This Movie Can Only Be Described With One Word.

recommended

Perfect cast and a good story

Great movie. Not sure what people expected but I found it highly entertaining.

'Riders To The Stars" was directed by one of the actors Richard Carlson and an uncredited Herbert L. Strock and mainly concerns a space mission to catch a meteorite before it burns up in the atmosphere. Most of the film though is about the recruiting and training of astronauts to go on that rather far fetched space mission and though it is not boring it isn't exciting either. They don't go into space until nearly an hour into the film, cue some stock footage.The main cast of William Lundigan, Richard Carlson and Martha Hyer are adequate but they are fortunately supported by the veteran actor with the unique voice Herbert Marshall who gives a solid performance as usual. King Donovan has a small role which is a shame as he is always watchable and Dawn Addams has an even smaller role.It is filmed in colour but it doesn't add much to the movie and Harry Sukman's music is not one of his best. In fact it was his first score in a long career. The line of dialogue "the nature of my doctorate will have to remain a secret for a few days" has always charmed me for some reason. Perhaps because it has the ring of poetry about it.

*Spoiler/plot- Riders to the Stars, 1954. During the early years of the Space Race, a group of scientists want to capture some meteors to use the metals that they contain for spaceship alloys. A large group of young scientists are recruited and trained to fly three rockets into space for the mission. The mission is successful, but many of the crews are lost.*Special Stars- Herbert Marshall, Richard Carlson, Martha Hyer, William Lundigan, James Best. DIR: Richard Carlson.*Theme- American science and engineering will accomplish any task.*Trivia/location/goofs- This film uses the 'Office of Scientific Investigation' from Ivan Tors, movie & TV producer. Watch for the gruesome scene in which a dead floating astronaut with his helmeted skull is shown. That scene is horribly memorable to young impressionable viewers for many years.*Emotion- A somewhat clinical and scientific fictional account on how to coordinate a mission in space. Most of the plot and story consist of choosing, training, and launching three manned spaceships to collect rock metal specimens. While this might have been riveting dram in the 50's, today its dated and boring. Experience it once, but this film is forgettable and often confused with films of the same time period and subject.

Second in Ivan Tors Productions' "Office of Scientific Investigation" (O.S.I.) trilogy, "Riders to the Stars" belongs to that sf sub-genre of straightforward space exploration epic -- no ray guns and bug-eyed monsters allowed. Which is no doubt why I found it so boring, when I caught it on the afternoon Big Show back in the 1960s.Thanks to TCM, I've had a chance to see it again, and while it's undeniably leisurely-paced in parts and suffers from a tragically inadequate effects budget, it's still a far better film than I remembered. However, much of my appreciation comes from the fact that it tickles my nostalgia nerve and has some nifty stock footage from the early days of America's space program, which at the time mostly consisted of shooting off captured V-2s out at White Sands. So viewers who don't have the fond memories of and/or historical interest in this era of the Space Age will probably find this pretty dull stuff.The writer -- Curt Siodmak -- deserves high marks for doing his research on the subject, thereby making the section of the film depicting the painstaking selection process and rigorous training of our trio of astronauts remarkably prescient at times. The science behind their dangerous mission isn't so well-thought-out, but it provides for some minor thrills as the astronauts attempt to chase down and retrieve a meteor from low Earth orbit.Worth watching, especially if you consider it as a companion film and precursor to "Gog", the third and final entry in the O.S.I. series.

Pretty decent, low-budget sci-fi film about a group of men first being selected for a dangerous space mission to lasso a meteor in space and return it to Earth so its outer hull can be analyzed. The men are taken through various tests such as patience, constitution, and the ability to not pass out under 12 g's of gravity. Finally, four men are selected and then we have out "Riders to the Stars." This film, directed by one of its stars Richard Carlson (of The Creature from the Black Lagoon fame), is rather well-done despite some obvious budgetary problems such as the rockets that move and go in space look more shaky and technologically inept than most clunkers on the road. There is in some instances a heavy use of stock footage - fortunately not over-played in true developmental scenes. I loved the opening credits with its operatic song "Riders to the Stars" and the beautifully painted backdrops, but I do wonder what they really have to do with THIS film. There are no aliens here. The actual time in space in the film is minimal. All that being said, this film has a nice, taut, tense pace and is filled with actors and actresses that know a bit about acting. The head scientist of the whole operation is played by smooth and urbane Herbert Marshall with his voice of command. Marshall looks relaxed in the role but is good nevertheless. The two primary male leads are the aforementioned Carlson and beefcake William Lundigan(as a physicist no less). Both actors are good as is the rest of the cast. The female love interest for Lundigan, a scientist in her own right, is the ever vivacious Martha Hyer. Riders to the Stars isn't a great sci-fi film in the tradition of The Day the Earth Stood Still, Invaders from Mars, Invasion of the Body Snatchers, The Thing from Another World,This Island Earth, or The War of the Worlds. Again, it is more science than fiction in terms of what its story is about. I think it is more in line with something like the very excellent Destination Moon - a discovery picture as to the human effort to travel to far horizons. It is more interested in the how of space travel, the getting there thinking, and character development than it is in gruesome or bizarre life forms. I tend to like both kinds of sci-fi films from that era, but the viewer that is looking for alien encounters may need to pass. A good, quality effort from the Golden Age of Science Fiction.