Alone to Alpha Centauri

A spacecraft embarks on a dangerous journey to Alpha Centauri in 1963's Ikarie XB-1. An eerie and influential science fiction film, it was based loosely on Stanislaw Lem's The Magellanic Cloud.

The crew are comprised of scientists, mathematicians, and technicians. A mathematician called Anthony (Frantisek Smolik) has a robot called Patrick who resembles Robbie the Robot slightly so this film was also influenced in turn by films that came before it. Forbidden Planet had some of the eeriness you find in this one but Ikarie XB-1's dark, black and white cinematography evokes something more of the coldness and emptiness of space, a feeling emphasised when encounters prove deadly.

There are two major encounters. First with a derelict Earth ship and then with a mysterious "dark star" that's only perceptible for how it obstructs the view of the normal star field. It's here that the film takes on a Lovecraftian quality that's appropriate for a truly alien environment.

Much of the story is focused on the sociological and psychological impact on a human community adapting to life on a spacecraft voyaging further and further from Earth. Director Jindrich Polak conjures tension really well, especially when one crewman goes mad and the others are forced to find ways to deal with him. There's also a nice bit about the psychological impact of time dilation as the characters muse on the fact that fifteen years will pass on Earth while the voyage seems to be only a matter of months to the crew. This story element isn't explored to its fullest potential as it is in Gunbuster or Interstellar but it's certainly an interesting point of anxiety for the characters.

Ikarie XB-1 is available on The Criterion Channel.