Mission Stardust (1967)

Such a frustrating disappointment

Sorry, this movie sucks

Excellent but underrated film

It's complicated... I really like the directing, acting and writing but, there are issues with the way it's shot that I just can't deny. As much as I love the storytelling and the fantastic performance but, there are also certain scenes that didn't need to exist.

"Ni panda, na na ko!" I offer all the diamonds seen in this movie to the one who tells me what it means. It's the first replica of that alien language spoken by the sick old man of leukemia, for which all the characters are starting to function and the final product is this film. We see stamped cardboard decorations which are not great, space suits of material like garbage bags, the same. The coolest element to see is the beautiful Swedish actress Essy Persson, 26 years old at the time when the film was made (1967). Without the sex appeal of her body, the movie would be totally impossible to watch. That's why 5 stars.

A mission to the moon discovers a couple of aliens who are stranded there in a large spacecraft. It turns out one of them has leukaemia, so the astronauts agree to return with them to earth to seek out a physician who can treat this. But there are unenlightened/corrupt human forces to contend with back on terra firma.For me this was a film of two parts – the sci-fi section on the moon and the more action-orientated section on earth. My issue with the film was that the first bit is much more interesting but only constitutes about a third of the movie. Once the action relocates to Earth it loses a lot of its interest and becomes a slightly tiresome action caper. I guess that overall this awkward combination of sci-fi with a crime/action story is one of the things that makes Mission Stardust quite distinctive. But for me its good parts were loaded at the start, meaning that by the end it felt a little disappointing to me.It's a 60's sci-fi film, so some slack has to be given regarding effects work. Quite a lot of them are really bad here but there is some decent model work for the spacecraft, while the robots were pretty original in design. The moon scenes in general were pretty well done and had a sort of Star Trek original series type of charm. The lead male characters were quite forgettable but the lead female alien Thora was quite striking and a good character. It is also worth pointing out that, like a lot of Italian genre movies of the time, it has a very good soundtrack as well. So, there are good things about this film but overall there weren't enough to save it from its tedious aspects.

It's not a good movie, but I've seen worse bad movies. The plot is not like the books. Please consider that the books tackle the huge question of what happens when aliens are encountered and the changes it means for the world. The movie follows a familiar arc for science fiction movies of its era. The events happen, but are arranged so that when it is over the world is left essentially unchanged. It would be interesting to read an account of the making of the film from Clark Dalton's point of view.Now that I've said that, I can say that I find it an enjoyable movie just for the simple reason of being able to see these characters on screen. Thora comes out the best: fierce, beautiful, smart, dangerous, all to a degree which I think is unusual for the sixties. Some might even find her an improvement on the book Thora; at the very least Essy Persson's beauty is easy to appreciate.

For the most part, Mission Stardust ignores the actual story of the first novel of the popular in Europe sci fi series, grafting on an uninteresting international crime subplot and amping up the romance and sexual innuendo between Rhodan (the suitably cast Lang Jeffries)and Thora (the astonishing Essy Persson). Burdened by very poor special effects and a limp supporting cast (poor Reggy gets next to no screen attention), this is a middling sci fi entry with a decent soundtrack but little appeal for any but the most anal Rhodanites.