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Year One
Stars indicate the most critically-acclaimed movies.
X Files, The
EMAILPRINTTwentieth Century Fox Film Corporation

Mixed or average reviews
Based on 23 critic reviews
How did we calculate this?
Based on 7 votes
Read user comments
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Movie Info
Genre(s): Action | Mystery | Sci-fi | Suspense/Thriller
Written by:
Chris Carter (also story)
Frank Spotnitz (story)
Directed by: Rob Bowman
Release Date:
Theatrical: June 19, 1998
DVD: June 3, 2003
Running Time: 121 minutes, Color
Origin: Canada / USA
Summary
RATING: PG-13 for some intense violence and gore
Starring David Duchovny, Gillian Anderson, John Neville, William B. Davis, Martin Landau, Jeffrey DeMunn, Blythe Danner, and Armin Mueller-Stahl
With the dubious assistance of a paranoid doctor, Mulder and Scully risk their careers and their lives to hunt down a deadly virus which may be extraterrestrial in origin - and could destroy all life on earth! (Fox)
Also On Metacritic
FILM: Elektra Reign of Fire The X-Files: I Want to Believe
Also On The Web: Internet Movie Database Official Studio Site
What The Critics Said
All critic scores are converted to a 100-point scale. If a critic does not indicate a score, we assign a score based on the general impression given by the text of the review. Learn more...
Entertainment Weekly Owen Gleiberman
Dark, funny, paranoid, arbitrary, humming with tamped-down eroticism and in love with all things weird: That's the good news.
Read Full Review >Washington Post Michael O'Sullivan
Like the TV show, The X-Files movie is stylish, scary, sardonically funny and at times just plain gross.
Read Full Review >Chicago Sun-Times Roger Ebert
As pure movie, The X-Files more or less works. As a story, it needs a sequel, a prequel, and Cliff Notes.
Read Full Review >San Francisco Chronicle Bob Graham
Neither true believers nor newcomers to the phenomenon will be disappointed.
Read Full Review >San Francisco Examiner Tim Goodman
In the movie, the truth will (and does) out itself. Mulder and Scully have seen the future and it's a giant leap for each of them to comprehend.
Read Full Review >Christian Science Monitor David Sterritt
This is more than enough material for two hours of summer-movie fun, and The X-Files delivers said fun reasonably well. The action scenes are bigger and bolder than their small-screen counterparts.
Read Full Review >LA Weekly Manohla Dargis
It's the brilliance of The X-Files to have turned Mulder's paranoid style into a function of cool. Mulder and Scully aren't just beautiful, smart, well-armed and seemingly impervious to the banalities of everyday life, such as cheap haircuts and ruinous love affairs--they're cool.
Read Full Review >The New York Times Elvis Mitchell
Though both stars are sometimes eclipsed when the film strains for big action episodes, Mr. Duchovny sustains enough cool, deadpan intellect and suppressed passion to give the story a center. Ms. Armstrong has the harsher, more restrictive role, but she plays it with familiar hardboiled glamour.
Read Full Review >The Onion (A.V. Club) Keith Phipps
It's a smart, exciting, involving film that's true to its source, which is all it really needs to be.
Read Full Review >Austin Chronicle Marc Savlov
Solid, workmanlike stuff, and enough to keep the legions of X-philes sated until next September. And since I realize some of you are dying to know, no, Mulder's butt remains, as always, fully clothed.
Read Full Review >Washington Post Rita Kempley
The X-Files movie is really just a two-hour teaser for the series's sixth season. And little else. You will feel exactly like Mulder when he says, "How many times have we been right here before, Scully? So close to the truth?"
Read Full Review >Slate David Edelstein
The X-Files isn't so much a bad movie as it is a crackerjack piece of television. It's crisply made--not sodden like many of the "Star Trek" pictures. But it's as annoyingly open-ended as the rest of the series' episodes.
Read Full Review >Los Angeles Times Kenneth Turan
With its shrewd mixture of paranoia and the paranormal, the way its elaborate mythology combines enigmatic phenomena with potent cabals intent on running the world, The X-Files experience resembles "Twin Peaks" crossed with "The Twilight Zone."
Read Full Review >Empire Neil Jeffries
The X-Files can stand proud as a genuine movie with a beginning, a middle and an end, two charismatic leads and a franchise ahead of it.
Read Full Review >Film Threat Ron Wells
The problem is, the main conspiracy of the show is so vast, you have to walk around it a couple of times before you can see what it is.
Read Full Review >The Globe and Mail (Toronto) Rick Groen
What we have here is a pretty good TV show huffed and puffed into a rather mediocre film.
Read Full Review >The New Yorker Bruce Diones
Ultimately disappointing--it's bigger budgeted, but somehow less engrossing when played outside the solitary intimacy of the tube. It'll be a great video flick.
Read Full Review >Variety Todd McCarthy
Falls somewhere in between standing on its own feet as a real movie worth the price of a ticket and merely being a glorified TV episode refitted for theaters.
Read Full Review >Salon.com Joyce Millman
It's a two-hour episode of the show, except with better production values and a nicer wardrobe for Scully.
Read Full Review >New York Daily News Jami Bernard
Truth is, it' not very good.
USA Today Dennis Moore
I entered the screening for The X-Files: Fight the Future with myriad questions... I left with disappointing answers. [19 June 1998, p. 7E]
TV Guide Maitland McDonagh
Essentially a supersize episode that ignores a slew of fifth-season developments and adds yet another monster to the mix, one that owes a striking debt to "Alien."
Read Full Review >What Our Users Said
The average user rating for this movie is 8.5 (out of 10) based on 7 User Votes
Note: User votes are NOT included in the Metascore calculation.
R. Lopez gave it an8:
This big screen adaption of the phenomenally popular T.V. series is nothing short of brilliant it has all the makings of a fantastic Sci-Fi thriller and a great conspiracy thriller all wrapped up into one sinister little package. The X-Files: Fight the Future is not an oscar worthy film but it is a great one on it's own as a stand alone it would have done fantastically but it's tie to the series' plot keeps it chained down from busting loose and showing it's true stuff. But it does good with what it's already established it brings to the Sci-Fi genre , like The Matrix did, seeing as it is The Matrix predecessor in Sci-Fi greatness. This film, in my opinion, set the benchmark for conventional Sci-Fi and turned it into what we see now. This movie I was hesitant to see at first but after watching the first three seasons I thought i should at least give it a try and boy was I blow away. It's a mystifying and malicious experience in the art of conspiracy and deceit and it moves along at a very steady and easy pace that you can easily keep up with and a story you can understand and follow as it plays out. This is the kind of film that keeps you guessing and guessing till the end it never let's up with the intrigue and the tension, it brings so much to the table and you have no choice but to eat it all up one small morsel at a time that so good you can't resist, this film also gives you a gritter side to The X-files adventure that you didn't see in the series it puts the agent's in more peril and danger then they have ever been in before and that is also another factor that contributed to this films success. But when it comes down to it there is probably nothing bad you can say in this films honor, it's just to good to put down. The X-Files: Fight the Future is great fun and it's a wild ride that you have toe experience to believe, it's sinister and diabolical, it calculating and efficient in it's execution of it's craft and style. it brings more than it should and it does well with it and gives you a good show for your money and if your forgiving this film won't displease you. All in all The X-Files: Fight the Future is a great Sci-Fi thriller that is a see and see again fun that you can't ignore. The X-Files:Fight the Future is red hot.
Katie K. gave it an8:
would like to have more of a continuation of the last episode of the show....what happened to the potential alien takeover, etc. Too many unanswered questions to just go back to business as usual. Disappointed that Scully STILL doesn't believe after all that happened in the last episode....that was really annoying and unrealistic. I am a diehard fan, so I would have watched it regardless, but I am disappointed that it was more like a TV CSI episode. Dana looked gaunt and depressed...eat some beef. Fox needs to eat less meat. I missed old characters...lone gunmen, cigarette man, etc. Skinner just had a cameo appearance. The other two agents were useless...and why they got a rapper musician to play an agent is beyond me....bring one of the old guys back from the show. Oh well, still I would watch it again. Hopefully they will do a third one.
kitty gave it a10:
The tv show is my favorite thing to ever be aired on tv, and this movie is just like a really long episode. it is creepy to a point, and even then I had some moments when I almost jumped clear up to the ceiling, which is rare for me. Plus I saw this before wathcing the show and I totally got it! And anyways this movie makes perfect sense to alien-obsessed me. Can't wait for the new movie!
Lucas R. gave it a10:
Awesome X-Files movie. It was like an episode, but two hours long; I was thrilled all the time. Worth watching.
Kilgore T. gave it a6:
Not a bad movie, but it had the potential to be much more than it turned out to be
