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Since all official attempts to launch a rocketship into the air seem to
be sabotaged, General Thayer (Tom Powers) turns to a private enterprise,
American Industries, & its head Jim Barnes (John Archer), to build him
a rocket to fly to the moon, because it seems that the US needs tthe moon
as missile launchpad.
Soon the rocket is ready to be tested when a few local politicians try
to prevent a stat ... now it's up to Barnes to collect a little crew &
fly to the moon in 17 hours - & his crew is himself as skipper,
General Thayer, Cargraves (Warner Anderson), who has consturcted the
engine as engineer, & naive young Joe (Dick Wesson), a construction
worker who just happens to be the only one who can work the radio.
The flight to the moon goes alright even if the crew has to exit the
spaceship in midflight for epairs & almost lose Joe into deep space in
the process.
Having landed on the moon, they find it to be a barren rock (pretty
much the way it really is, a rarity in1950's science fiction), but they
also find an unlimited source of uranium ...
When they want to go back though, they realize they have too little
fuel to take them all & their equipment back, so they stip the ship of
pretty much everything there is, but still ... 110 pounds too much. &
while the 3 brains of the operation - Barnes, the general & Cargraves
- are still arguing who is going to make the ultimate sacrifice & stay
behind, Joe in a grande gesture abandons ship ...
But in the end Barnes figures out a way how they can lose the last 110
pounds too, without leaving anyone, even joe, behind ... The end, or just
the beginning.
Cartoon character Woody Woodpecker is used in a sequence explaining the workings of the
rocketship.
A nice piece of 1950's sci-fi-nostalgia, & shot in colour, too (a
rarity among 1950's science fiction films), but overall it's just too
scientific & a bit too short on story to really stay entertaining
throughout.
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