Product Description

Only 12 have walked on the moon. You're next! Presented and narrated by Tom Hanks, Magnificent Desolation: Walking on the Moon is an IMAX documentary film that transports the viewer to lunar surface, where they can walk alongside the 12 extraordinary astronauts who have been there, experiencing what they saw, heard, and felt.

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Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #5961 in DVD
• Brand: HBO HOME VIDEO
• Released on: 2007-11-06
• Rating: Unrated
• Aspect ratio: 1.66:1
• Formats: AC-3, Closed-captioned, Color, Dolby, Dubbed, DVD, Subtitled, Widescreen, NTSC
• Original language: English
• Subtitled in: English, Spanish, French
• Dubbed in: French, Spanish
• Number of discs: 1
• Dimensions: 1.00 pounds
• Running time: 40 minutes

Amazon.com
Tom Hanks continues his love affair with space that began with Apollo 13 and his miniseries From Earth to the Moon with this compelling IMAX adventure, Magnificent Desolation. Fans of space fact and fantasy will not want to miss this engaging docudrama, which combines actual footage of lunar walks and interviews of the few men who've trod there with dramatizations of scenarios both exciting and terrifying.

The true way to experience this film, of course, is in its IMAX splendor, but home-theater buffs won't be disappointed. The footage takes the "lunar visitor" along moon's craters and potholes, with nothing but the vastness of space all around. Unseen film shows close-ups of terrain as well as technical infrastructure that may well be models for future moon-living. One particularly scary scene thankfully has never happened on a moon mission, and involves the sudden loss of breathing apparatus. Scuba divers will recognize the "buddy system" of sharing a single air source--and viewers with any kind of claustrophobic issues may want to fast-forward. But overall, the thrills of space travel are made as real as possible for us mere mortals who will only experience it from our comfy chairs. Roger that.--A.T. Hurley

Customer Reviews

Stunning!
I saw Tom Hanks's, "Magnificent Desolation: Walking on the Moon 3D" at the IMAX theater at the Franklin Institute in Philadelphia twice. It was stunning from beginning to end. Outer Space has always been my first love and when the film showed 3D shots of the lunar surface and what a future lunar base would look like, I got emotional to the point that tears were in my eyes. It is a must have for everyone's home movie collection and especially if you are a space buff like me. It will be in my collection, count on it!!!!

Cursory, IMAX-Formatted Look at the Apollo Lunar Missions Designed to Inspire the Next Generation
If you saw the superb 2007 documentary, In the Shadow of the Moon, I am not certain what the point would be in viewing this forty-minute 2005 IMAX film - at least if you are old enough to remember the television coverage of the Apollo missions. The former film includes spectacular archival footage of those missions and insightful on-camera interviews with ten of the surviving astronauts. This one is aimed more directly as a motivational film for a youthful audience as it seeks to reignite the pioneering spirit that sparked the first space flights. NASA aficionado Tom Hanks wrote and produced (along with director Mark Cowen) this enthralling if somewhat cursory look at what it took to get to the moon and what it will take to continue the legacy. The film not only recreates some of the actual Apollo lunar missions but also posits what could have happened had disaster struck. The result adds a suspenseful element obviously designed to engage younger viewers.

Hanks applies his storytelling skills to full dramatic effect during these fictitious interludes. They are intertwined with a whirlwind of facts presented in a breezy manner, an especially effective tactic in chronicling mankind's fascination with the moon since this film is meant to inspire as well as to educate. To reinforce the approach, there is a series of quick interviews with youngsters that bookend the featurette showing how the space race has completely preceded them and how it could be resuscitated for the next generation of lunar exploration which targets us back on the moon by 2016. A number of famous actors provide the voices of the astronauts - Matt Damon, Morgan Freeman, Paul Newman - but few are recognizable. The 3-D visual effects are lost on the 2007 DVD, though I think not as much as the elongated dimensions provided by an IMAX theater. Even more than the technical elements, what really brings the film together is Hanks' obvious enthusiasm for the subject. The DVD includes additional video footage and photographs from the Apollo 11 mission plus a trivia game.

Kiddies film only
I had high expectations for this film, but they weren't really met. The special effects are good, but it is interspersed by a mainly NASA recruiting film for kids. It has dumbed down the moon landings to a 8 year olds level. Ok it may be great for kids and I guess that is the intended audience, but I am sick of the modern way of dumbing everything down so it is boring. There is nothing to inspire me, no romance for returning to the moon, no excitement or adventure, even though they did try on this. The series "From the Earth to the Moon" got it right, why did Tom Hanks let us down with this one which could have been the best ever? The IMAX films "The Dream is Alive" and "Hail Columbia" got it right why did this one miss the boat I wonder?
Go see it at an IMAX theatre, but don't bother with the DVD if you are a real space fan. Also the extra material is of such low res graphics it could have been shot with a cell phone camera. It froze up my DVD player and I had to reboot it.