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| Once in a New Moon is just one of the vintage sci-fi movies in this box set |
As a
sci-fi fan of many years I love having my attention brought to any films I may
have missed in the past so it was wonderful to see a movie I had never even
heard of before being shown on Talking
Pictures TV, a channel that shows less well known movies and TV shows.
A small
English seaside town, Shrimpton-on-Sea, is wrenched from the face of the Earth
by the gravitational attraction of what is referred to as a ‘dead star’ and the
movie covers what happens during the enforced isolation from the rest of the
planet from the discovery that the town is essentially a new moon to the
resulting civil strife as resources start to dwindle.
Once in a New Moon is typical of a lot
of early science fiction movies in that, if looked upon with a critical
scientific eye, it fails to pass a reality check but does what sci-fi does so
well – gives people a chance to view current social and political issues with
enough intellectual distance between ‘real’ life and the scenario being played
out. In the case of Once in a New Moon the plot device used is isolation from the rest
of society to give a brief exploration of class war albeit rather a basic one.
The
landed gentry think that they shouldn’t have to share the dwindling resources
on their new planetoid whilst the villagers are forced to ration what little
they have leading to a General Election which the village representative, a
Socialist proxy (the film doesn’t identify political ideologies), wins. The Conservative proxy faction, the Lord and
his family, refuse to accept the result of the election and continue to issue
proclamations and hoard resources which leads to preparations for war.
Being a
movie of just over 60 minutes in length, Once
in a New Moon can’t really do much in the way of fully exploring the issue
of class war and is forced to rush a conclusion that fails to investigate how
the situation might play itself out had the small town’s isolation been
curtailed so quickly which would have afforded a deeper exploration of human
nature that underpins the ideological positions of the two sides of the
political class battle.
Given
that the film also throws in a love triangle between the postmaster’s daughter,
a suitor from the village and a son of the manor and spends about a third of
its running time to setting up the characters and situation, it achieves what
it does achieve in an entertaining way albeit with a bit of a sledgehammer
rather than the more nuanced approach a longer film would have allowed.
There
are comedy moments with the story including the wholly unrealistic notion that
both representatives in the General Election think that the other would be a
better leader than they would be (something that would never occur to real life
political leaders) and the villager’s preparations for battle readiness.
All in
all, Once in a New Moon is an
interesting movie that entertains and gives the viewer something to think about
but does suffer from the malady of all early sci-fi – the fact that it would be
hard pressed to interest the ‘average’ viewer given the lack of action compared
with most modern day films.
