Jose I
This movie was groundbreaking at the time, having the best effects ever and nothing could seem to top it. The story is creative, but this film is really not that good at today's standards. Compared to other pictures from the 1920s forwards, this is incredibly boring and the visual effects, as expected, do not hold up to today's standards. I'm not saying it's not worth a watch, as any cinephile like me can see how far we've come over the past century, but if I wanted to watch a sci-fi classic I'd put on 2001: A Space Odyssey.
Rated 2/5 Stars •
Rated 2 out of 5 stars
10/06/25
Full Review
Christopher C
Christopher B was kinda right, but the other person has a point.
Rated 2.5/5 Stars •
Rated 2.5 out of 5 stars
09/26/25
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Tyler S
Very simple, but a masterful production.
Rated 3/5 Stars •
Rated 3 out of 5 stars
09/20/25
Full Review
CD C
Rating: 8/10
**Artistic merit: 9/10 **
This is the most fully realized artistic vision I've yet seen in moving through movies from the beginning. The story is expertly told in 3 clear acts. The opening scene with the chalkboard is extremely effective silent exposition. Previous films either depend on a familiarity with the news or other source material, or a scenario obvious enough to not require any set up (Save the people in the fire). This with the beautifully designed backdrop with the long telescope leading to the moon out the window effectively sets up where we're going and why. And even secondary plots like what happens to the moon man are wrapped up, and images like the capsule in the eye of the moon have call backs. It's intricate and united.
And the world building is incredibly effective. This is the earliest film I've seen that establishes any kind of unique "world of the film." The more obvious part is the moon that looks like a jungle of stone. But this contrast is set up earlier in the soft robes, and hard metals of earth. And choices like showing Earth in the sky really bring a sense of wonder that is incredible given the technical limitations of the time.
And Méliès movie magic is in complete control here. Compare it to the other great 1902 film, The Little Match Seller, there the entire production revolves around the double exposure effect of what's in the young girl's mind. So our main character is shunted off to the corner of the screen. The effect controls the narrative.
Here the special effect is in service of the story. When the moon inhabitants disappear in a poof of smoke, my 6 year old proclaimed, "what kind of creatures are those!" And perhaps the most notable special effect is the moon growing larger and larger. He uses his mastery of technique to heighten the main emotion of the film so far: anticipation.
There are certainly artistic shortcomings, how did the capsule end up on a cliff? But most of them are issues that no one had yet solved, but that remain obvious, especially around framing. The action happens just outside the screen a frustrating number of times, and sometimes I want to shout at Méliès through time and space, "Just move the camera Georges, just pan it a little bit." But you can hardly blame Méliès for only managing to invent half of the modern conception of movies.
You can see a bit of Méliès' development from the The Haunted Castle, Dreyfus Affair, Joan of Arc, and Bluebeard. This film didn't come out of nowhere. But this was a massive step forward. And if you track film from the time we first saw people walking out of a factory to today, it's hard not to see "A Trip to the Moon" as a massive flag planted on the trail pointing the way to where we are now.
**Entertainment merit: 8/10**
This film moves. It's structured well, if not flawlessly. It relies mostly on the question of "what are they going to find on the moon?" It's a solid mystery, and one with a suitable resolution.
At about half the length of a sitcom, the film doesn't need to do a lot to keep you engaged. But it does what it needs to. You've got clear quirky characters you're rooting for, stakes and peril, and it's all set in a sumptuous visual environment.
For a film that is entirely staged in proscenium shots, it's impressive how much visual interest there is. And that environment stimulates while the narrative lags. There is a scene once the party reaches the moon, where they fall asleep. The story does lag, but taking in the still novel environment is enough to carry the viewer through.
Conflict Types: man vs. nature (35%), man vs. unknown (35%), man vs. supernatural (25%), man vs society (5%)
Genre: Science Fiction (35%), Fantasy (25%), Adventure (25%), Burlesque (15%)
Plot: Voyage and Return, Daring Enterprise, A Journey to the Other World (466), Man in Hole, Romance (Frye)
**Moral merit: 7/10**
This film is steeped in the ideals of Victorian scientific sensibilities. He is pulling from the same moral intuitions that created Jules Verne's "From Earth to the Moon" or HG Well's "The First Men in the Moon." And there is much good to be found here.
These are people of courage, undergird by thoughtful academic exploration first. And the world celebrates their achievements. I want my children to see studying hard and then doing great things with what you learned put up on a pedestal and lauded. I especially enjoy that it's also not taken too seriously, these characters have a bit of vaudeville bumbling going on.
There are a few minor things that tug around the edges for me. The moon creatures are immediately antagonistic, painting an antagonistic world, that we so often assume, but that is often kinder in reality. And though the creatures are presented as sentient, capable of organizing, building weapons, etc. the one that returns to earth is tied up and paraded. The creature may not be human, but it appeals to too long a history of dehumanization to not feel uncomfortable, and it certainly presents a vision of "victory" that likely does not produce long-term peace.
Virtues: Ambition, Courage, Diligence, Hope, Intelligence, Wit
Themes: Progress, Exploration, Conquest, Science, Ambition, The Academy
**Audience**
This film is for everyone! There are few films that can really be enjoyed universally. And I hesitate to recommend a black and white silent film to most people. There's a reason the most popular movies have color and sound. But 123 years later, this film stands up. Whether you love genre film, are a child with a big imagination, love action, enjoy history, or just want to be taken on an adventure for ten minutes, this film hits the spot. It is the earliest film that if someone told me they hadn't seen it, I would turn it on for them right then and there.
Audience segments: Everyone
Keywords: Cinema of Attractions, Trick Film, Special Effect Spectacle, Féerie, French Fantastique, Tableau Aesthetic, Long Cuts, Proto-Surrealist, Pantomime, Early Science Fiction, Early Fantasy, Burlesque, Black and White, Silent, No Intertitles, Theatrograph, 35 mm, 4:3, Studio Shot, Stop Trick, multiple exposure, dissolves & fades, pyrotechnics, stage machinery, orthochromatic
Rated 4/5 Stars •
Rated 4 out of 5 stars
09/17/25
Full Review
Henrique X
If La Sortie de l’Usine Lumière was cinema’s first step, Le Voyage dans la Lune was its first leap — not just to the Moon, but into fantasy, into science fiction, into the very idea that cinema could be an entirely invented universe. Released in 1902, this film by Georges Méliès is more than a pioneer: it’s a miracle of imagination, invention, and absolute faith in the power of visual spectacle. It marks the precise moment when cinema stopped simply “looking at the world” and began to create worlds out of nothing.
Loosely inspired by the works of Jules Verne and H. G. Wells, Le Voyage dans la Lune follows a group of astronomers who launch themselves to the Moon in a giant bullet-shaped capsule. Once there, they encounter alien creatures, are captured, escape, and return to Earth as heroes. Everything is exaggerated, theatrical, and impossible. And yet, it all works — not because it mimics reality, but because it obeys the logic of imagination established by its own fantastical universe.
That’s exactly what makes the film so powerful: it doesn’t try to look realistic — it tries to look fabulous. The Moon’s landscape, built from cardboard, smoke, and fireworks, became one of the most iconic images in film history: that lunar face with a rocket lodged in its eye says everything about the ambition, boldness, and humor of a newborn art. Visual absurdity becomes beauty. Artifice becomes magic.
Méliès — a magician before he was a filmmaker — mastered cinematic tricks like few others: disappearances, explosions, superimpositions, scene transformations. All done by hand, with in-camera edits and multiple exposures. Every frame is a showcase, every scene a stage performance. But unlike theater, Méliès’ cinema needed no physical limits. He could turn smoke into moon dust, a painted backdrop into an entire cosmos, a studio into a dream. Here we witness the birth of the cinema of imagination — the notion of space that shifts with a cut, the scene that becomes a moving spectacle.
And though there’s no spoken narration, the story is crystal clear. Méliès masters the rhythm of visual progression: each moment follows the next with internal logic, evolving through settings, gestures, and enchantment that require no words. It’s universal cinema — understood by any audience, anywhere in the world. Like every great fable, it speaks through images. And those images endure: the cannon, the Moon, the Selenites, the triumphant return.
There’s even a subtle commentary on the scientific arrogance of modernity: the wise men who travel to the Moon behave like colonial conquerors — attacking the unknown and returning home to celebration. From the very start, science fiction contains this duality: awe toward the unknown and the desire to dominate it. Méliès doesn’t moralize, but he does ironize. He knows that progress without poetry is nothing but noise.
Watching Le Voyage dans la Lune today feels like opening a magical chest. Yes, its effects are primitive — but they carry an artisanal strength and inventiveness that defy modern industrial polish. It’s a cinema of paper and ink, of smoke and shadow — and for that very reason, infinitely more alive than any contemporary digital simulation. It pulses because it was crafted by hand, with wide eyes and an open heart.
Le Voyage dans la Lune is not just the first science fiction film. It’s a declaration that cinema can be a theater of wonders, a cosmic circus, a moving painting that doesn’t merely reflect the world, but reinvents it on its own terms. It is a manifesto of the impossible — and even today, it’s impossible not to be enchanted.
Original review in portuguese: https://henriquexaxa.substack.com/p/critica-cinematografica-le-voyage
Rated 5/5 Stars •
Rated 5 out of 5 stars
08/04/25
Full Review
Jeremiah D.
AHH SPOOKY MAN FACE ON MOON!!!
Rated 3.5/5 Stars •
Rated 3.5 out of 5 stars
07/23/25
Full Review
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