Top 50 scariest movies of all time

5. 'Alien' (1979)

Sigourney Weaver: hot. Alien monster: ugly. Throw them together in a futuristic, highly stylized space battleground: beautiful. And terrifying. "Alien" was important not least because it showed that the science-fiction horror genre was one of possibility — this movie was also intelligently rendered, psychologically powerful, and, well, gross. Where else can find a bloody creature being birthed from a human surrogate? (For the answer, see number 43, "The Brood.")
(Robert Penn/Handout)