Scott’s Sci-fi Movie Marathon Recommendations

Scott Riblet sent me an excellent list of sci-fi movie marathon recommendations. They are below for your viewing pleasure. If you want to get picky, not all of them are technically sci-fi (i.e. Desk Set), but they are all arguably at least sci-fi adjacent (i.e. a big computer is involved in Desk set).

Lego sci-fiForbidden Planet (1956)

Action | Adventure | Family – Rotten Tomatoes score 98%

A starship crew goes to investigate the silence of a planet’s colony only to find two survivors and a deadly secret that one of them has.

Blast from the past (1999)

Comedy | Drama | Romance – Rotten Tomatoes score: 58%

A romantic comedy about a naive man who comes out into the world after being in a nuclear fallout shelter for 35 years.

Desk Set (1957)

Comedy | Romance – Rotten Tomatoes score: 100%

Two extremely strong personalities clash over the computerization of a TV network’s research department.

The Day the Earth Stood Still (1951)

Drama | Sci-fi | Thriller – Rotten Tomatoes score: 94%

An alien lands and tells the people of Earth that they must live peacefully or be destroyed as a danger to other planets.

Exam (2009)

Mystery | Thriller – Rotten Tomatoes score: 63%

The final candidates for a highly desirable corporate job are locked together in an exam room and given a test so simple and confusing that tension begins to unravel.

Cube (1997)

Mystery | Sci-fi | Thriller – Rotten Tomatoes score: 62%

7 complete strangers of widely varying personality characteristics are involuntarily placed in an endless kafkaesque maze containing deadly traps.

Creature from the Black Lagoon (1954)

Adventure | Horror | Sci-fi – Rotten Tomatoes score – 83%

A strange prehistoric beast lurks in the depths of the Amazonian jungle. A group of scientists try to capture the animal and bring it back to civilization for study.

The Mummy (1932)

Horror – Rotten Tomatoes score – 92%

A living mummy stalks the beautiful woman he believes is the reincarnation of his lover.

King Kong (1933)

Adventure | Fantasy | Horror – Rotten Tomatoes score – 98%

A film crew goes to a tropical island for an exotic location shoot and discovers a colossal giant gorilla who takes a shine to their female blonde star.

The Blob (1958)

Horror | Sci-fi | Thriller – Rotten Tomatoes score – 66%

An alien lifeform consumes everything in its path as it grows and grows.

7th Voyage of Sinbad (1958)

Family | Fantasy | Action – Rotten Tomatoes score – 100%

When a princess is shrunken by an evil wizard, Sinbad must undertake a quest to an island of monsters to cure her and prevent a war.

Thief of Bagdad (1940)

Adventure | Family | Fantasy – Rotten Tomatoes score – 100%

After being tricked and cast out of Bagdad by the evil Jaffar, King Ahmad joins forces with a thief named Abu to reclaim his throne, the city, and the Princess he loves.

Dracula (1931)

Horror – Rotten Tomatoes score – 91%

The ancient vampire Count Dracula arrives in England and begins to prey upon the virtuous young Mina.

Frankenstein (1931)

Horror | Sci-fi – Rotten Tomatoes score – 100%

An obsessed scientist assembles a living being from parts of exhumed corpses.

Photo by Masked Builder

The World’s Premier 24-Hour Movie Marathon

An elite 24-hour movie marathon with an application process? A process in which only 2% of those who apply are invited to attend? With celebrity guest appearances and live marching bands? You must be joking.

Alamo Draft House CinemaNope – it’s real! 2014 will mark the 16th Butt-Numb-A-Thon, a 24-hour movie marathon hosted by Harry Knowles from A’int it cool news. It goes down in December every year in Austin, Texas and it has shown a whole heck of a lot of movies.

To get in last year, you had to fill out this 20-question application, and you were competing with 10,000 people to fill one of 200 seats! Here is a quick recap of the 2013 butt-numb-a-thon, from one of the attendees.

Harry’s event really makes me want to up my movie marathon game! Perhaps I should invite celebrities to my house for my 2014 movie marathon. Mel Gibson attended the 2003 Butt-Numb-A-Thon. He’s not doing much these days, right?

[Update: 8 July 2019] This event has been permanently shut down, due to assault allegations made against the event’s founder Harry Knowles. Yikes. What an awful turn of events.

Photo by BruceTurner

Movie Marathon 2014 Planning Kickoff!

I’m kicking off planning for Movie Marathon 2014! This will be the sixth movie marathon my wife and I have hosted at our house (since 2009) and the tenth I’ve co-hosted in my lifetime (since 1999!). The working title is: Movie Marathon VI: The Undiscovered Country.

Movie Marathon 2014

First order of business – potential movies! I think I have a good starter list, but I need your help in getting more ideas! I’ve had great success in the past from suggestions from friends and family. The movies below are just what I’ve come up with on my own. Please comment in this post with your ideas!

We’ll be bringing back kid-friendly zones, so I’ve divided up the potential movie list into movies aimed at adults and those aimed at the kids. Enjoy!

Movies for the Adults

The Wicker Man (1973)

Horror | Mystery | Thriller – Rotten Tomatoes score: 100%

A police sergeant is sent to a Scottish island village in search of a missing girl whom the townsfolk claim never existed. Stranger still are the rites that take place there.

Bringing Up Baby (1938)

Comedy | Romance – Rotten Tomatoes score: 95%

While trying to secure a $1 million donation for his museum, a befuddled paleontologist is pursued by a flighty and often irritating heiress and her pet leopard “Baby.”

The French Connection (1971)

Action | Crime | Thriller – Rotten Tomatoes score: 98%

A pair of NYC cops in the Narcotics Bureau stumble onto a drug smuggling job with a French connection.

Notorious (1946)

Drama | Film-Noir | Romance – Rotten Tomatoes score: 94%

A woman is asked to spy on a group of Nazi friends in South America. How far will she have to go to ingratiate herself with them?

Hannah and her Sisters (1986)

Comedy | Drama – Rotten Tomatoes score: 91%

Between two Thanksgivings, Hannah’s husband falls in love with her sister Lee, while her hypochondriac ex-husband rekindles his relationship with her sister Holly.

Sunset Boulevard (1950)

Drama | Film-Noir – Rotten Tomatoes score: 98%

A hack screenwriter writes a screenplay for a former silent-film star who has faded into Hollywood obscurity.

The Crow (1994)

Action | Fantasy – Rotten Tomatoes score: 82%

A man brutally murdered comes back to life as an undead avenger of his and his fiancée’s murder.

Kid Friendly Zone

Bolt (2008)

Animation | Adventure | Comedy – Rotten Tomatoes score: 88%

The canine star of a fictional sci-fi/action show that believes his powers are real embarks on a cross country trek to save his co-star from a threat he believes is just as real.

Tarzan (1999)

Animation | Adventure | Drama – Rotten Tomatoes score: 88%

A man raised by gorillas must decide where he really belongs when he discovers he is a human.

Mulan (1998)


Animation | Adventure | Family – Rotten Tomatoes score: 86%

To save her father from death in the army, a young maiden secretly goes in his place and becomes one of China’s greatest heroines in the process.

Lilo and Stitch (2002)

Animation | Adventure | Comedy – Rotten Tomatoes score: 86%

A Hawaiian girl adopts an unusual pet who is actually a notorious extra-terrestrial fugitive from the law.

Ella Enchanted (2004)

Comedy | Family | Fantasy – Rotten Tomatoes score: 50%

Ella is under a spell to be constantly obedient, a fact she must hide from her new step-family in order to protect the prince of the land, her friend for whom she’s falling.

Cinemablend 24-hour movie marathons

I just discovered Gabe Toro over at Cinemablend has been writing up a whole series of 24-hour movie marathon ideas. Some sound great (Liam Neeson action marathon!) and some are just plain goofy (an entire movie marathon about bears? Really?).

Here they are, from best to goofiest: