‘MOON’ MOVIE A MUST-SEE, SO HERE’S A FEATURETTE

Starcruzer featured a trailer for Moon back on May 15, and now it’s on limited release, the movie is reaping acclaim from all corners. With a downbeat look at space along the lines of minor classics like Outlander and Silent Running, Moon makes a fresh alternative to the cgi-fest that is normal sci-fi fare today. So here’s an interesting featurette backgrounder that should tempt you into a visit.

Unusually for a current production, many of Moon’s effects rely on traditional model-making skills, and anyone who has seen Space 1999, a 48-episode series made from 1975-77 by Gerry Anderson, of Thunderbirds fame, will be familiar with the look and feel of model moon trucks crawling across a dusty high-contrast simulated lunar surface.

And Space 1999 had a familiar flavour for viewers of the time, for Gerry Anderson’s special-effects director, Brian Johnson, had worked on the seminal movie made by Stanley Kubrick, 2001 A Space Odyssey, which did the whole Moonbase thing in a way that’s still unequalled.