all about getting into someone’s head, literally. Being John Malkovich is fun mind-trip adventure that is completely original. [Dustin]

#6 – Stalker

Stalker is a brilliant Sci-Fi film almost for one simple reason. It’s aesthetics. It features no ray guns, no flying cars or any massive skyscrapers tickling the feet of clouds. No teleportation machines, no androids or cool gadgets. Stalker works purely on the way Andrey Tarkovskiy chooses to show you his story. The film is simple tale of a man (a stalker) who is tasked with taking two men to The Zone, a forbidden land where a room exists that grants wishes. The film is essentially two and a half hours of men walking slowly through wastelands of a forgotten world, philosophizing about life and its meaning. But it’s Tarkovskiy’s direction that dazzles us. Featuring long takes and extreme close ups to show a life ravaged by the evil of humanity, Tarkovskiy hypnotizes his audience into a maddening and yet, very fulfilling journey into the soul of men. [Blake]

#5 – Brazil

Terry Gilliam’s Brazil provides a cautionary, paranoid glimpse into a future where the technology we birthed with our own hands begins to swallow us whole. Gilliam shows us thick jungles of wire and tubing spilling into an apartment like spaghetti. We see an old lady so obsessed with recapturing her former beauty that she hires people to pull the skin on her face back so hard that it stretches like silly putty, ready to rip. Though rife with techno-horror, Gilliam finds room to inject his signature sense of whimsy, surrealism, and adventure as well. Few cinematic minds are as imaginative and eccentric as Gilliam’s, and Brazil is his magnum opus. [Bernard]

#4 – Cube

Six strangers wake up in a cube shaped room, with a door on each side leading to another room exactly like it. As they try to find a way out of the seemingly endless series of rooms (some of which are booby trapped to kill whoever enters them), tensions begin to rise until finding a way out is the least of their concerns. The best part about Cube, other than its ingenious concept, is how well it maintains the mystery of what exactly the cube is. With a budget of less than $400,000 (the entire film was shot within one cube ‘room’), Cube has more excitement and smarts than most sci-fi blockbusters from the last decade combined. A quick tip for anyone willing to give Cube a try: Pretend the film’s two sequels don’t exist. It’ll save you plenty of time. [CJ]

#3 – Moon

Rarely does a sci-fi movie allow for an Oscar-worthy performance from an actor, but Moon is outstanding entirely because of Sam Rockwell, who is the only actor onscreen for about 95% of the film. Sam Bell (Sam Rockwell) is the sole worker for Lunar Industries’ Moon-based mining site. Sam is in his last two weeks of a three-year assignment before returning to Earth, where his wife and child wait. In a routine trip out to the mining site, Sam is distracted by one of the recent hallucinations he’s been having and ends up unconscious. When he wakes, he’s back in the base unable to quite explain how. But it’s when he finds an identical version of himself out on the surface that Sam’s reality starts to bend and shift, slowly building to an exciting conclusion. The benefit of low-budget sci-fi is that bells and whistles are beyond the means of the production, and the simplicity of Moon is what really sells it. The quiet moon-base and Sam’s interaction with GERTY, his AI companion (voiced in dulcet tones by Kevin Spacey), who uses cartoony emoticon-style expressions, only mocks Sam’s growing paranoia as he unravels a disturbing mystery. Perfectly performed, Moon is a rare slow-building but psychologically thrilling sci-fi gem. [Ananda]

#2 – Timecrimes

A man notices a naked woman in the woods behind his home, and his decision to take a closer look leads him down a path involving time travel and masked murderers. Director Nacho Vigalondo has a surprisingly airtight narrative (mainly helped by his use of a secluded location), with all of the fun coming from exactly how every piece of the story fits together. At times eerie, funny and intense, Timecrimes is a perfect example of how to make a great time travel movie. [CJ]

#1 – Monsters

Though it’s title doesn’t accurately indicate the cleverness of the film, Monsters stands out among indie sci-fi films as an alien creature-feature with heart. Taking place 6 years after a NASA space probe crash landed in Mexico and large tentacled alien creatures began their reign of terror; photo-journalist Andrew (Scoot McNairy) begrudgingly agrees to chaperon his boss’s daughter, Sam (Whitney Able), out of quarantined Mexico back to the States. Newby-Brit director Gareth Edwards has a refreshingly firm grasp on utilizing off-screen presence to build suspense, especially using sound. And while we see glimpses of the alien early in the film, the focus remains on the daily terror of the people living in this invaded country, giving the film a thoughtful humanistic vantage. Monsters also satisfies the sci-fi viewers most basic need to see the monster in it’s entirety at the very end, but in a way that is both provoking and beautiful. The ad-libbed performances of the main actors and the off-the-cuff low-budget cinematography, combined with the tasteful special effects (done entirely by Edwards with prosumer software in his bedroom!), make Monsters an indie sci-fi must-see. [Ananda]

The Criterion Collection is home to hundreds of classic, obscure, foreign and independent films that come with the best possible picture and audio quality along with plenty of excellent special features. Their selection ranges from old Hitchcock classics like The 39 Steps to the massive amount of avant-garde works from people like Stan Brakhage or Hollis Frampton, but their goal of giving important classic and contemporary films their proper treatment has always stayed the same. After being inspired by Criterion’s Three Reasons campaign we decided to give our own three reasons why the following films deserve to get a place in the Criterion Collection.

Cashback – Dustin Jansick’s pick

#1 Freeze Time
The main character imagines that he can freeze time where he gets to freely move around and interact without anyone knowing. Originally, he does this to make time seem to go by faster at work but he ends up taking advantage of his artistic abilities by drawing the female form, clothing becomes optional. The final scene in the film is a magical one that people often experience, when time seems to stop when you kiss the one you love.

#2 Supermarket Fun
After watching Cashback, it makes you consider picking up a part time job night shift at your local supermarket. Or at the very least it shows just how much fun you can have at such mundane job. Racing down the aisles in a shopping cart and stuffing sex toys in women’s shopping bags were just two examples the film gave for mischievous adventures for the immature soul.

#3 Beauty Is Everywhere
One of the themes in Cashback is that beauty is all around you if you take the time to look for it. The visuals found in this indie film rivals other films with 10 times the shooting budget. Moving down aisles around people that are frozen in time was spectacularly done. Possibly the best scene is the 24 second clip of the main character hanging up the phone as he seamlessly transitions to falling back into his bed in a single shot. That shot took one full day of the 25 day shooting schedule to do.

Cashback trailer:

Stalker – Blake Ginithan’s pick

#1 Calm and Cool
Andrey Tarkovskiy loves his long shots and Stalker is filled with plenty of them. He lets scenes play out for minutes on end, even if it’s just three guys walking in the rusted wastelands of ‘The Zone’. At times the camera is so close to our subjects we feel as if we ourselves are walking with these men. Long takes, mixed with some lengthy tracking shots, make for some stunning cinematography. Some scenes the camera just sits and watches creating an edgy atmosphere as we get glimpses of utter magic.

#2 One of a Kind
When some people talk about a film, they sometimes say that they have never seen anything like it. I can truly say I have never seen a film like Stalker before. It’s a full blown science fiction masterpiece that contains no aliens, no ray guns, and no flying cars and somehow, the film feels very firmly cemented in the genre, practically reinventing it. While the basic premise of a man (the stalker) leading two others into ‘The Zone’ (said to have mystical powers) is all that happens, Stalker is about so much more.

#3 Magnetism
Stalker is brutally slow at times. There are times where you feel like time isn’t moving at all. But you don’t care because Tarkovskiy draws you in with unrivaled power. You are drawn into the lives of these three souls as they walk seemingly forever in a barren land where only a glimmer of hope exists. Tarkovskiy’s atmosphere is heightened by this. At times the characters don’t know what lies ahead of them and the tension is very palpable. A rare film where you literally don’t know what’s going to happen next.

Stalker trailer:

Sombre/La Vie Nouvelle/Un Lac – CJ Prince’s pick

#1 The Mind of a Killer
Philippe Grandrieux is a French director whose experimental films are criminally underseen. His debut feature Sombre follows a serial killer across France who goes into a crisis when he encounters a woman that he can’t bring himself to murder. It could be looked at as a (very, very screwed up) love story but Grandrieux shoots the entire film in a suffocating atmosphere, creating scenes of pure unsettling terror while achieving moments of transcendence. Sombre is the only movie by Grandrieux to get a US release, but it’s in an old non-anamorphic DVD. Releases in Europe fared a little better with picture quality but it’s impossible to actually go out and see this movie in North America properly.

#2 A Descent into Hell
His follow-up La Vie Nouvelle takes the elements in Sombre to their breaking point. Grandrieux puts his focus on visual and auditory sensations to get things across and for some La Vie Nouvelle could be seen as absolute torture. In this film we see an American visiting an Eastern European country who, after encountering a prostitute he becomes obsessed with, tries to hunt her down and buy her for himself. As the soldier travels further and further down into the seedy underworld of the sex trafficking business, the movie appears to start going off the rails entirely as we get closer and closer to its disturbing hellish climax. La Vie Nouvelle is a visceral experience that feels like a sensory overload at times, but it’s impossible to forget once you’ve seen it.

#3 A Family Disrupted
Un Lac may not have the dark storylines involving murder and prostitution that made up Grandrieux’s previous films, but it still feels as otherworldly and bizarre as Sombre and La Vie Nouvelle. Un Lac takes place at an isolated cabin where the son, who is madly in love with his sister, has to deal with a new stranger who arrives to help the family out. Despite the more human elements taking precedence here, Grandrieux’s approach hasn’t changed a bit (every scene shot in the cabin is shrouded in so much darkness it’s impossible to get a sense of what the inside looks like), creating a film that has just as much emotional resonance as his other two.

Sombre trailer:

La Vie Nouvelle clip:

Un Lac trailer:

Un Lac full streaming film: