Amazon.com video review:
There's a sense of awe to the special effects work of animation
specialists Gerry and Sylvia Anderson (Thunderbirds Are Go)--the
slow, lovingly detailed introduction of a massive spaceship creeping out
of
dock and struggling against its bulk while trapped on the ground, and the
almost balletic spectacle of the ship elegantly floating against an
impressive star field or dramatically flying against the rugged landscape.
These moments are the highlights of this sober science fiction thriller
about the discovery of a planet on the far side of the sun in Earth's
orbit.
A mission is hastily put together, with British astrophysicist Ian Hendry
teamed with hotshot American astronaut Roy Thinnes for the three-week
trip,
but when they suddenly crash-land the strange creatures that surround them
are revealed to be human. Against all rational explanations they're back on
Earth, but Thinnes suddenly discovers that everything is a mirror image of
his existence: Through the Looking Glass by way of The Twilight
Zone. Though it begins as a paranoid spy thriller set in the near
future
(the opening details an ingenious espionage caper featuring a very special
eyepiece), it quickly turns into a serious and oddly unsettling space-race
drama with a heady twist. Robert Parrish's direction is unusually aloof, but
the film is always intriguing and well acted with gorgeous special effects
that may rank second only to Stanley Kubrick's 2001 as the most
elegant vision of outer space flight on film. --Sean Axmaker
