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Review
by
Brian Lindsey
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6
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8 |
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10
= Highest Rating |
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On
the heels of the classical mythology-based Jason
and the Argonauts, visual effects maestro
Ray Harryhausen turned his attention once again
to 19th Century science fiction. In 1961 he'd
brought Jules Verne's Mysterious
Island to the screen; now it would
be War of the Worlds author H.G. Wells'
turn with First Men in
the Moon.
There are fewer stop-motion creatures in First
Men than is usual in Harryhausen's films,
but it's still a prime showcase for the best in
'60s-era special effects.
Much less liberty is taken with Wells' story
than was the case with Mysterious
Island —
which, after all, didn't feature any giant monsters
in the original novel. The inclusion of a female
character is the main concession to 20th Century
audiences. A wraparound framing device involving
a fictional mid-'60s lunar landing by a United
Nations space team certainly dates the picture
("Sgt. Andrew Martin, the farm boy from
Indiana, touched by the finger of fate to be the
first man to set foot on the moon!")
but is nicely pulled off nonetheless. After touching
down on the lunar surface, the U.N. mission's
international crew are astonished to find a tattered
Union Jack and some papers dating from 1899, claiming
Earth's satellite for Her Majesty Queen Victoria.
Could someone have possibly visited the moon 65
years earlier? It's too fantastic to believe.
A team of investigators traces the papers to an
elderly man living in an English nursing home.
His name is Arnold Bedford, and he has a most
incredible tale to tell.
England, 1899. Erstwhile playwright Arnold
Bedford (Island of Terror's
Edward Judd) rents a peaceful cottage in the countryside,
ostensibly to do some writing. Something of a
con man, he's actually hiding out from his creditors,
a problem his pretty American fiancée Kate (Martha
Hyer) is blissfully unaware of. He hopes to keep
the creditors at bay and stall Kate's marriage
plans until he can come up with some scheme to
revitalize his finances. Opportunity knocks in
the form of Joseph Cavor (Revenge
of Frankenstein's Lionel Jeffries), the oddball
scientist who lives in a big manor house on the
adjoining property. An excitable, absentminded
eccentric, Cavor has for years been working on
a project he claims will change the course of
history. Bedford thinks his neighbor a likely
candidate for the loony bin —
until, that is, he gets a personal demonstration
of Cavor's invention. Modestly dubbed "Cavorite"
by its creator, it is a substance that can 'shut
off' the force of gravity. In liquid form it's
inert, but once dried to a hardened state the
anti-gravitational properties take effect, sending
any object it's coated with skyward. The commercially
minded Bedford sees only the vast fortune to be
made; Cavor himself has a less practical application
in mind: a voyage to the moon. To this end Cavor
has constructed a hollow iron sphere, with built-in
retractable shutters which he plans to coat with
Cavorite. When the shutters are extended, the
force of gravity is cut off; when retracted (and
obviously somehow shielded, though this isn't
explained), the effect is reversed. By means of
controlling the shutters in different combinations
the craft can be steered.
Bedford thinks he's stark raving mad, of course,
but looming financial ruin and a falling-out with
Kate bring about a change of heart. (He really
needs to skip out on those debts, apparently.)
Kate marches over to Cavor's to confront her less-than-honest
fiancé at the very moment planned for the sphere's
departure. With the shutters deployed and the
sphere ready to go at any second, there's no choice
but to drag Kate inside before the force generated
by liftoff kills her. Thus the three passengers
are hurled towards the moon, sustained by the
bottled oxygen and provisions stowed aboard.
After a very rough landing
(which should have dashed them all to jelly),
Cavor and Bedford don diving suits to explore
the lunar surface. They don't get very far before
stumbling upon a subterranean passage that leads
them beneath the moon's crust; they're astonished
to discover an Earth-like oxygen atmosphere present
in the caverns. Even more startling is their face-to-face
encounter with a Selenite —
an insect-like moon creature wielding a spear.
The inner core of the moon is teeming with them,
their regimented society akin to that of a terrestrial
beehive. Bedford (upholding the human axiom of
"kill first and ask questions later") slays a
number of the Selenites when the creatures try
to prod him and Cavor deeper within the tunnels.
They make their way back to the surface only to
discover that the sphere —
and with it, Kate —
is gone! Tracks in the dust indicate the sphere
has been dragged below by the Selenites. The two
men are faced with no alternative but to penetrate
the alien city, to rescue Kate and recover their
only means of returning home.
More fantasy than science fiction, really,
First Men in the Moon
is a delightfully old fashioned adventure suitable
for the entire family. Jeffries is perfectly cast
as the obsessed, scatterbrained Cavor; he gets
all the laughs here, though I must admit the very
broad comedic bits are at times a tad overdone.
(Cavor has the increasingly annoying habit of
repeating phrases twice in a row, as in "It is
a secret! It is a secret!" and "I will tell you!
I will tell you!") The addition of the Kate character,
while understandable, generally serves only to
pad the film with extraneous scenes, particularly
during the first two-thirds. Your patience may
be tested while waiting for Cavor's little expedition
to finally get going. Once it does, though, we're
firmly back in Harryhausen's magical hands.
Since the story doesn't call for many monsters
—
apart from a few leader types and the Grand Lunar,
supreme ruler of the moon, the Selenites are portrayed
by either children or midgets in costumes —
the focus of the special effects is the architecture
of the subterranean city and the weird technology
of its inhabitants. These effects hold up remarkably
well today, still permitting a suspension of disbelief
that the sequences occurring on the moon's surface
most certainly do not. (Rest assured that Harryhausen
manages to throw in at least one cool giant-sized
monster, in this instance the caterpillar-like
'Moon Cow' of Wells' novel.) Under the capable
direction of sci-fi/fantasy vet Nathan Juran and
featuring a splendid score by composer Laurie
Johnson (The Avengers), First
Men in the Moon should —
despite the slow spots —
readily delight children of all ages... especially
those middle-aged Baby Boomers like me who grew
up watching these fantastical films.
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The
Columbia DVD presents First
Men In The Moon in 2.35:1 Widescreen, utilizing
a generally excellent transfer. Aside from a bit
of speckling here and there it looks almost flawless.
A strong "Discrete" Surround audio track
(Mono 4.0) does a surprisingly good job with Johnson's
score.
Those who've already purchased other Columbia-Harryhausen
DVD releases will be disappointed with the extras
provided. The same documentary featured on at least
3 of them, The Harryhausen Chronicles, is
offered here, too. Narrated by Leonard Nimoy, it's
a worthwhile retrospective of the effects master's
career, but I've already seen it before — a bunch
of times. Ditto for the This Is Dynamation
featurette, a short promo reel for The
7th Voyage of Sinbad. Three theatrical
trailers are also included, for the main feature
plus 7th Voyage of Sinbad
and The
Golden Voyage of Sinbad. (EC's DVD rating
of '8' for the disc is conditional on not
owning any of the other Harryhausen DVDs from Columbia-TriStar.
Otherwise, it's a '6'.) 9/23/02 |
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