Corrected entry: Paul Mantee mentions that the orbiting spaceship has all that he needs to stay alive. If so, why did he and Adam West eject to land on Mars? They were worried about the craft's orbit decaying, but it stayed up all the time until Mantee exploded it. Someone's suggested it would decay faster if they stayed on, but orbital decay is due to atmospheric drag and not due to adding mass to the ship. Their mass is insignificant in relationship to the velocity of the ship.
Larry Koehn
12th Aug 2003
Robinson Crusoe On Mars (1964)
12th Aug 2003
Robinson Crusoe On Mars (1964)
Corrected entry: Paul Mantee had to blow up the orbiting Earth spacecraft as he watched it from the surface. Why could we hear it explode when it is outside the martian atmosphere and within a second after pressing the detonation button?
Correction: Because in the science fiction universe sound not only travels in a vacuum, it travels at the speed of light. If you doubt that, watch the Death Star explode - we see it from millions of kilometers away but we still hear the sound at the same time as we see the explosion, and all this in the vacuum of outer space. There are too many other examples to list here.
12th Aug 2003
Robinson Crusoe On Mars (1964)
Corrected entry: The trailer for this movie states that a trip to Mars is at a distance of 70 million "astro" miles. I have heard of nautical and statute miles but astro?
Correction: The trailer states it, the film doesn't. Not a movie mistake.
12th Aug 2003
Robinson Crusoe On Mars (1964)
Corrected entry: Mantee takes great strides in covering his tracks on Mars when he realizes he may not be alone because he find a buried human with shackles on the arms of the skeleton. He later sees a spaceship near the horizon landing, and he thinks it is from Earth to save him. The crafts lands in a zig-zag pattern; yet, he landed his craft straight down. The human skeleton near his cave plus the strange landing of the craft should have brought his guard up, but instead, he gets excited and heads over to the landed craft the next day.
Correction: He is alone on Mars, millions of kilometers from home. Realistically, he has no hope of rescue, and cannot survive for long in this hostile environment. He sees another space ship landing, and he goes a bit nuts. I would too. Character mistake.
12th Aug 2003
Robinson Crusoe On Mars (1964)
Corrected entry: Breathing the air on Mars was a big problem throughout the film because there was so little of it. With that in mind, why was Mona the Monkey never seen suffering like Paul Mantee?
Correction: Because Mona is a capuchin monkey and she needs about a twentieth of the oxygen a human needs. If a human can breathe the atmosphere with slight difficulty, as our hero can, a capuchin monkey would have no problems at all.
12th Aug 2003
Robinson Crusoe On Mars (1964)
Corrected entry: Meteroids do not glow in space and make rushing sounds as it did in this film.
Correction: In fact a 'Meteroid' (sic) is nothing like the thing we see - a 'meteoroid' is a piece of space debris that impacts on the Earth's surface. Whatever it was, it was superhot, perhaps from entering the Martian atmosphere, so it was glowing. As for the whooshing sound, there is sound in space in the sci-fi universe - it is artistic license.
12th Aug 2003
Robinson Crusoe On Mars (1964)
Corrected entry: Because the escape slave "Friday" has shackles on his arms, the aliens can home in on him and create great pain through the bracelets. The second half of the film, the aliens are constantly after him. Why are the aliens worried about an escaped slave on a hostile planet who won't live very long after they leave?
Correction: You are trying to second guess the motivations of a non-existent race of aliens from outer space. Perhaps losing a slave was a huge social disgrace? Maybe slaves were enormously valuable? Maybe this particular slave was wanted for committing some terrible crime (on their standards)? Maybe Princess Threena was secretly in love with him and wanted him back? Maybe he's a perfect organ donor match for King Throg's ailing son and heir?
12th Aug 2003
Robinson Crusoe On Mars (1964)
Corrected entry: Mantee plants an American flag outside the cave he stays in. For a thin martian atmosphere, that flag was mighty robust.
Correction: This is science fiction, not reality. If the Martian atmosphere was represented accurately, Crusoe would be dead within seconds of landing.
12th Aug 2003
Robinson Crusoe On Mars (1964)
Corrected entry: There are a lot of scenes with fire burning on Mars. Even back in 1964, scientist knew that the martian atmosphere was mostly carbon dioxide and fire doesn't burn in CO2.
Correction: This is science fiction, not reality. If the Martian atmosphere was represented accurately, Crusoe would be dead within seconds of landing.
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Correction: They used up their remaining fuel to avoid a meteor, so the main concern is fear of another collision course without fuel to move out of the way.
Bishop73