Top 5 Space Travel Films

On July 4, 2016, NASA’s Juno spacecraft arrived at Jupiter to begin its exploration of the planet. Although NASA’s mission to Jupiter is unmanned, we thought it appropriate to honor the accomplishment with a list of five top films about NASA and space travel. Rather than consider science fiction space films generally, this list focuses mainly on space travel closer to home.

THE MARTIAN

Director Ridley Scott and author Andy Weir worked hard to get the science mostly right, in this dramatic thriller about an astronaut accidentally left behind on Mars. Matt Damon heads a terrific cast and injects a lot of humor and makes scientist/astronauts look cool. The film has been praised by people who worked at NASA for getting the teasing patter and resourceful team work among astronaut/scientists right. Perhaps the best, most scientifically accurate movie about space and astronauts yet.

GRAVITY

Okay, it has some problems with the science, but astronauts have praised its ability to capture the sense of being in space. And it is a heck of an edge-of-your-seat thriller, starring Sandra Bullock as one tough woman astronaut who has to depend on her own brains and skills when disaster strikes the international space station. The scenes of space walking and of hurtling above Earth in orbit are breathtaking.

2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY

A great visionary science fiction film, filled with mystery and the surreal, along with a harrowing sequence featuring the iconic evil computer HAL. The non-CGI visual effects still impress in this ground-breaking film from Stanley Kubrick and science fiction writer Arthur C. Clarke.

APOLLO 13

Based on a real event, Tom Hanks stars as one of a team of astronauts whose trip to the moon is short-circuited by malfunction. This inspiring, fact-based drama is a nail-biter and a testament to astronauts’ bravery, coolness under fire and NASA engineers’ resourcefulness.

THE RIGHT STUFF

A classic film about how it all began for NASA, with a spotlight on the the hotshot jet plane test pilots who became the first American astronauts.