Space Exploration

The films listed here concern astronauts on missions to explore space and other planets. The very first of these could be considered Georges Melies’ A Trip to the Moon (1902) and there have been a number of other works ranging all the way through the adventures of Flash Gordon to Star Trek (1966-9) and its assorted incarnations.

There were several works predicting the Moon Landing. Of these, Destination Moon (1950) created an interest in real world space exploration (see Films Depicting NASA and the Space Program). Many films and tv series of the 1950s and 60s feature astronauts exploring the Solar System or landing on and exploring alien worlds near and far.

The space exploration film has largely died down since the 1970s and been replaced by the Space Opera, concerning adventures in a familiar, lived-in universe. The 2010s have shown a renewed interest in the exploration of near space with the hit of Gravity (2013) and the films that followed, which focused around a scientifically believable exploration of the solar system and the potential landing on Mars and other worlds.