First Men in the Moon (1964)

Director:

Nathan Juran

Writers:

Nigel Kneale (screenplay) &
Jan Read (screenplay) ...

Release Date:

20 November 1964 (USA)

Genre:

Adventure | Sci-Fi

Tagline:

H.G. Wells' Astounding Adventure in Dynamation!

Plot:

Based on the HG Wells story. The world is delighted when a space craft containing a crew made up of the world's astronauts lands on the moon...

Plot Keywords:

Moon | Astronaut | Flag | Space | Flashback

Cast

Edward Judd	...	Arnold Bedford
Martha Hyer	...	Katherine 'Kate' Callender
Lionel Jeffries	...	Joseph Cavor
Miles Malleson	...	Dymchurch Registrar
Norman Bird	...	Stuart, Moon Landing Crew
Gladys Henson	...	Nursing Home Matron
Hugh McDermott	...	Richard Challis, UN Space Agency
Betty McDowall	...	Margaret Hoy, UN Space Agency

Also Known As:

H.G. Wells' First Men in the Moon (UK) (complete title)

Runtime:

103 min

Country:

UK

Language:

English

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

2.20 : 1

Sound Mix:

70 mm 6-Track (70 mm prints) | Mono (Westrex Recording System) (35 mm prints)

Certification:

Australia:PG | Finland:K-12 | Norway:11 | Sweden:11 | UK:U | West Germany:12 (nf)

Filming Locations:

Chertsey, Surrey, England, UK

Company:

Ameran Films

Trivia:

The original H.G. Wells book has an atmosphere on the moon, so the characters required no space suit of any type, making the diving suits worn by the characters an addition of the filmmakers.

Goofs:

Anachronisms: Large 48-star US flag in the parade scene (presumably stock footage).

Quotes:

Selenite: It's... absolutely... imperial.

Movie Connections:

Featured in Fantastic Fantasy Fright-o-Rama Show Vol. 1 (1996) (V)

A Film Of Two Halves

Judging by the comments of my fellow IMDb contributers it seems FIRST MEN IN THE MOON is a film that doesn't cheat the memory . If for example you loved this movie as a kid you'll still love it as an adult . I'm afraid I have to disagree with this groundswell of opinion because I too loved this movie as a child but watching it again today I came very close to switching it off on a couple of occasions

Why ? Well let's look at the story structure . The opening contains a hook of the first manned flight to the moon where a British union flag is found and it's discovered that Senior citizen Arnold Bedford was in fact part of an expedition who had visited the moon several decades earlier . So far so good but then the film spends almost a whole hour back in Victorian England setting up the characters of Bedford , eccentric inventor Joseph Carvor and Kate Callender . You'll spend most of this running time trying to work out if Carvor is more irritating than Kate in much the same way as historians debate if Stalin was a worse dictator than Hitler . It's not helped by the performances of Jeffries and Hyer

Things do radically improve when the trio take a long awaited trip to the moon and it's very easy to see why so many people fondly remember this film . You could complain that the selenites are obviously small of stature ( Child ? ) actors dressed in cloth , some of the sets are unconvincing etc but at least director Nathan Juran has tried - And to a certain degree succeeded - in bringing a sense of wonder to the movie . It should also be pointed out that the special effects are very impressive for their day and still hold up well . Also take note of the eldritch sound effects for some of the scenes set in the selenite base and the chilling voice of the Grand Lunar

This is certainly a film of two halves and its glowing reputation is all down to the second half . It's also a film where the effects from Ray Harryhausen are more important than the story structure . It's a film that will almost certainly disappoint fans of the original novel and will equally disappoint fans of co-writer Nigel Kneale whose work here lacks the compelling intelligence of much of his other work