The First Men in the Moon

The First Men in the Moon is a low budget BBC4 adaptation of the HG Wells book. The film stars Mark Gatiss as Cavor and Rory Kinnear as Bedford. Gatiss also adapted the screenplay.

The setting is July 1969 on the eve of the first lunar landing as a 90 year old Julius Bedford tells a young lad the story of how two men made the first journey to the Moon back in 1909.

He recounts that when he was a young man, he met Professor Cavor who had invented 'Cavorite', a substance that blocked the force of gravity and they worked together to build a ship that would fly them to the moon and encounter the Selenites.

The film is an affectionate tribute to the HG Wells book but the pacing is uneven, the drama is low key and the special effects display its low budget origins.

Gatiss and Kinnear do their best to elevate the production values but the direction does not help too much to make it more memorable.