12 to the Moon

A slapdash screenplay filled with random emergencies, 15 second solutions, random melodrama and emotional outbursts, and worse than usual unscientific "science" cripple what is nonetheless an optimistic effort.

The ship boasts a pre-Star Trek multicultural crew, but even here the screenwriters can't resist making the African man the superstitious one, and the Japanese woman the one who is capable of on-the-spot translation of hieroglyphics which "resemble Chinese" characters.

Still, it is an interesting effort within the context of the international space race, and worth 75 minutes for fans of that era's matinee science fiction culture.

Let me just say first, that it was a very noble idea for the moon to be explored as a global effort. They had representatives of many nations and even a black man and two women! (Actually pretty bold ideas at the time.) And even in the midst of the Red scare, they had a Russian, who, despite being a jerk, stops another European from sabotaging a mission to save the U.S. Yes, the movie seems to have been made with noble intentions towards world peace. That said, this is one big turkey. First, no one involved with the movie had any idea about what the moon and space were really like. (They have steam coming out of craters, and several clusters of meteors just between earth and the moon.) Second, the SFX are pitiful. (The ship at times has visible strings, and at one point a stick. The moon also appears to have Stage lights at one point.) These ingredients makes it a fairly awful movie. My recommendation? Watch the MST3K version and applaud the good intent but laugh at how awful everything else is.

12 to the Moon (1960) has ordinary special effects, acting and direction while a variety of plot devices at least keeps the action going.

The spaceship which lands on the moon is called the Lunar Eagle One. Nine years after this movie was released, the first human landing on the moon was accomplished in a lunar lander called the Eagle.

Coincidentally, the six NASA manned moon missions had a total of twelve astronauts who walked on the lunar surface.

For real-life lunar missions, it was originally conceived that a mission to the moon might involve the launching of a complete rocket, sending it to the moon, landing it on the surface and taking off again for return to earth. As we know, by the time of the Mercury, Gemini and Apollo missions that idea had been ditched in favour of using a multi-staged rocket and employing command and lunar modules to undertake the moon landing mission.

Instead of having a cast of thousands going on a mission to the moon along with the associated problems of weight to fuel ratios, as well as oxygen, food and water supplies, the Apollo missions had a crew of three with two to land on the lunar surface and one to remain in the orbiting command module.

In relation to the Secretary General of the ISO's speech at the start of the film, many people today might recall the global telecast of the first manned moon landing in 1969, along with the name of the lunar lander ("Eagle.") Despite it being a US mission, the landing was proclaimed as a "giant leap for all mankind."

This 1960 release was the first U. S. science fiction film to have a spaceship with a multi-racial crew, six months after the East German/Polish production of "The Silent Star"/"First Spaceship on Venus" (1960) with its multi-racial crew.

Considering the era in which the film was made, the composition of the crew should keep even wokey-dokey, PC & inclusive obsessed modern audiences reasonably happy. The international make-up of the crew was also quite an innovative idea for the time considering that such a notion hadn't really become a reality on such a scale until the development of the International Space Station program.

Putting racial and gender considerations aside, it appears that compatibility and emotional stability weren't factors in the selection process considering how some of the crew fly off at the handle over nationalistic and ideological differences.

What shows through is the speculative nature of our view of space and space flight at the time the film was made. Many still believed that there might be life, even intelligent life on Mars and Venus. Such films as 12 to the Moon ought to be viewed as both harmless entertaining film fun and as a snapshot of the values, attitudes, concerns and ideas of the time.

"12 to the Moon" is certainly not a very good sci-fi film, though with so many terrible sci-fi films made during this same era, at least it cannot be counted among them. Heck, at times the film almost is good...almost.

The film is about an international space flight to the moon with 12 astronauts from 9 different nations. Despite this, all of them sound pretty much like Americans...except for some of the astronauts from enemy nations--they are a bit like cartoon characters. It's especially annoying when the Russian astronaut argues with the three Americans and talks about the joys of communism. It's all a lot of Cold War hooey. Fortunately, this crappy dialog ends when they land on the moon. Unfortunately, the moon is inhabited by super- intelligent creatures that communicate to the crew telepathically and they warn them to get lost...which they promptly do. However, these nasty moon folk aren't very nice and do all sorts of nasty things to prevent them from getting back and telling the rest of the human race about them. Ultimately, a really stupid plan is executed and the day is saved...or is it?

The biggest problem with the movie aren't the silly sets but the dumb dialog...and the film too often sounds as if the film were rushed to completion. According to IMDb, that's exactly what happened and the film was made in a paltry 8 days! Occasionally interesting...but not very.

This movie has been misunderstood and slammed by some of the reviewers. At the time of the production in 1959, we still didn't even know exactly what the Earth looked like from space! All we had were a pitiful few almost useless "trophy" satellites careening around the Earth... Martians and intelligent life on Venus were still open topics for scientific discussion! It was a great time for speculation and open-minded thought. And on the other hand, the Cold War era movies always had to have a political morality issue thrown in... they actually still tried to put values into their work. Todays audiences should be proud to stand on the shoulders of the people who built the world they have the luxury of spitting on. It's actually pretty cool to watch the maker's conception of future space exploration. It's a shame we are too prejudiced to share their dream for an hour or so. The rocket may resemble a butane lighter and the meteors may not be real, but hey... it's an old movie!!! Get a grip on yourself and a bowl of popcorn and enjoy this piece of pre-spaceflight speculation for what it is.