Scott_Mercer What if Ed Wood had an actual budget of some type? And he really, really, really applied himself in his directing chores? And maybe had some other person do a polish on the script for him, to smooth out some of his legendary surreal dialog? And then he hired some people as actors that were much less embarrassing than anyone in his usual stock player company?The result would have been something close to First Man Into Space.It has a low budget, and some really obvious science fiction tropes. Everyone plays the whole scenario deadly seriously, but not SO seriously that they enter bizarro world, say, in the manner of Criswell in Plan Nine From Outer Space. If you want to be generous, you could say the acting is reserved and tasteful. If you want to be less generous, you could say the performances are stiff and mind-numbingly boring.There have been many other bad, low budget science fiction movies with similar premises (astronaut goes into space, comes back to Earth as inhuman monster), such as The Crawling Hand, The Incredible Melting Man, and that abomination to end all abominations, Monster-A-Go-Go. I'm sure there were some that pre-date this film as well.Nobody's shaming themselves here, but still, this is not worth seeking out as some sort of lost classic or anything. There are many science fiction classics of yore you should check out before this one. If you want a bonafide well-done, outstanding film, it isn't this. By the same token, if you want a hilarious, goofy, over-the-top slab of goofball incompetence to mock and deconstruct, this is not that type of movie either. Put this one on the back burner, there's plenty of other flicks to get to before you spend 75 minutes with this puppy.

MartinHafer I love 1950s sci-fi films, so seeing FIRST MAN INTO SPACE is a natural. While there are usually two types of sci-fi from the era, serious and bug-eyed monster types, this film managed to be a little of both. In the process, it ended up being neither so super-cheesy it was funny nor serious enough to merit seeing--making it instead an adequate time-passer.The first third of the film has to do with the experimental rocket plane program of the 1950s. Instead of calling them 'X planes' (like they actually referred to them at the time), they were called 'Y planes' and were concerned with seeing if a rocket plane fired from a bomber (in this case, an old B-50) could pass through the Earth's atmosphere. Problems seemed certain when a hot-shot pilot (the brother of the Commander in charge of this specific program) showed a lack of restraint and caution--taking unnecessary risks to go farther and higher than anyone before this time. Eventually, on the second flight, he actually does leave orbit and then something terrible occurs. The plane crashes, but the pilot is nowhere to be seen. Unknown to everyone is that the guy was alive...of sorts, and is now an enemy of mankind (what else?).Overall, despite being released by MGM, it has all the marks of a reasonably well-done B-movie from a secondary film studio. All of the actors are unknowns or nearly unknowns and some times they tend to talk over each other's lines. As far as the special effects go, mostly they were excellent for the era...but the guy with the slime layer over him is a bit silly (you'll just need to see it to understand).

MARIO GAUCI Lame rip-off of THE QUATERMASS XPERIMENT (1955): the first half is deadly dull, even dreary - but the latter stages improve considerably with the scenes involving the rampaging 'monster'. In the accompanying featurette (a rather dry affair at a mere 9 minutes, when compared to the ones created for the other titles in Criterion's "Monsters & Madmen" set), director Day - who admits to not being a fan of the sci-fi genre - tries to justify the film's shortcomings by saying that he had a zero-budget to work with (where all the outer space scenes were composed of stock footage!)...and I'd have been inclined to be more lenient with the film had I not recently watched CALTIKI, THE IMMORTAL MONSTER (1959) - a similar (and similarly threadbare) but far more stylish venture from Italy! Bill Edwards as the cocky but unlucky astronaut - obsessed with achieving the titular feat - is positively boring at first, but he eventually manages to garner audience sympathy when his physical features are deformed and the character develops a taste for blood! Marshall Thompson as his commanding officer and elder brother is O.K. as a leaner Glenn Ford type; he had previously starred in FIEND WITHOUT A FACE (1958), another (and more successful) Richard Gordon-produced sci-fi which, incidentally, is also available on DVD through Criterion. Italian starlet Marla Landi, struggling with the English language, makes for an inadequate female lead; even her input in the featurette proves to be of little lasting value! The Audio Commentary is yet another enjoyable Tom Weaver/Richard Gordon track where, among many things, the fact that FIRST MAN INTO SPACE was intended as a double-feature with CORRIDORS OF BLOOD (1958) is brought up - but it was eventually put out as a standalone release, so as to exploit the topical news value of the current space race; it's also mentioned that the monster dialogue was actually dubbed by Bonar Colleano (who, tragically, died in a traffic accident prior to the film's release!). Weaver even recalls a couple of anecdotes from the time when he was involved in the production of the DVD featurette shot by, of all people, ex-cult-ish film-maker Norman J. Warren: Landi, who by then had become a lady of title, was still ready to help out in carrying the equipment necessary to film the interview down several flights of stairs!; Edwards was supposed to have contributed to the featurette but, once in London, he proved reluctant to co-operate with Weaver - eventually, the latter learned that the actor had been recently diagnosed with cancer and, in fact, he died in 2002!

vtcavuoto "First Man into Space" is one of those movies that doesn't have much in the way of thrills but is good viewing nonetheless. Marshall Thompson is good in the lead as a commander for the space program but the rest of the acting is so-so. The space scenes are dated but hold up O.K. Special effects aren't very special but the make-up is pretty cool. So, why do I recommend this film? It's because it's one of those"so-bad-it's-good" movies. Actually, it's not real bad. I wish there was more action in the film. The pacing is a bit slow in parts and some of the lines are laughable. There were far worse films of this genre though. Still, it's something you may want to catch at least once.