Here is a movie with a scene that happens today – July 20. I hope you enjoy the film and watch it tonight.
ROBINSON CRUSOE ON MARS
Colonel Christopher Draper and Colonel Dan MacReady are on Mars Gravity Probe One. Orbiting the red planet they are almost hit by a meteoroid. Avoiding it takes them into the upper atmosphere, so they eject in their escape pods, but once they’re gone the main ship assumes a low, but stable orbit. Draper finds a cave and later some coal like rocks that he burns for heat. He finds the other escape pod. MacReady is dead, but their pet monkey Mona is alive. He discovers that the rocks give off oxygen when they are burned and uses this discovery to refill his oxygen tanks. He tracks Mona to an underground water source and edible Martian plants that she has discovered. On July 20th, [50:09 to 55:03] Draper takes a bath. He later dreams of the dead MacReady. Then Draper discovers a humanoid body with a black bracelet on its wrist that was murdered and he causes the orbiting ship to self-destruct so there is no trace of him. Alien spaceships appear and begin blasting. He goes to the area and finds they are using humanoids as forced labor for mining. One of the captives escapes and joins Draper, who calls him Friday. He is wearing a black bracelet like the one Draper found on the body. The alien ships blast the area and leave. Friday learns English and provides Draper with pills that supply oxygen . When they return to the abandoned mine site, all the humanoids have been killed. The meteoroid explodes, burying them in ash, but Friday saves Draper’s life. Later the aliens return and track Friday by his bracelet. They blast the cave and Draper and Friday flee through underground caverns. They finally emerge near the polar ice caps. Another meteoroid crashes into the ice cap, causing it to start melting. Draper detects a ship, but it is from Earth.
A grade B science fiction classic. It borrows the plot from Defoe and puts it on Mars, instead of a deserted island. This Mars is nothing like the real planet and the special effects are very cheesy. This movie is corny, but it’s a guilty pleasure.
At 50:27-28 he says it’s been “four months and three days” since the crash. At 50:10 a shot of Draper’s calendar shows 3/17 which is (I presume) the date he crashed.
Producer - Aubrey Schenck
Director - Byron Haskin
Screenplay - John C. Higgins and Ib Melchior
Runtime – 1 hour 50 minutes
Released – June 17, 1964
Starring –
Paul Mantee as Christopher Draper
Victor Lundin as Friday
Adam West as Dan MacReady
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