NPR's Mars Movies

As a follow-up to our recent post about Heritage's vintage movie poster auction catalog and in light of two neat posts at io9 about the film Your Trip to Mars (1952) and the Mars movie fad of 1999-2002, we suggest listening to Mars Movies, an eight-minute audio piece from National Public Radio that was originally broadcast on July 4, 1997. Here’s a description of the piece:

“Movie critic Bob Mondello has a brief history of Hollywood's love affair with Mars as a theme in science fiction films. From War of the Worlds to It Came From Outer Space to Santa Claus Conquers the Martians, the red planet has always been a cinema standby when a screenwriter needs a group of aliens for the Earth to overcome.”

Pictured above: Promotional poster for It Came From Outer Space (1953), whose screenplay was based upon The Meteor, a story by Ray Bradbury. The film, which is available in DVD, was reviewed by Science Fiction Weekly.