Category: Orphans in Space

Welcome to a new landing page for Orphans in Space: Forgotten Films from the Final Frontier. The short films and liner notes here are adapted from the DVD set of the same name, published off-line in 2012. This new access site coincides with the 15th World of Knowledge: International Film Festival of Popular Science and Educational Films, December 1-6, 2021, in St. Petersburg, Russia.  On Sunday, December 5th, the festival includes a 90-minute program of orphan films (and one non-orphan), projected for the audience in the theater of the New Holland Pavilion. Live Zoom Q&A afterwards with filmmaker Jeanne Liotta

[Read on. . . . ] Observing a World of Knowledge: Orphans in Space

Orphans in Space: Forgotten Films from the Final Frontier special edition for Roger That! 2021  Chimp Recovery (RCA Service Co., 1961) 6 min., color, silent Source: University of South Carolina Moving Image Research Collections Recorded February 1, 1961, Chimp Recovery, is the title assigned to one of three rolls of unedited footage showing the first chimpanzee launched into orbit as part of Project Mercury, the American man-in-space mission. One roll, dated January 23, 1961, documents a medical examination of “astrochimp” no. 65. Upon his safe return to Patrick Air Force Base in Florida, NASA gave him the name Ham. A

[Read on. . . . ] Chimp Recovery (1961)

Orphans in Space: Forgotten Films from the Final Frontier special edition for Roger That! 2021  Carillon (Christmas) Parade  (WIS and WNOK, 1968) 5 min., b/w and color, silent Source: University of South Carolina Moving Image Research Collections  @USCMIRC The term newsfilm became increasingly common in the television age, referring less often to newsreels than to 16mm footage shot for TV networks and local stations. Film remained the medium for newsgathering through the 1970s. As videotape replaced celluloid many stations jettisoned their older newsfilm. Libraries and archives have often taken in large quantities of these reels. Now millions of feet of

[Read on. . . . ] Carillon (Christmas) Parade (1968)

Orphans in Space: Forgotten Films from the Final Frontier special edition for Roger That! 2021 Daguerreotype of Earth’s moon (1840) John W. Draper  The Orphans in Space DVD cover image comes from the Draper Family Collection, housed in the New York University Archives. The collection includes celestial photographs taken by John William Draper (1811-1882) and his son Henry Draper (1837-1882). Both were physicians, professors of chemistry, authors, and amateur but innovative photographers — true polymaths. The many photographic copies derive from a 3.25″ x 2.75″ (“sixth plate”)  daguerreotype of the moon made (presumably) on March 26, 1840. A newly-appointed professor

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Orphans in Space: Forgotten Films from the Final Frontier special edition for Roger That! 2021 To say a filmmaker impacted astronomy itself might sound like an exaggeration. But there is a heavenly body, an astroid, officially called 321046 Klushantsev (2008 QL33).   The  work of director, writer, cinematographer, and special effects maestro Pavel Vladimirovich Klushantsev (1910-1999) is on display here with the educational short Meteorites, made in 1947 at the Leningrad Popular Science Film Studio (aka Lennauchfilm). This is the first place to see this remarkable film on the web [save for a Russian-language torrent], but several of the director’s other

[Read on. . . . ] Pavel Klushantsev films

Orphans in Space: Forgotten Films from the Final Frontier special edition for Roger That! 2021 Men in Orbit (John Lurie, 1979)  Super 8, 42 min., color, sound Source: NYU Fales Library & Special Collections The film is Streaming on Ubu.  Eric Mitchell and Lurie play the astronauts.  Camerawork by James Nares.  In 1988, Lurie introduced his 1979 film on VH-1’s New Visions.   Notes by J. Hoberman; interview with John Lurie by Andrea Callard John Lurie’s Men in Orbit is one of a number of short feature-length Super-8 sound films produced mainly in Lower Manhattan during the late ’70s, often

[Read on. . . . ] Men in Orbit (1979)

Orphans in Space: Forgotten Films from the Final Frontier special edition for Roger That! 2021 Teenage Cosmonauts (Igor Rodachenko, USSR, 1979)  10 of 17 min. Source: NYU Tamiment Library Produced by the Ukrainian Newsreel Documentary Film Institute, this classic Soviet propaganda film was distributed (with English narration) by the Union of Soviet Societies for Friendship and Cultural Relations with Foreign Countries (Russian acronym VOKS). With its celebration of the space program and educational system, Teenage Cosmonauts was part of a larger effort to reconstruct Communism in the 1960s and 70s around the “new Soviet man.” The young cosmonauts represent the

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Orphans in Space: Forgotten Films from the Final Frontier special edition for Roger That! 2021 Beyond the Moon (R. E. Barnes, ca. 1961) 11 min., color, silent Narration by Megan Prelinger Soundtrack by Agatha Kasprzyk and Rafaël Leloup (2011) Source: Prelinger Archives  After a stint in the U.S. Navy, Robert Earl Barnes (1931-2009) spent most of his career at television station WKEF in Dayton, Ohio, where he was a satellite coordinator. He was also a prolific amateur filmmaker, often working in science fiction and horror genres. For Beyond the Moon Barnes filmed miniatures, model kits, and tabletop sets, enacting the launch

[Read on. . . . ] Beyond the Moon (ca. 1961)

Orphans in Space: Forgotten Films from the Final Frontier special edition for Roger That! 2021 A Trip to the Planets (192?) 17 min., b&w/color, tinted, silent Narration by Megan Prelinger, 2012 Soundtrack by Agatha Kasprzyk and Rafaël Leloup, 2012 Source: Prelinger Archives, Library of Congress As cultural historian and archivist Megan Prelinger notes in her voice-over commentary, A Trip to the Planets is “a true orphan.” Production credits are absent from the 16mm print, perhaps deleted by a producer-distributor of second-hand goods to cover its tracks. Even this title was created after the fact, as we find no record of

[Read on. . . . ] A Trip to the Planets (192?)