Project Moonbase

"Project Moonbase was never really a movie, so much as a busted television project that was salvaged as a 63-minute B-title released to theaters. It wasn't seen too much until the early 1970's, when it worked its way into some film package that was licensed by local stations like WOR-TV in New York. With a 63 minute running time, it didn't fit into too many ordinary time-slots, but they managed to schedule it about every six months by chopping out the first 10 minutes of story. The DVD comes to us courtesy of the Wade Williams Collection, which has apparently tracked down the most extraordinarily high-quality source ever seen on this title -- there are major studio releases from 1953 that don't look as good as Project Moonbase does on this disc. Until the final section of the movie, where some scratches and blemishes appear (though these defects won't mar anyone's enjoyment of the picture), this disc is as good as this movie has ever looked or sounded. The 12 chapters are more than adequate for the film at hand, and the Iamge Entertainment release gives about the best presentation of Project Moonbase ever seen -- whether or not that's a virtue depends upon one's tolerance for middling special effects, at their best a bit short of the level achieved on the series Men Into Space at the end of the 1950's, and some generally poor acting. The latter offers only two points of interest, for the presence of veteran character actor James Craven in a small supporting role, and future television star Hayden Rorke in a slightly larger part. Fans of Edward D. Wood Jr. may also note the presence of future Plan 9 From Outer Space cinematographer William Thompson in the credits, and also a Karl Johnson -- who may or may not be the actor/police officer son of Tor Johnson -- as associate producer (one can just imagine the younger Johnson being roped into some aspect of this picture). The movie opens automatically on start-up, and the menu must be accessed manually. There are no extras of any kind, just lots of fun of the Mystery Science Theater 3000 kind."