The Best Dystopia Movies and TV Shows on The Criterion Channel
Finding a good Dystopia movie and TV show to watch can be hard, so we've ranked the best ones and included where to watch them. Check out our list of the best Dystopia movies and TV shows of all time streaming on The Criterion Channel.
1. Night of the Living Dead
97%
What it's about: A group of people try to survive an attack of bloodthirsty zombies while trapped in a rural Pennsylvania farmhouse.
Where to Watch: Available to watch free online (PopcornFlix, SnagFilms, Tubi & 1 other), stream on a popular subscription service (Prime Video, Starz, ConTV & 4 others), stream on a popular TV everywhere service (Starz, Epix & Syfy) & rent or buy from $2.00 on 6 services (iTunes, Google Play & 4 others).
2. Delicatessen
89%What it's about: This bizarre surrealistic black comedy takes place in a small fictitious post-apocalyptic town where food is scarce and butcher Clapet has the macabre business of using human flesh to feed his customers. Yet when his daughter falls in love with his next slaughter victim things turn into chaos.
Where to Watch: Available to stream on a popular subscription service (Prime Video & The Criterion Channel) & rent or buy from $3.99 on 4 services (iTunes, Prime Video & 2 others).
3. Wings of Desire
98%What it's about: Two angels, Damiel and Cassiel, glide through the streets of Berlin, observing the bustling population, providing invisible rays of hope to the distressed but never interacting with them. When Damiel falls in love with lonely trapeze artist Marion, the angel longs to experience life in the physical world, and finds -- with some words of wisdom from actor Peter Falk -- that it might be possible for him to take human form.
Where to Watch: Available to stream on a subscription service (The Criterion Channel & Kanopy) & rent or buy from $2.99 on 3 services (iTunes, Google Play & Prime Video).
4. Escape from New York
85%What it's about: In 1997, the island of Manhattan has been walled off and turned into a giant maximum security prison within which the country's worst criminals are left to form their own anarchic society. However, when the President of the United States crash lands on the island, the authorities turn to a former soldier and current convict to rescue him.
Where to Watch: Available to stream on a subscription service (CBS All Access & The Criterion Channel) & rent or buy from $2.99 on 6 services (iTunes, Google Play & 4 others).
5. Fantastic Planet
90%What it's about: On the planet Ygam, the Draags, extremely technologically and spiritually advanced blue humanoids, consider the tiny Oms, human beings descendants of Terra's inhabitants, as ignorant animals. Those who live in slavery are treated as simple pets and used to entertain Draag children; those who live hidden in the hostile wilderness of the planet are periodically hunted and ruthlessly slaughtered as if they were vermin.
Where to Watch: Available to stream on a subscription service (The Criterion Channel) & rent or buy from $2.99 on 5 services (iTunes, Google Play & 3 others).
6. Weekend
96%What it's about: A supposedly idyllic weekend trip to the countryside turns into a never-ending nightmare of traffic jams, revolution, cannibalism and murder as French bourgeois society starts to collapse under the weight of its own consumer preoccupations.
Where to Watch: Available to stream on a subscription service (The Criterion Channel & Kanopy).
7. Lord of the Flies
91%What it's about: Amidst a nuclear war, a plane carrying a group of schoolboys crash lands on a deserted island. With no adult survivors, the boys are forced to fend for themselves. At first they cooperate, but when the they split into two separate camps -- one led by the pragmatic Ralph and the other by militaristic Jack -- their society falls into disarray, leading to a disturbing examination of human nature and a chilling conclusion.
Where to Watch: Available to stream on a subscription service (The Criterion Channel & Kanopy) & rent or buy from $3.99 on 2 services (iTunes & Prime Video).
8. Things to Come
93%What it's about: The story of a century: a decades-long second World War leaves plague and anarchy, then a rational state rebuilds civilization and attempts space travel.
Where to Watch: Available to stream on a popular subscription service (Prime Video, ConTV & The Criterion Channel) & rent or buy from $1.99 on 5 services (iTunes, Google Play & 3 others).
9. Jubilee
100%What it's about: Queen Elizabeth I visits late twentieth-century Britain to find a depressing landscape where life has changed since her time.
Where to Watch: Available to stream on a subscription service (The Criterion Channel & Kanopy).