Le Voyage Dans la Lune (1902)

Le Voyage Dans la Lune is Georges Méliès' most famous film, very loosely based on the novel by H.G. Wells. This 1902 release pretty much set the standard for science fiction genre films for more than a century. A passionate (perhaps mad) scientist proposes a trip to the moon; others scoff and ridicule him; the trip proves successful, but the scientist and his companions are attacked by moon creatures; the creatures take the scientists to their ruler, who sentences them to death; there is a struggle, and the scientists escape to their rocket; they return to Earth, and to the adulation of the public. What really holds this very short film together is Méliès' sense of spectacle. A former stage magician, Méliès became interested in cinema as a medium with which to astound his audiences, and this is precisely what he did. The most famous shot in the film, depicting a rocket hitting the "man in the moon" in the face, has become a cinema landmark, and has been anthologized in numerous compilations. The Smashing Pumpkins made a video in the '90s as a loving lampoon of the film's visual style, which deals almost entirely in stylized sets, exaggerated depth perspective, and the talents of the numerous vaudeville personalities Méliès used in his films. As a template for what was to come in the next hundred years, and simply as an entertainment, Le Voyage dans la lune is a cinema landmark, and still immensely entertaining and influential. ~ Wheeler Winston Dixon, All Movie Guide