Nonureva Really Surprised!

Actuakers One of my all time favorites.

Matialth Good concept, poorly executed.

Nayan Gough A great movie, one of the best of this year. There was a bit of confusion at one point in the plot, but nothing serious.

Carlos Barton When I look back at sci-fi documentaries of the last decade, I often think of this BBC-produced two-parter from 2004, about a cluster of astronauts setting off on, in their universe, the greatest exploration mission in human history, a trip to the edge of the solar system on the mile-long, nuclear-powered Pegasus. They encounter the infinite wonders of out region of space, landing on Mars and Venus, inspecting the rings of Saturn. The astronauts even go to the surface of Pluto (VTTP was made before it was demoted from planet status)! The journey gets inevitably sad in some places, with the loss of several probes and one of the astronauts to lymphoma.But what makes the program so special is that it tries to be as realistic as possible, with endlessly fascinating info being exchanged with the viewers along the way and manages to add the dangers of space travel e.g. debris, radiation sickness, yet without making the whole thing feel so depressing.The CGI used by the BBC plus the narration of David Suchet aka. Poirot can only add to the outstanding quality of VTTP and the John Williams-esque music, especially that used for the intro, is mindblowing to listen to against the images of the planets. In some people it will shed tears. So will this documentary. An underrated masterpiece of science- fiction that would leave Arthur C Clarke grinning from ear to ear if he were here to see it.

TxMike When I first requested this DVD from my public library I thought it was going to be a legitimate documentary. Having been a space fan since the Sputnik went up when I was a young boy, I've never lost my interest. And, living near Space Center USA doesn't hurt.However, this is a BBC production, a fictional story with a British cast, mostly veterans of various TV shows. Some of them are faking American or Russian or French accents and do so credibly much of the time. They take time to make it realistic as they can, but still many of the laws of Physics and the fundamentals of deep space travel are violated, but not so badly as to make it distracting.The story is set some time in the near future when a team of space travelers leave Earth to explore the solar system. The first destination is a landing on Venus, but only a very short one because of the heat and the suit's limited ability to protect. Then off to Mars, Jupiter via a pass through the Sun's outer atmosphere, Saturn, Pluto, and finally back to Earth. With large tanks of Hydrogen fuel pre-placed along the route so they could refuel. A total trip of 6 years and 50 days. That was the plan, anyway.The film is done as a documentary, as if a camera crew were following the real explorers (impossible) and present at mission control. When a crisis arises, we see Mission Control staff telling the "documantary" cameraman to get out of the way. All in all an entertaining 2 hours, for anyone who enjoys space travel adventures done in a realistic style. A few times I even was able to put aside that it was all fiction.SPOILERS. Radiation near the sun causes one traveler to become very sick. He holds out until Saturn, and he is "buried" wrapped in foil and cast out to drift among the rocks of the ring for eternity. They have a close near miss several times, at least once on each planet or moon, as unexpected events arise. The last stop was an asteroid which begins to throw out boulders as they are exploring it, doing some damage to the spacecrafts, but they survive to return to Earth.

beeryusa Duck_of_Death needs to watch this film again, as his major criticism is completely baseless. The film never once forgot about the time delay, and it was mentioned explicitly in a couple of places. The crew were never shown having conversations with mission control that didn't obey the time delay rules.One thing I did think was a bit far-fetched was the amount of risk involved - would a crew land on a planet on which pressure suits would only last two hours? I doubt it. Would a manned space ship go into a star's corona? I doubt it. Would humans land on a moon that was being bombarded with huge amounts of radiation? I doubt it. Also, the ship seemed overly sturdy. Would a ship designed like that risk atmospheric flight to slow it down? I doubt it. Would it survive being hit by comet debris? I doubt it. I think in both cases the stresses on the structure would be too much. But all-in-all, the unlikely scenarios were compensated by some nicely done special effects, good editing and production, and some good acting, especially by the actors portraying the ship's commander and the Russian cosmonaut.

zooeyhall I came across this movie on DVD purely by chance through a Blockbuster rental. Voyage to the Planets is an excellent BBC 2hour documentary/drama about a future "grand tour" of the solar system. Taking pains to adhere to current knowledge about the planets and space flight, and plausible extropolations from existing technology, this movie tells the story of astronauts on a journey to Venus, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, and Pluto.The special effects are excellent for a TV show. I found the actors believable as astronauts. The situations presented are for the most part plausible, and you learn a lot about the science of the planets and spaceflight! Only two minor complaints: I found some of the situations and dialogue somewhat maudlin at times. Furthermore I am unsure that a single crew and ship would be sent on a single mission to see all those destinations at once time. More than likely, visits to Venus, Mars, Jupiter, etc. would/will be separate missions.They didn't try to skimp on this show with production values. The scenes of Venus and Mars were actually filmed in the northern deserts of Chile--the driest area on earth and a dead-ringer for the Martian landscape. Weightlessness sequences were filmed in a diving Russian transport jet. The producers could have fudged on either of these using studios and CGI, but chose the real thing instead.I would like to especially mention the marvelous music that was composed for this movie. Don Davis's thrilling theme is the first thing that grabs you when the movie starts, as the magnificent shot of the Pegasus passes the screen and David Suchet intones "it is the destiny of man to explore the stars...".Watching this on a small television screen is one regret I have. What a thrill to see this in a movie theatre, or even better an IMAX presentation!