Cheaply-made, poorly acted, and unimaginatively directed, Flight to Mars still is entertaining despite what its has going against it. A flight to Mars is planned with five people(three older gentleman, Cameron Mitchell as a newspaperman, and one female scientist/obvious love interest)"manning' the ship. The spaceship gets there and finds that very human-like Martians live there and have technological advances that would make Earth blush. But all is not rosy in the subterranean cities of the Martians(here shown as some caves and a few rooms). The Martians are a dying planet and one faction wants the Earthlings to fix the ship only to take it away at the last moment and then mobilize for an attack on Earth and another faction wants to talk peace and see if they cannot persuade Earth to give them living space. The special effects here are pretty lame even for 50's sci-fi standards complete with slow-moving rocket ship, pastel/neon alien garb where the women wear shorts that would make many blush(except the men of course), and little less offered. Cameron Mitchell is the journalist and is affable if nothing else. Marguerite Chapman is beautiful in very short shorts but adds little acting range. The rest of the cast is filled with some older sci-fi veterans like Arthur Franz and Morris Ankrum doing serviceable jobs. This isn't a premiere sci-fi film from the Golden Age by any standard, but it is very watchable and zips by at fast pace.
Review of Flight to Mars
