fter a close call with a meteorite, NASA astronauts Colonel Dan McReady (West) and Commander Christopher "Kit" Draper (Mantee), in orbit around Mars, are forced to eject from their spacecraft, hoping to land safely on the Martian surface below.
But Kit's escape pod is badly damaged in the landing, and all he's able to salvage are a few pieces of equipment, some water, food and a few containers of oxygen. So, separated from his beloved commanding officer, with pistol in hand, Kit sets off into the barren Martian landscape to search for shelter. Thus begins an odyssey that will test both his ability and his will to survive.
Kit's struggle to find the necessities of life becomes the driving force of his days. But through both ingenuity and accident, and in spite of a few near-fatal mishaps, he finds that he just might be able to survive on the Red Planet for as long as he needs to.
Eventually Kit ventures out of his cave shelter with some oxygen (Martian air is apparently breathable, but not for long periods of time) and discovers McReady's crashed pod. The only survivor of the crash, however, is Mona--the astronauts' simian shipmate, who becomes Kit's one and only companion.
After some months (and many improvements to his and Mona's lifestyle), Kit discovers that they aren't alone on Mars. He comes upon a human-looking, shabbily-dressed man who is fleeing from a number of fast-moving spaceships--the likes of which Kit has never seen before--that are obviously determined to blast this man into dust.
Having eluded the hunters, Kit (who's been dying for some human--or humanoid--companionship) learns that this person is actually an escaped alien slave. Kit names him "Friday, with apologies to Robinson Crusoe." It takes the two some time to learn to communicate and to adjust to life together. But just as they do, Friday's former captors succeed in tracking him down and he, Kit and Mona are forced to flee across the perilous Martian landscape through such sites as volcanoes, the Martian canals and the polar ice cap, hoping to find safety or even someone who can help them escape Mars altogether.
Meditative and intelligent
As the slightly goofy title suggests, the story of Robinson Crusoe on Mars is based on the novel Robinson Crusoe by eighteenth century author Daniel Defoe. The film itself is not entirely as silly as its name, however--it is instead a meditative and minimalist bit of decent, humanistic science fiction.
Its minimalism doesn't always work in its favor, though. While the movie is effective in exploring the numerous and immense difficulties faced by a man fighting for survival in a harsh, dangerous environment (very intelligently adapted to an imagined Martian experience), it doesn't go as far as it perhaps could or should in exploring Kit's interiority. The bottom line is that Robinson Crusoe on Mars can be pretty slow and boring at times, reminiscent of some of the worse moments of a movie like Marooned (a.k.a. Space Travelers).
Dubious scientific positings about the nature of Mars aside, the film does do a marvelous job--with its muted soundtrack and brilliant use of color, for example--of portraying a desolate and alien landscape. And the effects, considering the technology of the day, are quite exciting--from the ever-changing Martian skyline to the ominous, War of the Worlds-like sky-zipping alien spacecraft.
Today's viewers might take issue, however, with a few of the somewhat dated contents of Robinson Crusoe on Mars. Mantee's Commander Draper can be a pigheaded, arrogant, male WASP military type at times. He does soften considerably after Friday saves his life, though, actually deigning to offer a word to Friday (who looks and acts undeniably like a stereotypical Native American "noble savage") in Friday's own language, instead of in the English that Kit always insists they use.
And while not the most emotionally rousing, the relationships between Kit, Friday and, yes, Mona, are both believable and appealing. Mona herself (listed fourth in the actors' credits simply as "The Wooly Monkey") actually gets a large amount of screen time and threatens to steal the show on more than one occasion. It's a good thing--she certainly livens the picture up.
