Film

Inseminoid

Name: Inseminoid
Genre: Horror, Science Fiction
Released: 1981
Cast: Robin Clarke, Jennifer Ashley, Stephanie Beacham, Steven Grives, Barrie Houghton

A 1981 British sci-fi horror film where an alien impregnation turns a space archaeologist into a maternal killing machine. It's crude, urgent, and unafraid—all practical effects and crew in actual peril, with genuine body horror. For viewers who love cosmic dread filtered through grindhouse energy and don't mind wonky execution.

TMDb rating

2.1

Should you watch it?

Watch it if you like grimy, claustrophobic early-eighties creature horror where the sets feel lived-in and the dread builds from cramped corridors and bodily unease rather than explanation.

Skip it if you need slick pacing and polished modern effects, since this is a rough, uneven affair that leans on practical gore and a cast of unfamiliar faces.

What it asks of you: It runs about an hour and a half and rewards patience with atmosphere over momentum, so expect long stretches of tense waiting before the set pieces arrive.

Not sure? Find tonight's pick in a minute.

If you liked this

Alien1979

The template for everything here: claustrophobic spacecraft, a creature inside the walls, a crew picked off one by one. Ridley Scott's discipline makes the terror feel inevitable and inescapable.

But It's been canonical for four decades and spawned endless imitators. Nothing about it feels undiscovered anymore.

The Brood1979

Cronenberg's savage meditation on motherhood and rage, where a woman's psychological torment becomes literal flesh. Like Inseminoid but infinitely smarter about its metaphors and far more unsettling.

But It's philosophical horror about trauma. If you want action and jump scares, the pacing will feel glacial and deliberate.

Xtro1982

British sci-fi nastiness that matches Inseminoid's willingness to be weird and visceral. An alien returns to Earth and reproduces in ways that will make you squirm. It commits to its vision.

But The logic is dreamlike rather than rigorous. Plot holes are a feature, not a bug. Some find that liberating; others find it infuriating.

Not sure tonight? Get a pick in a minute, starting from Inseminoid

The wildcard

Something you would not have found on your own.

The Poseidon Adventure1972

Both trap a diverse crew in a sealed environment where escape routes collapse and death comes from being cornered. The monster is the maze.

A disaster film where a trapped crew fights through a dying space—here, an overturned ocean liner instead of a spaceship. It invented the template of ordinary people against an implacable environment with nowhere to run. Inseminoid essentially remakes its logic in a sci-fi register.

But It's a 1970s ensemble piece with soap-opera dialogue and logic that belongs to an older cinema. The pacing is stately, not kinetic.

Contamination1980

Italian sci-fi schlock about alien eggs infesting a ship and breeding through human hosts. It's Inseminoid's trashy cousin—energetic, absurd, and genuinely creepy when it counts.

But The dialogue is stilted, the pacing lurches, and the science is nonsense. It works if you surrender to it; it grates if you resist.

Creature1985

A space base finds something in the ice and everything goes to hell. It channels Alien and The Thing with real invention and practical creature effects that are genuinely nasty.

But It's scattered in tone and feels like it was edited down from something longer. Character work is thin.

Lifeforce1985

A comet brings vampiric aliens to Earth. It's audacious, erotic, apocalyptic, and gloriously unhinged. Tobe Hooper in full fever dream.

But It's completely bonkers and takes itself seriously while being ridiculous. The tonal whiplash will either exhilarate or exhaust you.

Kamikaze '891982

A dystopian thriller set in Berlin with cold-war paranoia and a body-modification subplot. It shares Inseminoid's sense that the body is the first site of invasion and violation.

But It's a German-language riff on Philip K. Dick with a fractured, hallucinogenic narrative. It requires patience and doesn't hold your hand.

The Hidden1987

An alien parasite inhabits human bodies to breed and kill. Tense, inventive, and far better made than its premise deserves. A creature feature with actual wit.

But Once you understand the twist, the second half becomes more conventional. The ending doesn't quite stick the landing.

Invasion of the Body Snatchers1978

Paranoia about the body being stolen from within, replaced by something cold and alien. Kaufman's version is icier and more dread-soaked than the original.

But It's methodical sci-fi philosophy rather than creature horror. The thrills are intellectual; the scares are creeping rather than visceral.

Possession1981

Both use pregnancy and maternal violation as literal horror rather than metaphor. Both are willing to be ugly and transgressive about the female body as a site of transformation.

Andrzej Żuławski's visionary nightmare about a marriage disintegrating into cosmic body horror. A woman hosts something inhuman growing inside her, which may be metaphor or may be literal. It's operatic, graphic, deeply strange.

But It's deliberately obscure and often incoherent. The acting is stylized to the point of camp. It demands you meet it on its own fever-dream terms or leave it entirely.

The Seventh Victim1943

Both center a woman as the primary target of predation. Both use a confined world—city or spaceship—as the hunting ground. Both understand that a hunted woman is the engine of body horror cinema.

A 1940s horror about a woman hunted through New York for reasons involving an occult society. It's shadowy, urban, psychologically creepy—Val Lewton's minimalist approach to dread. It proves you don't need gore or monsters to trap an audience.

But It's a black-and-white B-movie from eight decades ago with period dialogue and slow pacing. The 'threat' is often suggested rather than shown, which modern audiences sometimes find frustrating.