Rocketship X-M (1950)



Original 1950 Poster

Rocketship X-M (1950) 

Starring Lloyd Bridges, Osa Massen, and John Emry.  There is a misconception among fans of classic science fiction that Destination Moon (1950) is the first space-travel movie. The truth is, director Kurt Neumann beat that film to the punch by at least three weeks with Rocketship X-M. When writer Orville Hampton wrote the original script, he imagined an adventure about the first men on the moon.  However, due to similarities with the more well-known Destination Moon, the story elements changed to put the crew on Mars.  The film opens with a press conference featuring the team of astronauts answering questions about their historic launch.

The odd thing is, they are all dressed on normal civilian clothes while calmly answering questions and providing exposition. Meanwhile, the voice on the intercom is providing a countdown minutes from the launch! Don't you guys need to, I don't know, put on your space suits, maybe hop on board the ship?

We meet the star, pilot Colonel Graham, played with the normal coolness by Lloyd Bridges. He was a great actor, but unfortunately, I primarily associate him with Airplane!  When things got bad, I kept waiting for him to comment something like, "Looks like I picked a bad week to stop sniffing glue."

 

Other team members include our love interest, Dr. Lisa Van Horn. This was pretty progressive for 1950, having a primary scientific genius played by a woman. I began thinking about how ahead of it's time this movie is. Unfortunately, that rising hope was quickly squashed when she makes a computation that does not agree with that of the other math genius, Dr. Eckstrom, played by John Emry. He quickly dismisses her computations, commenting about how she's just an emotional woman. Yikes. So, the big question here is: why even bring a second mathematician if her calculations are to be thrown out in the event of a conflict? It seems like a waste of resources, but I digress.

So the movie failed in the social progressiveness department, but it is still farther ahead than many sci-fi films of today. At least she keeps her clothes on. Where the movie earns marks for me is in the superior visuals (for a 1950 movie).  The story has our heroes fly the ship through an asteroid field, and the special effects are not bad. Remember, you have to judge movies from the era based on other films from the same time-frame. Young fans of Star Wars Episode 1 might sneer at the models and bluescreen work, but I enjoy it. It's part of the charm.

In addition, the film scores points with me because they at least try to be close to scientifically possible.  The characters encounter zero gravity, which is to my knowledge the first time it is depicted in a theatrically released movie. The characters themselves do not float, but smaller items such as pens and a harmonica do float, creating some comical moments. 

They intend to go to the moon, but due to some mechanical failure that is never fully explained, they slingshot through the Earth's gravity and accelerate wildly, causing everyone to pass out. When they wake up hours later, they are in Mars orbit. OK, so the film is not 100% scientifically plausible, but the design of the ship which incorporates a gyro-style compartment which was envisioned to be in use at the time, combined with their use of planetary gravity to assist launch and landings is pretty well conceived.

My biggest beef with this movie occurs here. They encounter Martians, who unfortunately are just humans in a costume. No makeup, no attempt to look different. This kind of cop-out makes me angry in a movie about space aliens. It reminds me of the short-lived TV series based on War of the Worlds in the 80's. It had martians in the first episode that looked like the awesome aliens from the original George Pal movie, but then the writers must have been told they had no budget, so subsequent episodes featured Martians who...you guessed it, magically inhabited human bodies and therefore required no makeup. Not surprisingly, that show ended quickly as America tuned out, but I digress.

Overall, I recommend it for buffs, but not mainstream audiences, who may get bored with the long segments in space, and eventually walking around Mars's rocky landscape for what feels like an eternity.  I won't give away the ending, in case you want to download this from the Internet on one of the many Public Domain sites. It's not a bad way to kill an hour and 20 minutes if you are into old Sci-fi and B-movies like myself. Final verdict: 2 1/2 out of 4.