@Adam. It shows how quickly tech and expectations advanced in just the decade after Forbidden Planet's release. Compare Planet of the Apes (1968)'s heroic optimism about technological progress: Taylor's close-to-C (actually 0.999999745C), one-way expedition to the stars blasts off from Cape Kennedy/Canaveral in *July 1972*. That makes 2001 (1968)'s speculations about, e.g., large moon-bases and manned Jupiter missions by the end the 20th Century look incredibly sober and cautious!
The fantasists of 1968 didn't come close to guessing the somewhat disheartening truth: that 1972 would see the last Apollo mission to the moon, and that 40+ years later, no further manned exploration of the solar system, let alone the universe beyond that, would have occurred. Indeed, no human's been out beyond low earth orbit since 1972.
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Adam60z (3781)
4 years ago
Yes, but that's partly because scientists realized it's much easier to do unmanned missions. But that doesn't satisfy man psychologically. However someday we HAVE to return to the Moon and beyond, establish a Moonbase, etc. That is our destiny. Anyway I wouldn't say Planet of the Apes was optimistic considering the ending.
But going back to waiting 140 years to get to the Moon, that wasn't the timeline most scientists and others thought. Even the great film Destination Moon from 1950 had a very realistic Moon mission in that same year!
Actually the original 1952 screenplay for Forbidden Planet set it in 1976 and a mission to Mercury.
Also the movie set in the 23rd century did not have computers on the ship. When they asked for coordinates they wrote them down on a piece of paper!
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