It's fun, it's light, [but] it has a hard time when its tries to get heavy.

Good films always raise compelling questions, whether the format is fiction or documentary fact.

It's a feast for the eyes. But what really makes this dramedy work is the acting.

I enjoyed watching this film and would recommend other to give it a try , (as I am) but this movie, although enjoyable to watch due to the better than average acting fails to add anything new to its storyline that is all too familiar to these types of movies.

This film is not cool, it's boring. I suspect that the typical Soviet film lovers are inflating it's rating as they often do on IMDb. It's one star above an East German film from around the same time "First Spaceship on Venus" that film was unwatchable (I give it 2 stars) it was so boring. You might say that this is a butchered Corman version with spliced in scenes that make little sense and that the original is much better, that's fine, but I doubt I would enjoy the original either. It's just so boring. One big redeeming factor though is Joe the robot, the communist's answer to our capitalistic bourbon making Robbie, he's pretty cool and will even destroy humans to self preserve itself! I would never attempt to watch this film straight on it's own, I watched it via horror host Mr Lobo and his Cinema Insomnia show. As a Mr Lobo hosted version I give it 7 stars, there are some funny skits with him and a trash can robot that asks some funny tough questions about it's purpose in life other then being a slave to Mr Lobo. One thing about the Mr Lobo version I watched though is he's advertising some bloody grindhouse trash films, I had to fast forward past those, disgusting. The retro commercials are fun though as is a fake commercial for a skateboard lawyer, Rad Abrams. If you are a lover of MST3K and are looking for more material to watch that's free online you will enjoy the Mr Lobo episodes like this one.

Well, having now explored a bit of background for this film, much has now been explained like the words not moving with the lips of the actors and the planet, costumes, and special effects of the astronauts on Venus being so much more superior than the scenes with Faith Domergue and Basil Rathbone in white lab coats and little else of any cost. Quickie director/producer and later mogul Roger Corman lifted a Soviet science fiction film and then made a few adjustments and added some "American" scenes with Domergue and Rathbone under the direction of Curtis Harrington. I agree with many of the reviewers that the Soviet film is rather good. I would have enjoyed seeing it in its natural form. That film, based on what I saw here, had vision. But this film is not Corman's nor Harrington's but rather nothing more than stolen(whether it be legally or not) property. And let's face it - Harrington's additions are so poorly crafted and acted that they detract from the film rather then add to them. Basil, only a couple of years from death, looks soooo tired. Faith has all the vitality of cardboard in her scenes. She is the epitome of wooden acting -and it is easy to understand why as she has no one to really talk to or act off. The film in this form has only maybe six or seven brief scenes with Harrington's additions. The rest is a fairly innovative Soviet film definitely worth a peek. but let's not give undue credit to anyone who is not Soviet here just for taking another's product and repackaging it. You also must realize that the silly dialog and loose ends this picture have are due to the film being "squeezed" into something it was not meant to be.

Derived from a magnificent, early 60's Soviet sci-fi about a manned trip to Venus. The models, sets, vehicles, weapons, robots, costumes, and other tech items are equal to or better than the best of its Western contemporaries in terms of imagination and realism. Co-starring Faith Domergue and Basil Rathbone - yes, Sherlock Holmes - in overdubbed scenes designed, I guess, to make you not notice that in the rest of the movie, the dubbed English audio track doesn't follow the Russian lip movements. The original Russian story does come through, of a fantastically complex world explored by men from Earth employing high tech contrivances. In fact, the quality of the engineering is so good, they must have had input from Soviet industry and/or academia. All in all, a fascinating peak into Soviet sci-fi and how Hollywood had to mask its Soviet pedigree to have it accepted by Americans.

*Spoiler/plot- 1965, Voyages to the Prehistoric Planet, A spaceship orbits the planet Venus. It is piloted by female astronaut. On the surface, two fellow astronauts and their robot set out for a voyage of exploration. Back on the Moon, Professor Hartman observes the progress and supervises. The landing party is attacked by several prehistoric creatures. They also find evidence of a ancient civilization. 'John', their helpful robot is lost during a volcanic eruption while saving two crew members. *Special stars- Basil Rathbone as mission commander Professor Hartman. Roger Corman as film director. *Theme- Planet's can have civilizations, just keep looking. *Based on- Russian film, 'Planet of Storms '62 *Trivia/location/goofs- Roger Corman's retread of this Russian film by re-hashing some interesting Russian film footage. Interesting use and scenes of a robot can be enjoyed. Outstanding use of astro-car rounds out the enjoyable mechanical items of this crew's planetary exploration kit. Listen to the female astronaut, Marcia jokingly reads her lines of camera and seriously talks about the spaceship's 'propellers' needing to be warmed-up. There are no propellers to be seen on any spaceships in this film. *Emotion- Somewhat enjoyable film to watch despite the scene's plot continuity. Nice to see what the Russian cinema was producing. Production values were very respectable. The landing party crews being attacked by lizard-men and shooting back with pistols is hard to view for it's silliness.