In Wells' original 1901 novel, the story, set in the rural village of Kent, focused on an eccentric scientist, Cavor, conducting anti-gravity experiments on a man-made substance called 'Cavorite,' and his neighbor, Mr. Bedford, a struggling, debt-ridden playwright. Enlisting Bedford's help, Cavor eventually succeeds in proving the "gravitational opacity" of cavorite and together the two men depart for the Moon in a glass-lined steel sphere powered by Cavor's invention. After successfully landing on the lunar surface and exploring the terrain, Cavor and Bedford are captured by moon men Selenites and imprisoned. Bedford manages to escape, and believing that Cavor has been killed, he locates their stolen sphere and returns to Earth. Once he is back, Bedford publishes an account of his adventures and learns from a Dutch scientist experimenting with wireless waves that messages are being sent from the moon by Cavor. It appears that Bedford's former neighbor has learned to live and communicate with the Selenites but eventually Cavor's messages become incoherent and then abruptly stop. The story ends with Bedford assuming that the Selenites silenced Cavor because they were afraid of further Earth expeditions to the moon.
Georges Melies's loose 1902 adaptation of Wells' First Men in the Moon condenses the story into a brief running time of barely eleven minutes but in 1919, Gaumont studio attempted a longer feature version, directed by J.L.V. Leigh, which added a female character as the love interest. It is now considered a lost film. No one else attempted to film Wells' story until the early sixties when screenwriter Nigel Kneale, stop-motion animator Ray Harryhausen, and director Nathan Juran were brought together by producer Charles Schneer.
After securing the rights from Frank Wells, son of the famous author, Schneer approached Columbia Pictures with the project. Despite their initial reluctance, Schneer's previous successes for them - 20 Million Miles to Earth [1957], The 7th Voyage of Sinbad [1958], Jason and the Argonauts [1963] convinced them to finance First Men in the Moon [1964]. Kneale, who had penned The Quatermass Experiment, a highly influential science fiction series on BBC-TV, updated Wells's original story to include a clever framing device set in present times in which a United Nations space mission to the moon discovers evidence of a British expedition in 1899, during the reign of Queen Victoria. Kneale also expanded the role of the female love interest who was first introduced in the 1919 version. Martha Hyer was cast in the latter role with Lionel Jeffries and Edward Judd being tapped to play Cavot and Bedford, respectively.
In the book Ray Harryhausen: An Animated Life, the special effects master describes some of the difficulties of filming First Men in the Moon. "Along with numerous other tasks, I was also faced with the design basics for a whole alien civilization. Because the Selenites were to be insect-like, I decided that all doors and apertures were to be hexagonal, a common structure in the insect world. Whether it was scientifically accurate was secondary to the consideration that it should look realistic, be practical and above all spectacular. These basics were relatively straightforward, but when it came to broader aspects of the story that included tunnels, lunar landscapes, lens complexes, oxygen machines and the palace of the Grand Lunar, the budget prevented any of them from being built as full sets, so I designed them as miniatures and incorporated the actors with the aid of traveling mattes. For example, the huge bubbling vats that produced the oxygen were three- or four-foot high miniatures. However, these design headaches were nothing compared to Charles [Schneer] and Columbia Pictures announcing that the film, if possible, should be photographed in widescreen to give it an added attraction."
Filmed in the anamorphic process known as "Dynamation," in which live action and stop-motion animation can be combined via rear-projection and split-screen techniques, First Men in the Moon proved to be more restrictive and cost-prohibitive for Harryhausen on a creative level. As a result, his famous stop-motion work was only highlighted in three key sequences the Selenites in their high tech laboratories, the giant mooncalf and the Grand Lunar.
Most of the live-action cinematography took place at Shepperton Studios where a full-sized section of the moon's surface was constructed on a sound stage for the framing sequence and for the arrival and departure of Cavor's sphere from the lunar surface. NASA served as technical advisors on the film and the blueprints for their own Lunar module aided Harryhausen tremendously in designing the entire U.N. expedition sequence; it would also serve as a dry run for NASA which would stage a real moon walk for the entire world on television on July 20, 1969.
Less successful was the design of the Selenites. Harryhausen said, "I have never been keen on using 'men in suits' as animated creatures, but several scenes called for masses of smaller 'worker' Selenites, which would have taken an eternity to animate. So we had to resort to using children in suits. I designed a suit made into twenty-five moulded latex costumes with reinforced sections. Although they were never really convincing, mainly because the children's arms were not spindly enough to match the animated Selenites, the low-key lighting allowed Jerry [a nickname for director Nathan Juran] to use the suits with reasonable success."
Despite the many technical frustrations he experienced while working on First Men in the Moon, Harryhausen also enjoyed some aspects of it. "Some of my fondest memories during production," he said, "were the surprise visits of several personalities. The first was Frank Wells, son of H.G. Sadly, I only met him briefly, but he showed great enthusiasm for the design and animation, and we talked about his father. Another visit was by one of Hollywood's greatest directors, William Wyler. He was shooting a film on another stage, and although he wasn't there very long, I did manage to talk with him, and he seemed intrigued at what we were doing. Furthermore, when British performer William Rushton was unable to turn up for the part of the writ server, we unexpectedly secured the services of one of the world's top actors. Lionel [Jeffries] persuaded Peter Finch, who happened to be shooting The Pumpkin Eater (1964) on the next stage, to guest in the role. To save time, Lionel wrote out Finch's lines on the back of the summons paper, which he delivered with enormous enjoyment."
When First Men in the Moon opened theatrically, it was treated by most critics as a children's film and not as a bona-fide sci-fi thriller in the style of Wells' The War of the Worlds or The Time Machine. Howard Thompson of The New York Times dismissed it, writing, "Only the most indulgent youngsters should derive much stimulation let alone fun from the tedious, heavy-handed science-fiction vehicle that arrived yesterday from England..." The Variety review was more positive and reflected the film's general reception, calling it "an exploiteer's dream. Family audiences should flock to the wickets. It is an astute blend of comedy, occasional thrills and special effects work. Film is a good example of the kind of fare that television cannot hope to match in the foreseeable future."
Moviegoers did not, however, flock to see First Men in the Moon as they had previous Harryhausen ventures such as Jason and the Argonauts and The 7th Voyage of Sinbad. Part of the problem may have been the film's emphasis on comedy instead of suspense or action-adventure and many reviewers noted that the whimsical tone neutralized any potential excitement. The Hollywood Reporter, in fact, proclaimed it "the first space fantasy comedy." Harryhausen was also working with a different composer this time instead of Bernard Herrmann, who was unavailable. While Laurie Johnson's score is atmospheric and evocative of its setting, it lacked the dynamic range and intensity that Herrmann's music brought to such Harryhausen films as The 3 Worlds of Gulliver (1960) and Mysterious Island (1961), among others.
Harryhausen also admits that "...the poster Columbia came up with really didn't help to sell it. It was too childish in its attempts to point out that it was 'in' in the Moon, not 'on.'" Yet people who avoided the movie missed a visual treat, brimming with rich Victorian-era art direction, futuristic set designs reflecting the Selenites's world and unusual special effects. "Personally," Harryhausen stated, "I believe it is one of the most faithful adaptations of Wells' novels, but perhaps the time was not right for such a film, or perhaps the real moon landings were too close. Hopefully, posterity will look upon it with kinder eyes."
Producer: Charles H. Schneer
Director: Nathan Juran
Screenplay: Nigel Kneale, Jan Read; H.G. Wells (story)
Cinematography: Wilkie Cooper
Art Direction: John Blezard
Music: Laurie Johnson
Film Editing: Maurice Rootes
Cast: Edward Judd (Arnold Bedford), Martha Hyer (Katherine 'Kate' Callender), Lionel Jeffries (Joseph Cavor), Miles Malleson (Dymchurch Registrar), Norman Bird (Stuart), Gladys Henson (nursing home matron), Hugh McDermott (Richard Challis).
C-103m.
by Jeff Stafford
