What’s it about?
The U.S. military launches the first rocket expedition to Mars after veiling its preparations in strict secrecy until the last minute. The five-person crew consists of the workaholic ace engineer who designed the rocket, his “girl scientist” fiancee, a pessimistic professor who believes the mission is doomed, a reporter sent to cover “the human angle”, and a fifth guy who is not even one-dimensional enough to have a single memorable characteristic. A meteor storm encountered during the flight destroys the landing gear and the crew is forced to crash land on the red planet, damaging the rocket in the process.
Once on Mars, the crew are greeted by several Martians wearing brightly colored spacesuits (and looking consequently like a delegation of Teletubbies). They are taken to an underground city of generic sci-fi wonders, which the “girl scientist” declares a “woman’s paradise” after finding out that all dishes and silverware are washed automatically. The thrilling action then moves to the meeting room of Mars’s ruling council, where the seemingly straightforward task of repairing the rocket somehow results in a tangle of double- and triple-crosses as political factions vie for control of the Earth technology.
Is it any good?
Not really. Practically nothing of any interest whatsoever happens during the pre-launch preparations (which drag on for an interminable 12 minutes) or most of the flight to Mars (despite attempts to make the adjustment of a “gravitation dial” seem exciting). The interior of the rocket itself is kind of neat, if only to see what people in 1951 imagined that kind of thing would look like. But there’s nothing especially unusual about it except a tube that launches torpedoes full of written observations back towards Earth once the rocket is beyond radio range. Otherwise there don’t seem to have been many advances in rocket technology or interior design since Fritz Lang’s 1929 movie WOMAN IN THE MOON.
Even worse, there’s no attempt to show what life on a rocket might be like. I don’t expect scientific accuracy from a movie like this, but the crew lounge around in khakis and skirts, drink out of Styrofoam cups, smoke pipes, and behave more or less like they are flying first class from New York to Los Angeles. Even laughably ridiculous space gadgets would be better than none at all. Things improve a bit when they land on Mars. The crew changes into shimmery Martian outfits with insignia on the tunics -- that’s some solid sci-fi stuff there. The little bit we can see of the city looks like any generic city of tomorrow. It’s certainly nothing groundbreaking, but at least they tried to make it look futuristic.
But the main problem with the movie is that it’s just not ever exciting. The dialogue is dull and repetitive, and it’s hard to really care about the plot. Supposedly a faction of Martians want to steal the rocket technology and invade Earth (because their planet is dying, natch) but all that threat amounts to is one guy arguing in favor of invasion in the council chamber. We never see the Martian armies -- or even so much as a single weapon, since the little fighting in the movie is all done with fists -- so the invasion remains utterly abstract. There are also two insultingly boneheaded love stories going on in the background, but the less said about those the better.
What else happened this year?
-- The big sci-fi movie event of 1951 is definitely THE DAY THE EARTH STOOD STILL, which I would recommend to anybody in a heartbeat.
-- Howard Hawks’s THE THING FROM ANOTHER WORLD is quite good as well, and was eventually remade into an even better movie by John Carpenter in 1982.
-- THE MAN IN THE WHITE SUIT is a decent Ealing comedy starring Alec Guinness as a scientist who invents an indestructible fabric and finds himself pursued by interests in the textile industry who will stop at nothing to suppress his discovery.
If you only watch one sci-fi movie from 1951...
Stick with THE DAY THE EARTH STOOD STILL like everybody tells you. In fact, you can skip FLIGHT TO MARS altogether since there’s nothing here you can’t get from better movies.
Monday, January 26, 2009
Monday, January 19, 2009
1950: DESTINATION MOON
What’s it about?
When a military rocket launch designed to put a satellite in orbit around the Earth ends in failure and budget cuts, the general in charge turns to good old fashioned American industry (with its fabled know-how and stick-to-it-iveness) to get the job done. But rather than simply complete the original mission, they instead decide to send a manned rocket to the moon -- for the purpose of either allowing the U.S. to install missiles on the lunar surface or to stop unnamed hostile foreign powers from doing so (details are murky on this point).
A propaganda film starring Woody Woodpecker convinces the plutocrats of America to fund the moon shot, but a series of snags threaten to doom the mission. Meddling government bureaucrats and pesky public opinion force the rushed launch of a completely untested rocket with a last-minute astronaut replacement who hasn’t even been briefed on elementary facts like weightlessness. Later, inattention to basic safety precautions causes a spacewalk to end in a predictably bad way. A botched landing on the moon also uses up so much fuel that the crew is faced with (almost literally) the oldest dilemma in movie space travel -- one of them must stay behind to allow the others to leave.
Is it any good?
The main selling point of DESTINATION MOON is that it’s supposed to be a scientifically accurate picture of what it would actually take to get to the moon. To that end, they show off things like plausible spacesuits, airlocks, and no-spill drink containers. They also manfully admit to several science facts that even modern sci-fi movies often ignore -- like how there is no sound in a vacuum or how a rocket speeding through space looks practically stationary. They also don’t dodge the weightlessness -- there’s eventually some cheating with magnetic boots, but no pseudo-scientific gravity generators or other such nonsense.
The biggest downfall of the movie is that it’s pretty dry throughout, and especially so at the beginning. More running time is given to getting the funding for the mission than to the construction of the rocket or the solving of any engineering challenges, which is pretty disappointing. There are also no scenes of the crew training, and the way the rocket finally takes off with only 17 hours notice is patently ridiculous. (Even in 1950 they ought to have known that.) In fact, the whole political crisis that forces the early launch feels contrived and unnecessary. But I suppose if I wanted to see engineers solving the problems of space travel, I should watch a historical account of how the real Apollo missions went.
As far as the characters go, they barely have any existence outside of their roles as astronauts. For the most part, that’s fine since the movie is really primarily concerned with the spectacle of the moon mission. But it does make the final dilemma feel hollow and academic since there’s not really any reason why the audience should care which one of the astronauts stays behind. The moon parts of the movie are easily the best, however, and it’s pretty obvious that most of the set construction budget went into making the lunar surface look cool. I also thought the spacewalk sequence was pretty gripping -- but I feel that way about almost any spacewalk sequence. (This is no doubt the result of a deep-seated fear of floating away in space that I’ve harbored ever since my very young self watched General Zod toss a cosmonaut off the moon in SUPERMAN II.) But even the best and most exciting parts of DESTINATION MOON have been done and re-done dozens of times since 1950. That’s not really the fault of this movie, but it still makes it is seem predictable and creaky to modern eyes.
What else happened this year?
-- The only other sci-fi flick from 1950 that I could find information about is a picture called ROCKETSHIP X-M starring a young Lloyd Bridges. I didn’t bother watching that one, so I’m not sure if it’s any good.
If you only watch one sci-fi movie from 1950...
Since DESTINATION MOON is the only movie I’ve seen from this year, I guess it’s also the only one I can recommend. But you might as well skip the year unless you're really interested in 1950s sci-fi.
When a military rocket launch designed to put a satellite in orbit around the Earth ends in failure and budget cuts, the general in charge turns to good old fashioned American industry (with its fabled know-how and stick-to-it-iveness) to get the job done. But rather than simply complete the original mission, they instead decide to send a manned rocket to the moon -- for the purpose of either allowing the U.S. to install missiles on the lunar surface or to stop unnamed hostile foreign powers from doing so (details are murky on this point).
A propaganda film starring Woody Woodpecker convinces the plutocrats of America to fund the moon shot, but a series of snags threaten to doom the mission. Meddling government bureaucrats and pesky public opinion force the rushed launch of a completely untested rocket with a last-minute astronaut replacement who hasn’t even been briefed on elementary facts like weightlessness. Later, inattention to basic safety precautions causes a spacewalk to end in a predictably bad way. A botched landing on the moon also uses up so much fuel that the crew is faced with (almost literally) the oldest dilemma in movie space travel -- one of them must stay behind to allow the others to leave.
Is it any good?
The main selling point of DESTINATION MOON is that it’s supposed to be a scientifically accurate picture of what it would actually take to get to the moon. To that end, they show off things like plausible spacesuits, airlocks, and no-spill drink containers. They also manfully admit to several science facts that even modern sci-fi movies often ignore -- like how there is no sound in a vacuum or how a rocket speeding through space looks practically stationary. They also don’t dodge the weightlessness -- there’s eventually some cheating with magnetic boots, but no pseudo-scientific gravity generators or other such nonsense.
The biggest downfall of the movie is that it’s pretty dry throughout, and especially so at the beginning. More running time is given to getting the funding for the mission than to the construction of the rocket or the solving of any engineering challenges, which is pretty disappointing. There are also no scenes of the crew training, and the way the rocket finally takes off with only 17 hours notice is patently ridiculous. (Even in 1950 they ought to have known that.) In fact, the whole political crisis that forces the early launch feels contrived and unnecessary. But I suppose if I wanted to see engineers solving the problems of space travel, I should watch a historical account of how the real Apollo missions went.
As far as the characters go, they barely have any existence outside of their roles as astronauts. For the most part, that’s fine since the movie is really primarily concerned with the spectacle of the moon mission. But it does make the final dilemma feel hollow and academic since there’s not really any reason why the audience should care which one of the astronauts stays behind. The moon parts of the movie are easily the best, however, and it’s pretty obvious that most of the set construction budget went into making the lunar surface look cool. I also thought the spacewalk sequence was pretty gripping -- but I feel that way about almost any spacewalk sequence. (This is no doubt the result of a deep-seated fear of floating away in space that I’ve harbored ever since my very young self watched General Zod toss a cosmonaut off the moon in SUPERMAN II.) But even the best and most exciting parts of DESTINATION MOON have been done and re-done dozens of times since 1950. That’s not really the fault of this movie, but it still makes it is seem predictable and creaky to modern eyes.
What else happened this year?
-- The only other sci-fi flick from 1950 that I could find information about is a picture called ROCKETSHIP X-M starring a young Lloyd Bridges. I didn’t bother watching that one, so I’m not sure if it’s any good.
If you only watch one sci-fi movie from 1950...
Since DESTINATION MOON is the only movie I’ve seen from this year, I guess it’s also the only one I can recommend. But you might as well skip the year unless you're really interested in 1950s sci-fi.
INTRODUCTION
What is this thing?
At the beginning of 2009, I decided that I might as well watch the many classic science fiction movies that I’d never seen yet. After a little thinking, this evolved into a plan to watch at least on sci-fi flick from every year between 1950 and the present. I also thought it would be fun to watch the movies (as much as possible) in chronological order to get an idea of how things have changed over the past sixty years.
I’m starting with 1950 partly because it’s a nice round number, and partly because the fifties were the first decade when the movie industry really started churning out sci-fi flicks with any regularity. There are obviously some great sci-fi movies from years long before 1950 -- TWENTY THOUSAND LEAGUES UNDER THE SEA in 1916, THE LOST WORLD in 1925, METROPOLIS in 1927, BRIDE OF FRANKENSTEIN in 1935, MODERN TIMES in 1936, and so on. But after doing some research, it didn’t seem likely that I’d be able to find enough promising sci-fi movies that were readily available if I started any earlier than the fifties.
In reality, I’m often watching more than one movie for each year since there are often quite a few that sound interesting that I haven’t seen yet. There are also several well-established classics that I feel like I ought to watch again, since I haven’t seen many of them in ten years or so. But I am trying to pick some less well-known ones for the movies I write about. I’ve been pleased and a little surprised to see how many good sci-fi flicks there are that I’d never really heard much about before.
I’m not claiming that the movies I plan to write about are long lost secrets that nobody else knows about. Anything that’s available on DVD has some degree of notoriety, after all. But in picking a movie from 1958, for instance, it didn’t seem terribly interesting to write the thousandth article about THE FLY or THE BLOB or ATTACK OF THE 50 FT WOMAN -- all of them classics either outright or of the cult variety. So wherever possible, I’ve tried to dig a little deeper and find some lesser known movies that sound promising as well. Of course, by not sticking to the established classics I’ll likely come across a good many duds that aren’t really worth watching at all. But I’m expecting the pleasant surprises will more than outweigh the disappointments.
Having said all that, there are some years where I had trouble finding anything that sounded good but wasn’t already a classic of some sort. But it’s my hope that some other people will have seen some of the movies I write about and share their own opinions, so it’s not so bad to stay on the main roads at least part of the time.
So why science fiction?
For the most part, the qualities that make a good movie are the same in practically any genre. So, in that sense, choosing to watch only science fiction movies is arbitrary. I want to see some good movies, and the fact that these will be sci-fi movies is more or less incidental. But be that as it may, there is undeniably something unique about science fiction that accounts for at least part of its attraction for fans (just as there is something unique about any other genre).
The promise of science fiction is very often the promise of seeing something astounding, or weird, or mysterious, or frightening. Something, in short, beyond the realm of usual experience. This extraordinariness can be manifested in countless ways -- I won’t even attempt to list them here. But sci-fi might show us a sober view of where we are headed, or a satirical one of what we are now, or a brain-bending one of what we could become, or a fantastic one of worlds that will never exist. So, to that end, I do believe there is a different yardstick on which sci-fi often partly is (and frankly should be) judged. In other words, every great movie -- sci-fi or otherwise -- should constantly keep me wondering what will happen next. But a great sci-fi movie should also move me in some extraordinary way, and hopefully show me something new that I’ve never seen before. Or, at the very least, a new way of looking at something familiar.
In terms of what exactly “counts” as a sci-fi movie, I tend to be pretty lenient. In my mind there is a lot of overlap between science fiction, horror, and fantasy -- one genre often bleeds almost seamlessly into the next, and many movies either fall into more than one genre or don’t fit neatly in any. Therefore, I don’t intend to spend much time worrying about what is exactly science fiction and what isn’t. I usually know it when I see it, but if I do end up straying once or twice beyond the usual bounds of the genre -- well, so much the better. I believe that science fiction as a genre works best when it is a big tent that allows for many different styles and topics, rather than when it is narrowly and rigidly defined based on largely technical criteria.
But, Matt, aren’t most science fiction movies pretty bad?
There’s a famous axiom attributed to sci-fi writer Theodore Sturgeon that ninety percent of anything is crud. That was his way of refuting charges that the quality of science fiction is usually inferior to other kinds of stories. For the most part, I think what Sturgeon says is right. But there is no doubt that there are also special circumstances surrounding science fiction that has sometimes made it more susceptible to low-quality product than many other genres.
For one thing, there have been times when sci-fi stories were thought to be exclusively children’s stories. And often even today, sci-fi is called “escapist” in a way that’s not meant to be flattering. There are also certain factions of fans and creators within the genre who have very clear ideas of what they personally think qualifies (or, more often than not, doesn’t qualify) as “real” science fiction. For evidence of this, you need only check the letter columns of any sci-fi magazine to find angry letters from readers annoyed that such-and-such a story was printed in a science fiction magazine even though it didn’t match what they think science fiction ought to be.
So, yes, there is a lot of bad science fiction. Some of it’s created cynically by people who think that those who are interested in sci-fi don’t care about (or can’t judge) quality. Some of it’s the result of writers complying with arbitrary constraints that have nothing to do with telling a good story (and often get in the way of it). And some of it’s simply the ninety percent of crud that Sturgeon was talking about. Over time, that crud usually gets lost and forgotten -- but sci-fi again is a bit unusual in this respect as well. Midnight movie showcases like MYSTERY SCIENCE THEATER 3000 and theaters that show cult movies have kept alive an interest in “bad” sci-fi movies -- often old movies made on low budgets and often touted as “so bad it’s good”. And now that the DVD format has made it cheaper than ever to bring movies into homes, there are whole companies devoted to issuing these kinds of movies.
I’m not really much for the “so bad it’s good” philosophy, but I do find that I have a pretty high tolerance for what we might call B-movie or low budget defects. I can’t say that I delight in bad acting or silly props or embarrassing dialogue or nonsensical science, but I’m more than willing to look beyond them if there’s something really imaginative or unique going on at the core of the movie. Whenever possible, I prefer my sci-fi movies to be entirely good. But if they deliver where it counts, then I can turn a blind eye to the defects that come from small budgets, tight timetables, or non-professional crews. Having said that, there is a big difference between cheap special effects that are creatively deployed, and those that are dull and derivative. The same is true of implausible scripts, actors with limited ranges, recycled sets, and so on. I also ought to mention that I feel the same way about the low budget basements of practically every genre -- I have just as big a soft spot for the cheap western, the cheap horror flick, the cheap noir, or the cheap war movie that delivers the goods despite its shortcomings.
In any event, I know not everybody has the same tolerance for these B-movie defects as I do. So where movies seem to fall into the generally “bad” category, I’ll do my best to be honest about that -- even if I happen to think the movie is pretty darn good for other reasons. But, likewise, if I’m recommending a movie that I admit is low quality, you can bet that there’s something pretty imaginative or interesting about it nonetheless. I’ve seen enough sci-fi flicks with no imagination and no redeeming qualities to appreciate the ones that manage to wring a sparkle of creativity from the most limiting ingredients.
Well, that’s all I have to say by way of introduction. I hope you enjoy reading about my experiment in sci-fi films! And I hope to hear what other people think about these movies too!
At the beginning of 2009, I decided that I might as well watch the many classic science fiction movies that I’d never seen yet. After a little thinking, this evolved into a plan to watch at least on sci-fi flick from every year between 1950 and the present. I also thought it would be fun to watch the movies (as much as possible) in chronological order to get an idea of how things have changed over the past sixty years.
I’m starting with 1950 partly because it’s a nice round number, and partly because the fifties were the first decade when the movie industry really started churning out sci-fi flicks with any regularity. There are obviously some great sci-fi movies from years long before 1950 -- TWENTY THOUSAND LEAGUES UNDER THE SEA in 1916, THE LOST WORLD in 1925, METROPOLIS in 1927, BRIDE OF FRANKENSTEIN in 1935, MODERN TIMES in 1936, and so on. But after doing some research, it didn’t seem likely that I’d be able to find enough promising sci-fi movies that were readily available if I started any earlier than the fifties.
In reality, I’m often watching more than one movie for each year since there are often quite a few that sound interesting that I haven’t seen yet. There are also several well-established classics that I feel like I ought to watch again, since I haven’t seen many of them in ten years or so. But I am trying to pick some less well-known ones for the movies I write about. I’ve been pleased and a little surprised to see how many good sci-fi flicks there are that I’d never really heard much about before.
I’m not claiming that the movies I plan to write about are long lost secrets that nobody else knows about. Anything that’s available on DVD has some degree of notoriety, after all. But in picking a movie from 1958, for instance, it didn’t seem terribly interesting to write the thousandth article about THE FLY or THE BLOB or ATTACK OF THE 50 FT WOMAN -- all of them classics either outright or of the cult variety. So wherever possible, I’ve tried to dig a little deeper and find some lesser known movies that sound promising as well. Of course, by not sticking to the established classics I’ll likely come across a good many duds that aren’t really worth watching at all. But I’m expecting the pleasant surprises will more than outweigh the disappointments.
Having said all that, there are some years where I had trouble finding anything that sounded good but wasn’t already a classic of some sort. But it’s my hope that some other people will have seen some of the movies I write about and share their own opinions, so it’s not so bad to stay on the main roads at least part of the time.
So why science fiction?
For the most part, the qualities that make a good movie are the same in practically any genre. So, in that sense, choosing to watch only science fiction movies is arbitrary. I want to see some good movies, and the fact that these will be sci-fi movies is more or less incidental. But be that as it may, there is undeniably something unique about science fiction that accounts for at least part of its attraction for fans (just as there is something unique about any other genre).
The promise of science fiction is very often the promise of seeing something astounding, or weird, or mysterious, or frightening. Something, in short, beyond the realm of usual experience. This extraordinariness can be manifested in countless ways -- I won’t even attempt to list them here. But sci-fi might show us a sober view of where we are headed, or a satirical one of what we are now, or a brain-bending one of what we could become, or a fantastic one of worlds that will never exist. So, to that end, I do believe there is a different yardstick on which sci-fi often partly is (and frankly should be) judged. In other words, every great movie -- sci-fi or otherwise -- should constantly keep me wondering what will happen next. But a great sci-fi movie should also move me in some extraordinary way, and hopefully show me something new that I’ve never seen before. Or, at the very least, a new way of looking at something familiar.
In terms of what exactly “counts” as a sci-fi movie, I tend to be pretty lenient. In my mind there is a lot of overlap between science fiction, horror, and fantasy -- one genre often bleeds almost seamlessly into the next, and many movies either fall into more than one genre or don’t fit neatly in any. Therefore, I don’t intend to spend much time worrying about what is exactly science fiction and what isn’t. I usually know it when I see it, but if I do end up straying once or twice beyond the usual bounds of the genre -- well, so much the better. I believe that science fiction as a genre works best when it is a big tent that allows for many different styles and topics, rather than when it is narrowly and rigidly defined based on largely technical criteria.
But, Matt, aren’t most science fiction movies pretty bad?
There’s a famous axiom attributed to sci-fi writer Theodore Sturgeon that ninety percent of anything is crud. That was his way of refuting charges that the quality of science fiction is usually inferior to other kinds of stories. For the most part, I think what Sturgeon says is right. But there is no doubt that there are also special circumstances surrounding science fiction that has sometimes made it more susceptible to low-quality product than many other genres.
For one thing, there have been times when sci-fi stories were thought to be exclusively children’s stories. And often even today, sci-fi is called “escapist” in a way that’s not meant to be flattering. There are also certain factions of fans and creators within the genre who have very clear ideas of what they personally think qualifies (or, more often than not, doesn’t qualify) as “real” science fiction. For evidence of this, you need only check the letter columns of any sci-fi magazine to find angry letters from readers annoyed that such-and-such a story was printed in a science fiction magazine even though it didn’t match what they think science fiction ought to be.
So, yes, there is a lot of bad science fiction. Some of it’s created cynically by people who think that those who are interested in sci-fi don’t care about (or can’t judge) quality. Some of it’s the result of writers complying with arbitrary constraints that have nothing to do with telling a good story (and often get in the way of it). And some of it’s simply the ninety percent of crud that Sturgeon was talking about. Over time, that crud usually gets lost and forgotten -- but sci-fi again is a bit unusual in this respect as well. Midnight movie showcases like MYSTERY SCIENCE THEATER 3000 and theaters that show cult movies have kept alive an interest in “bad” sci-fi movies -- often old movies made on low budgets and often touted as “so bad it’s good”. And now that the DVD format has made it cheaper than ever to bring movies into homes, there are whole companies devoted to issuing these kinds of movies.
I’m not really much for the “so bad it’s good” philosophy, but I do find that I have a pretty high tolerance for what we might call B-movie or low budget defects. I can’t say that I delight in bad acting or silly props or embarrassing dialogue or nonsensical science, but I’m more than willing to look beyond them if there’s something really imaginative or unique going on at the core of the movie. Whenever possible, I prefer my sci-fi movies to be entirely good. But if they deliver where it counts, then I can turn a blind eye to the defects that come from small budgets, tight timetables, or non-professional crews. Having said that, there is a big difference between cheap special effects that are creatively deployed, and those that are dull and derivative. The same is true of implausible scripts, actors with limited ranges, recycled sets, and so on. I also ought to mention that I feel the same way about the low budget basements of practically every genre -- I have just as big a soft spot for the cheap western, the cheap horror flick, the cheap noir, or the cheap war movie that delivers the goods despite its shortcomings.
In any event, I know not everybody has the same tolerance for these B-movie defects as I do. So where movies seem to fall into the generally “bad” category, I’ll do my best to be honest about that -- even if I happen to think the movie is pretty darn good for other reasons. But, likewise, if I’m recommending a movie that I admit is low quality, you can bet that there’s something pretty imaginative or interesting about it nonetheless. I’ve seen enough sci-fi flicks with no imagination and no redeeming qualities to appreciate the ones that manage to wring a sparkle of creativity from the most limiting ingredients.
Well, that’s all I have to say by way of introduction. I hope you enjoy reading about my experiment in sci-fi films! And I hope to hear what other people think about these movies too!
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