IMDb user comments for
Fantastic Voyage (1966)

advertisement

Filter:

Best Chronological Prolific Authors Loved It Hated It Hide Spoilers:

Page 1 of 6:

[1] [2] [3] [4] [5] [6]

Index

57 comments in total

---

15 out of 19 people found the following comment useful :-
Superior Sci-Fi Adventure!, 9 July 2002

Author: (bsmith5552@rogers.com) from Ottawa, Ontario, Canada

The premise of "Fantastic Voyage" seemed very unlikely in 1966, however in 2002 I'm not so sure.

The story concerns a top secret miniaturization program being developed by the Americans and concurrently by "the other side". A scientist from the other side has the secret of counteracting the situation where the miniaturization effects wear off after one hour. Unfortunately, the scientist receives a brain injury in an assassination attempt. This results in General Carter (Edmond O'Brien), the commanding officer of the project deciding to "send in" a team of experts miniaturized, to the injured man's brain to repair the damage.

The team consists of Drs. Duval (Arthur Kennedy) and Michaels (Donald Pleasance), Pilot Capt. Owens (William Redfield) and the romantic leads, Grant (Stephen Boyd) and the ever lovely Raquel Welch as Duval's assistant. Assisting O'Brien as a medical expert is Arthur O'Connell as Col. Reid. Of course, as in most film's of this type there is the inevitable fifth columnist aboard. The acting is good, particluarly the performances of veterans Kennedy, Pleasance, O'Brien and O'Connell.

The real star of the "Fantastic Voyage" are its amazing special effects. Filmed long before today's computerized digital effects, this film still makes believable, the illusion of a team of people being injected into a person's bloodstream. To fully appreciate the effects the viewer should see it in its widescreen format.

Watch for James Brolin in a small role as one of the lab technicians. And if you get bored, there's always (snort, pant, drool) Raquel in her form fitting diving suit.

---

12 out of 14 people found the following comment useful :-
And What A Trip It Is!, 24 February 2003

Author: ClassixFan from USA

This film was originally introduced to me at about 8 or 9 years of age on a Saturday afternoon and it quickly became a favorite of mine. This film tells the story of a brilliant scientist who is injured on his way to offer the U.S. military some much needed info for miniaturizing people and objects and allowing them to stay in the miniature state beyond the now 60 minute time limit the military is faced with. With a top-notch cast that includes; Stephen Boyd, Edmond O'Brien, Donald Pleasence and Raquel Welch as the medical Dr.'s and scientists that are miniaturized and injected into the scientists body in an effort to repair a wound that can't be fixed through the usual means. The effects in this film are truly amazing and make for a lot of fun as the sub/crew journey through the body and face problems along the way, especially as they are attacked as foreign bodies by the scientist's own natural defense system. If you haven't had the pleasure of seeing this little gem, by all means find it and rent it and if it's been a while, why not revisit this film, I'm amazed at how well it stands up, even after almost 40 years since it's release.

---

16 out of 23 people found the following comment useful :-
Blue Screen effects, straight ahead!, 22 January 2001

Author: moonspinner55 from redlands, ca

Every time "Fantastic Voyage" comes on TV, I turn it on expecting it to be better. Better than what? The standard sci-fi's of the day, the Irwin Allen TV shows. It's about on that par. There's the usual grueling technical preliminaries, the discussion over whether or not to take A GIRL along (never mind that she's a scientist), the setting up of the cardboard characters--with a madman among them (this is among the hoariest of clichés, going back to Hitchcock's "Lifeboat"--why do we need a psycho aboard ship? Isn't the premise about microscopic scientists venturing forth into a human body enough?). I did love the special effects, although the constant use of back-projection is hokey now (some professional critics said it was hokey then!) and I have no idea why the actors are all so stiff and unappealing. I guess with a $5-million-or-more budget on the line, 20th Century Fox couldn't ante up the extra cash for frivolity. **1/2 from ****

---

16 out of 24 people found the following comment useful :-
Colourful Though Flawed Fantasy Adventure, 19 August 2005

Author: Theo Robertson from Isle Of Bute , Scotland

To enjoy this movie one must turn off their brain as soon as the theme tune of 20th Century Fox starts . The whole set up is very hard to swallow - A scientist who know the secret of miniaturization is injured by commie assassins and now lies in a coma due to a blood clot on the brain and only by miniaturizing a submarine type capsule and sending both it and its crew through an artery can both the scientist and free world be saved . It's never actually explained as to why miniaturizing is such a radical development for espionage or warfare . Think about it does this mean you can infiltrate the Kremlin by sending an envelope containing a miniaturized army ? Seeing as the enemy are aware of the process they can easily protect themselves against this - By running a rolling pin over all incoming mail . And wouldn't shrinking someone to the size of something little bigger than an element kill them anyway due to the changes in mass ? Wouldn't air pressure alone kill any miniaturized person ? And wouldn't it have been a good idea to vet the crew to find out if any of them were claustrophobic before sending them on their mission ?

You understand what I'm saying don't you ? The ideas and plot devices presented are entirely laughable because of their nature , that's why I told you to stop thinking about it . If you manage this you've got a pretty enjoyable escapist fantasy once it gets started . You realise that if the capsule crew go on an uneventful journey we wouldn't have much of a movie so we find obstacles at every corner involving detours , anti-bodies and a traitor within and if none of this gets you excited how about Raquel Welch in a really tight costume ? What do you mean she hasn't been given any decent lines ?

---

9 out of 12 people found the following comment useful :-
Pretty good little film., 23 July 2002

Author: Brian Ellis from Chantilly, VA

To answer everyone's question about how did Issac Asimov resolve the Proteus issue at the end of the movie; in his novelization of the film (which is a very good sci-fi book on its own), the sub comes out with everyone else in the teardrop along with "a very surprised white blood cell." The scene with Donald Pleasance gave me chills when I saw it as a child and having recently seen it again, it still is creepy. I think this is due to Pleasance's performance more than anything else. I do have to say that seeing Stephen Boyd being driven around the LA Sports Center (subbing for the top secret research center; they had to have everything removed by 5:30 in the afternoon the week they filmed there because sporting events were going on at night) in a golf cart seemed a bit silly but I guess that showed how important he was. With these kinds of films, one has to ignore all certain types of questions about how come this did or didn't happen when the scientists did this and just relax and enjoy it.

---

9 out of 12 people found the following comment useful :-
Classic SF and great visuals, 7 May 2000

Author: Rene' Smeraglia from Washington, DC

This movie holds up after nearly 35 years. The TV version is often chopped up for commercials and the print muddy, but if you can get a good video or see it on a premium movie channel, Fantastic Voyage will still produce a sense of wonder as you navigate "inside" an injured man's body with a team of intrepid explorers to find and repair microscopic damage. Some of the Cold War aspects of the film might jar, as well as a 35-year-old vision of "high tech", but the spec effects of the journey of the PROTEUS through the human vascular system was years ahead of its time.

---

9 out of 13 people found the following comment useful :-
A Great Thriller, 21 July 2003
Author: Brian Washington (Sargebri@att.net) from Los Angeles, California

This is not only a great science fiction film, it is also a great thriller as well. I especially loved the fact that this was supposedly done in "real time" and that the characters and that it was not only a mission to save the scientist life, but a race against time before the miniaturization wore off. Also, even though the effects are dated, they still were pretty good for the era they were produced in.

---

9 out of 13 people found the following comment useful :-
`Grant, help! My hands are trapped! Get me out!! Get me out!!!', 15 January 2002
Author: Finch Face Malone (emnw@emnw.org) from Seattle, Washington

`Fantastic Voyage' was the first sci-fi movie to employ psychedelic special effects. It was released in 1966 when LSD, hippiedom, and the word "groovy" took America by storm. A medical team in a far-out looking submarine are miniaturized to microscopic size and injected into a scientist's body to fix his brain. They travel through blood plasma, which resembles the inside of a lava lamp. Then they get lost in a rainbow whirlpool and have to journey through the heart, lung, and ear to find their way to the brain. Raquel Welch strips off some of her clothes in one scene, while God and Darwin lock horns in other scenes. God triumphs over Darwin in the end, and we never see Raquel get naked. Rated: Gee

Alan Hale from `Gilligan's Island' was originally cast for `Fantastic Voyage', but was replaced by William Redfield. The actors that star in this film are all dead, except for Raquel Welch.

---

10 out of 17 people found the following comment useful :-
This Special-Effects Film Needs A Re-Make, 13 May 2006

Author: ccthemovieman-1 from Lockport, NY, United States

I found this very interesting in parts and very boring in others....and that was awhile ago. With today's faster-paced movies, I would probably find this too much on the boring side today. The same holds true for the special effects: great in its day, nothing that much today.

This movie features a well-known cast but feels like a 'B' science-fiction film. A couple of decades later, they made another version of this called "Inner Space," and that was more interesting. I think another re-make would be appropriate about now in the mid 2000s. With today's technology, it would look spectacular. That's the problem with movies that rely heavily on special effects: they get dated quickly.

This movie might have been "fantastic" in the mid '60s, but not now.

---

4 out of 7 people found the following comment useful :-
Is there a doctor in the house?, 13 March 2005
Author: inspectors71 from The State of Confusion

*** This comment may contain spoilers ***

When my sister came home from seeing Fantastic Voyage at the State Theatre in Spokane in 1966, she raved about how scary it was for the crew of scientists, miniaturized by a secret government organization to destroy a blood clot in the brain of a wounded official, to be attacked by "ant-bodies," or that's what I thought she said. Since sisters are hopelessly stupid--and even I knew there were no bodies of ants swimming around in us--I figured the movie was too. A few years later I found out how the body fights off infection--ANTIBODIES!

I saw FV on ABC a few years after it came out. Boy, was I wrong about the movie (not my sister)! FV is a wonderfully exciting sci-fi adventure with all the right ingredients: Stern, bold heroes, sweating generals, a heroine with D-cups and a jump suit (Quit giggling out there; that means you, mister!), a cringing, rat-like villain, state-of-the-art special effects (ohmygosh, we've come a long way) and the coolest little radar dishes flapping back and forth around the wounded man's head.

This really is one of the best examples of good science fiction I've ever seen--it's adventurous, suspenseful, weirdly believable, and those those death defying D-cups!

Houston, we've got a problem!

---

---

Page 1 of 6:

[1] [2] [3] [4] [5] [6]

Add another comment

---

Related Links

Plot summary	Plot synopsis	Amazon.com summary
Ratings	Awards	External reviews
Plot keywords	Main details	Your user comments
Your vote history