3 underrated sci-fi movies on Amazon Freevee in January

The best part about Amazon Freevee is that, as the name implies, movies are free to access. You don’t need a paid Amazon Prime subscription to watch, but you will get periodic ads throughout the film. That’s not a huge deal: it’s just the right amount of time to refill your drink or popcorn or take a quick bathroom break.

The movie selection on Amazon Freevee is always changing, making it tough to keep up. If you’re looking for something in the sci-fi space, these are three underrated sci-fi movies on Amazon Freevee that you should watch in January before they’re gone. All of them are from the ’70s and ‘80s, but they still hold up today.

Mad Max (1979)

Mad Max isn’t your typical fly-under-the-radar movie because it was popular enough to spawn several sequels in the ‘80s, followed by Mad Max: Fury Road in 2015 and Furiosa in 2024. However, the post-apocalyptic and dystopian action film had initially polarized critics who felt it lacked emotion due to its violent story. Boy, were they wrong. Over time, views clearly changed on the movie, which stars Mel Gibson as the titular character. He’s a police officer in the future who kills a biker gang as revenge for the murders of his wife and child. He then spends his days drifting alone through a wasteland, trying to help others (and himself) survive.

Now widely considered to be one of the best action movies ever made and credited with influencing the apocalyptic and post-apocalyptic genre as we know it today, Mad Max went on to become the most profitable movie ever made at the time (since overtaken by others). It’s still overlooked by some who feel the action is a bit dated, but they are wrong. Mad Max still rips, and is worth watching.

Stream Mad Max on Amazon Freevee.

From Beyond (1986)

A sci-fi horror film, From Beyond is based on the H.P. Lovecraft short story and chronicles a science experiment gone horrifically wrong. When two scientists use a device called a Resonator to try and stimulate the pineal gland, responsible for helping modulate sleep cycles, they somehow awaken creatures from another dimension.

One scientist gets pulled into the terrifying alternate world and returns to Earth as a shape-shifting monster. Now, no one in the lab is safe. The movie stars Jeffrey Combs, who has played numerous roles in Star Trek, and soap opera star Barbara Crampton. Parts of From Beyond, most notably the more graphic content, were cut to achieve an R rating. But sometimes, as this underrated movie demonstrates, it’s what you don’t see that’s most terrifying.

Stream From Beyond on Amazon Freevee.

1984 (1984)

If you know the George Orwell novel 1984, you know exactly what the movie 1984 is about. Fittingly premiering in the year 1984, the dystopian drama brings Orwell’s classic and terrifying story of Big Brother and societal oppression to life on screen. Most notably, 1984 was Richard Burton’s last screen appearance.

The story follows Winston Smith (John Hurt), a civil servant trying to make it through life under the thumb of a totalitarian regime attempting to remove all individual thought from society. There’s no comparison to reading Orwell’s novel, cover to cover. But 1984 is an interesting depiction that holds up as much today as it did 40 years ago. It might even convince you to crack open the book again (or for the first time).

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