Truly Dreadful Film

This movie is the proof that the world is becoming a sick and dumb place

The plot isn't so bad, but the pace of storytelling is too slow which makes people bored. Certain moments are so obvious and unnecessary for the main plot. I would've fast-forwarded those moments if it was an online streaming. The ending looks like implying a sequel, not sure if this movie will get one

The story, direction, characters, and writing/dialogue is akin to taking a tranquilizer shot to the neck, but everything else was so well done.

The USAF is planning a trip to Mars. While this has some beautiful visuals, once they're on the way, the usual stuff happens. One guy gets killed during EVA, the Colonel (one of the characters fathers) becomes a religious nut who nearly kills them all, and this version of Mars is way off. (For a better version see Robinson Crusoe on Mars), but it's still worth seeing. I can only wonder what Pal would have done with an A budget.

I don't know what to make of this film- it is OK production-wise. It is way too talky definitely, but the acting is quite good by the some of the cast (although Phil Foster is just terrible) so when most of them talk its OK as such. The talk is well staged and competently written. Its almost as if the producers and director were thinking in terms of producing a stage play- not usually a good approach to an outer space movie.The artwork is above average and excellently done. Even the spacecraft are above average for the 1950's.The whole film is competent but they forgot one thing- THEY FORGOT TO INCLUDE ANY ENTERTAINMENT VALUE. The main reason for this is simply lack of action. Even the increase in activity at the end is not given much punch by the cast.Its good to see the young William Redfield and young Ross Martin. However they aren't given much to do. Would Ross Martin have been well used in "Wild Wild West" if just standing and talking? His acting would have been good but... unless you're doing Shakespeare an excessive amount of talk probably isn't satisfying enough to a movie audience.Someone should issue an edited version with Phil Foster cut out- and why not, he doesn't add anything anyway.

This film has good-for-the-time FX, but unfortunately has a few really egregious errors depicting astronauts kicking themselves off a space platform in a zero-g vacuum. In a better film, that kind of error would be more tolerable, but this is not such a film. There are some good actors and some good moments here and there, and by virtue of this being a big budget George Pal 1950's production, an old school scifi fan is going to have a bit of fun here and there with this film. But the enjoyment is radically impaired by numerous instances of over-the-top and embarrassing sentimentality, emotionalism, and feeble attempts at comic relief. This is a good film to make fun of, but is no fun if you try to take it seriously. It has little in common with the good Pal films, such as Destination Moon, War of the Worlds, When Worlds Collide, other than FX. It is interesting, however, to note that this movie contains many plot elements and scenes that would later be included in '2001: A Space Odyssey:' 1. Ferris Wheel type space station and shuttle scenes 2. Repairing an antenna on a space walk scene 3. Picture phone communication between an astronaut and his lover exposing the emotional estrangement of the couple ENGAGE SPOILER WARNING 4. Decompression of space vehicle scene 5. Crew member going nuts and trying to kill everyone on the mission

During the 1950s, Hollywood made a ton of films about voyages to the Moon or Mars. Most of these films look very quaint and old fashioned when seen today, but you must allow for the fact that they simply couldn't produce the grand special effects we take for granted in more modern films. Plus, while the way the trips occur seem pretty strange compared to the actual moon landings, you must also allow that back in the 1950s it was still all speculation--they simply didn't know better about many of the important aspects of such a journey.However, despite some very old fashioned ideas about such a voyage, CONQUEST OF SPACE is a very good film for its day. Much of this is because unlike most of the other films of the genre, this one does not use stock clips of old V-2 launches and features all original rocket and space shots. Sure, the models in this production are a bit on the cheesy side, but you can tell they at least tried to get it right. In particular, what I founds interesting is that they used a space shuttle-like craft to go to Mars--not a more traditional rocket.The film was also interesting because instead of the traditional bug-eyed monsters or malevolent external forces like some films employed, the big nemesis of this film is space fatigue and mental illness caused by this exhaustion. The only negative about this was later in the film when the general obviously was insane due to these effects and yet his best friend so doggedly refused to admit it--even when the guy did everything but put on a hat and declare that he was Napoleon!! The only other thing that bothered me about the film is that like some of these types of films, there was a crazy notion that the film needed a comic relief crew member (Siegel). While not an uncommon plot device, you'd sure think that the Earth with its billions of people would have someone better and smarter than him!! Overall, an excellent film for people like me who like this genre, though I can pretty safely assume that many people today would not be particularly interested in the film. It's a shame, as it's an interesting glimpse into the 1950s.