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One of the earliest Alien rip-offs was made for US television. We take a look back at 1981’s The Intruder Within.

Much like Jaws, Star Wars and Mad Max before it, the success of 1979’s Alien prompted studios and producers the world over to make their own hastily-made rip-off movies. Thanks to – shall we say – enterprising filmmakers like Roger Corman and Norman J Warren, we got cheap and cheerful fare like Barracuda (1978), Battle Beyond The Stars (1980) and Inseminoid (1981).

One of the earliest Alien clones to emerge like a shambling monster, though, was The Intruder Within – a low-budget TV movie that cheekily borrowed all sorts of ideas from Ridley Scott’s hit, but transplanted the entire thing from a spaceship in the future to an oil rig in the post-energy crisis early 1980s. As you can probably imagine, it isn’t a lost classic, but it’s fascinating to revisit, both...

After taking viewers on a walk down the macabre memory lane of ’80s horror cinema with the documentary In Search of Darkness (coming to Shudder later this year), CreatorVC is now giving fans of ’80s sci-fi a similar experience to look forward to with the new documentary In Search of Tomorrow. Although its main focus is on sci-fi films of the ’80s, there are still plenty of insightful scares examined in the new documentary, as the latest trailer highlights the documentary's inclusion of many memorable movies from the horror/sci-fi subgenre.

From Aliens and Invaders From Mars (1986) to Predator and The Thing, the new In Search of Tomorrow trailer shows what happened when horror and sci-fi collided to create iconic cinema moments and masterful practical effects.

Here's what writer/director/producer David Weiner had to say about the horror sci-fi elements of In Search of Tomorrow:

"Eighties Sci-Fi was packed with memorable horror-crossover elements,...

Directed by: Ji-hoon Kim

Written by: Je-gyun Yun

Starring: Ji-won Ha, Sung-kee Ahn, Ji-ho Oh, Ae-ryeon Cha

In the 1981 TV movie The Intruder Within, Medical Center's Chad Everett plays the commander of an oil rig who inadvertently discovers some prehistoric eggs. One of the eggs hatches, releasing a snake-like malevolent creature that begins to hunt down the crew one by one. Directed by Peter Carter (Rituals), The Intruder Within has the dubious distinction of being one of the first full-on Alien rip-offs on television or film. (Roger Corman’s first attempt, the surreal Galaxy of Terror, would be released theatrically later that year.) It’s a typical early-eighties television yarn with flat visuals, story points timed for commercial breaks and very little onscreen violence. Joseph Bottoms (The Black Hole) is the “Ash” of the piece, attempting to study the life form at any price. There's also a “chest burster” counterpart which is shown,...