La conquista dello spazio

Not George Pal's best,but at least he had us farther along then we are now.His unflagging optimism was all up there on the screen.As a kid who built space ship models I loved this stuff.The film drags a little now,but the dead astronaut's body tagging along for the ride till his "at sea" burial,kept me awake all night at age 8.movie trivia moment:character actor William Redfield who washed out of the mission crew got to pilot the miniaturized sub in "Fantastic Voyage".Talk about perseverance!

I first saw this one Saturday afternoon when I was about 14 and immediately fell in love with it.I realize it is a little corny at times,and Mickey Shaughnessy is pretty hard to take,but otherwise it is a fun movie.Good special effects,and the cast does a nice job(no matter what critics of this movie say),especially Walter Brooke ,one of my favorite unsung character actors.Watch it if you get the chance!

Conquest of Space is certainly worth a look for anyone examining the more realistic (at least at the time) cinematic examinations of space exploration. The space "wheel" scenes might be viewed as primitive precursors to the station in 2001. The acting and script are typical of the era--the comic relief in particular is grating at times. But the effects are well-done, especially shots of approaching rockets viewed from space, and meteoric fragments which bombard a hapless spaceman. A minor effort next to Pal's other films of the period, but not a bad way to spend an hour and a half.

Producer George Pal was a man of vision and accurate imagination. The one thing that he can be given undeniable credit for is how accurately he portrayed the surface of Mars. The Mars Explorer photographs when we had them revealed a world not unlike what we see in Conquest Of Space. Of course a lot of credit is also due to scientist Willy Ley whose books are the basis of the film.

Conquest In Space is a future world concept from 1955 where we now have a World Space Organization where the USA is taking the lead in space exploration. An international space station is constructed and people live there months at a time. It's under the command of General Walter Brooke who is concerned with the psychological problems of being too long in space. So he wants a handpicked crew for the exploration of the moon.

But the authorities on earth are shooting for bigger game. Kind of unrealistically they decide to forget the moon and aim for Mars. Brooke is in command and his eventual crew is his own son Captain Eric Fleming, Sgts. Mickey Shaughnessy, Benson Fong, and Phil Foster. In this future world no blacks or women are on the space station. The presence of the latter might well have cured at least some of the problems the guys were having.

On the way there Brooke develops some space problems of his own as he gets downright metaphysical, wondering if God meant for us to leave the planet earth that He bequeathed as a domain for man. Those issues cause all kinds of problems for the rest of the Mars expedition that are the basis for the plot of the film.

Conquest Of Space is imaginative but also intelligent. No hostile Mars creatures are found at least not in the corner of Mars they land. It was a realistic assessment of man surviving in a hostile environment and one of the better science fiction films of the Fifties.

It is interesting that Pal felt the first astronauts would be like navy crews - I don't think that NASA ever sent NCOs into space, only the best qualified scientists and pilots. The age of the commander would have disqualified him as well, and as it turns out, that would have been better for the expedition. I found the Irish "tag-along" character deeply annoying, and I am not sure how he could have managed to sneak on board.

All that aside, this was Hollywood's first serious attempt to reach Mars, and considering that Viking hadn't been there yet, it's not too bad. Shame about the blue skies...

Most interesting for me was that the futuristic "minimalist" fittings and fixtures on the space wheel look like nothing other than the style of the sets for the really up-to-date Star Trek: Enterprise.

Yes, just like the present, it's going to be a retro future, folks!