10 Great Sci-Fi Movies For The Modern Age

4. Coherence

Coherence follows eight friends at a reunion dinner party when the close passing of a meteor splits open the fabric of the universe and unspools parallel realities. This sounds pretty high concept and it is, but the low budget aesthetic of Coherence works to its advantage. It feels gritty and real, managing to smuggle in the overblown idea amongst the familiar back-biting of old friends that maybe aren’t so friendly anymore.

As they investigate further, the dinner party turns into a malevolent game of musical chairs with the group hopping between realities, hoping to find out what’s going on and end in the right, or at least the best reality before the music stops. Questions start to arise as the group ask if everybody is who they say they are and relations threaten to implode along with reality.

Coherence’s ability to tap into the visceral and disturbing side of becoming unstuck in the universe gives it a nastier edge than a lot of its contemporaries. It takes the balancing act of realism, horror and high concept in stride, earning a category all of its own.