Stowaway to the Moon (1975 TV Movie) User Reviews

A boy sneaks on board a spacecraft and goes along for the ride!

[jaybabb · 7/10 · 8 November 2001]

This is a sweet, simple story about a boy who stowaway on a spacecraft the night before lift off. It appears that he really thought this plan through, he studied up on space travel and the complex nature of traveling in space. This kid is smart, he knew what he was doing!

This is 1974 and the security technology has not yet been available. It's impossible to get away with some thing like that today. I like the way this story is told, it's not corny, but neither is it overblown.

This film also brings back the memories of the Apollo space program, while I was only 5 years old when Apollo 11 mission to the moon, I still remember the event because it was all anyone talked about at the time.

This is good story telling. I give it ***1/2 out of *****.

A low budget TV Movie that entertains and teaches....

[miller-movies · 7/10 · 5 June 2000]

Lloyd Bridges and John Carradine are the only big name actors in this TV movie, but the remainder of the cast do fairly well. This is a film about a NASA Moon mission, with a boy who stows away in the trash compartment. While moderately simplistic, it does a good job of showing what an actual mission was all about. Michael Link stars as the title character. Do not expect massive FX, tho there is some good footage from the Apollo missions. Astronaut Charles Conrad provides some nice insight as a news reporter. Shown on Fox Movie Channel on June 5th... it might be repeated. 7.

Lloyd Bridges and John Carradine

[kevinolzak · 6/10 · 18 July 2017]

"Stowaway to the Moon" was broadcast 5 1/2 years after the first lunar landing in 1969 (only two years after the last), and no doubt symbolized the fascination with space in the hearts of young viewers. Based on a 1973 novel by William R. Shelton, and apparently quite faithful to its fictitious source, about 11 year old E.J. Mackernutt (Michael Link) successfully sneaking past NASA security at Cape Kennedy to hide in the trash compartment of the Camelot rocket due to take off in a few hours. Inspired by the fishing and honey making expertise of old Jacob Avril (John Carradine), whose home adjoins the launch site, the already incisive boy uses his knowledge and acumen to assist the trio of astronauts once they're on their way to the moon for rock samples. As one might expect, unexpected mishaps always play out to a satisfactory conclusion, predictable yet never less than entertaining. The passage of time can't help but make this well played adventure a bit naïve, kind of a child's version of the 1950 "Destination Moon," itself passe after just two decades. The presence of top billed Lloyd Bridges, from the rival production that beat the original moon film to theaters in 1950, "Rocketship X-M" (forced to use Mars as their destination), is a welcome bonus, fretting over things at Houston while an 11 year old boy earns plaudits out in space. The rushed climax makes everything look like it may have been a dream all along, but for viewers of any age it's a relic of a bygone era when the familiar lunar stock footage was still relatively new, with real life astronaut Charles 'Pete' Conrad doing the commentary.

I remember this!

[gazzo-2 · 25 May 2003]

Sure I can remember seeing this on TV when I was 9, the kid weighed about 87 lbs, and if I remember right, nearly freezes to death while they are circling the moon(?)-there was some suspense and all that. I had never heard what this was called but I remembered parts of it all these years.

Yes this is worth seeing if you can find it; not a bad rainy Saturday afternooner thing for your kids at the least. And hey, it has John Carradine AND Lloyd Bridges. Not bad.

**1/2 outta **** at least.

kid sneaks aboard Apollo flight, travels to the moon

[jefffisher65-708-541158 · 7/10 · 23 June 2013]

Stowaway to the Moon is a film I can recall from my childhood when I was also a dedicated real-life space flight follower, and can recall the final moon flights fairly well. Anybody else ever have the Science Club booklet, Apoloo-to-the-Mooon Map with those paste-down stickers, and/or maybe even the model kit of Apollo Eleven on the Mooon? Anywyay, I doubt today's kids would be interested, non-digital, you see.

Anyhow, I only saw this film once on a rare television showing since the 1970s, but the handful of reviews here sums it pretty well. I suspect the movie was meant to be entertaining as much as anything else, and perhaps the rushed ending was due to the low made-for-TV film budgets as much as anything else. It was good to see Lloyd Bridges and John Carradine, of course as well as real-life moonwalker Cahrles Conrad in a small role. I wish somebody would bring this out on disc for nostalgia's sake.

Only nostalgia keeps this from a 1/10

[agb8369 · 4/10 · 17 December 2012]

I remembered this as a kid like some others. IF this movie was an after school special catering to kids, my perspective would be different, but it was not when released in 1975.

1. Even pre-terrorist days, launch sites were locked down tight. Especially then with a war still in its wake. No kid is going to sneak aboard.

2. There is not as much space as depicted in the capsule. They are tight, just as the capsule the kid is shown in at the beginning of the movie.

3. The guard entrances when the dad cam in would not have been so lax.

I could go on all evening on this flick since it is clueless and lazy with effort. Based on the insanely rushed ending, they somebody must have gotten how bad this was and cut the budget- hence the abrupt and nonsense ending. Even as a kid all those years ago I thought the kid was dreaming, up until the end. Due to the odd demeanor of the adults and the lack of logic, I thought the movie was intended to be the kid dreaming and it then would have made sense. Reason being, the movie literally seems like a dream of an eleven year old.

From a kids perspective, the movie would be a 7/10, since THEN it would make sense.

We have ignition

[WilliamJE · 2/10 · 25 July 2022]

Stowaway to the Moon is very typical for a 1970's made for television movie. It is both low budget and not very well written. The film may have worked better if it had been all a dream but it wasn't.

Once, when the wonders of space still beckoned to children...

[TVholic · 8/10 · 14 June 2005]

It's been so many years since I last saw this. Sort of a children's version of "Marooned" or an earlier, better version of "Spacecamp."

Young EJ is an intelligent, young boy with an obsessive interest in the space program. So he hatches a plan to sneak past the launch support crew and surveillance cameras during the launch preparations for the "Camelot" moon mission, managing to get himself into the Apollo space capsule. Once they're en route to the Moon, he's discovered. His presence causes problems and strains the resources of a spacecraft meticulously designed to hold only three men, but he also helps solve other problems that arise and so gains the respect, friendship and admiration of the astronauts.

Child actor Michael Link did a fine job in the titular role. EJ was written as highly intelligent but not a precocious smart aleck like so many child characters today. A young nerd, as it were. Most of the adults were fine as well, including veterans Lloyd Bridges and John Carradine.

For all the haters who harp about how implausible this movie is, it was a family-oriented TV movie, not a documentary or even a big-budget theatrical feature film. NASA itself had no problems with it and lent their full support. They supplied genuine footage from the Apollo missions to be interspersed in the movie. They even allowed all the scenes at "Mission Control" to be filmed in one of the actual Kennedy Space Center firing rooms (launch control center) in Florida. Apollo astronaut Pete Conrad played himself as a TV commentator. None of this would have happened if they had thought this movie was garbage.

It was the daydream of many a young boy and certainly some young girls (paging Dr. Sally Ride) in the years immediately following the Apollo missions to be an astronaut. "Stowaway" took that a step further with a dream of going into space without having to grow up (and grow old) first. But show this movie to most kids today and they would be likely to not only find the special effects lacking (which is not all that important) but the space program dull and uninspiring.. How times have changed. No longer does the nation cluster around TVs, holding its collective breath throughout each mission People have become jaded to space, even though the shuttle only goes up every few months at most -- no more often than the Moon missions did. If JFK could see the level of disinterest today, he would cry. Shows and movies about the space program (as opposed to space operas, alien invasions and the like) are rarities today. Only a few come to mind from the last two decades. The Right Stuff, Apollo 13, From the Earth to the Moon, Spacecamp, Space Cowboys. Alas, the last two were targeted at diametrically opposite age groups. All of us would benefit if some of the early wonder were instilled in generations now and yet to come.

A Very Enjoyable TV Movie

[Retro_TV_Man · 9/10 · 13 December 2008]

Wow. I was just talking with friends about movies that I remember watching on television when I was young and this gem came to mind.

The main character is an avid fan of the moon program and comes up with a plan to get up close and personal with a rocket on it's way to the moon. He manages to stay on board during the launch and that's when the fun begins. Yes, it's simplistic in that it ignores some of the basic physics of space flight but I'm sure the core audience of this movie - young fans of the Apollo missions - really didn't notice.

If I remember it right they discover him on the way to the moon and he ends up saving the day as the pilot of the command module comes down with the flu and the kid looks after him and helps him recover while the other astronauts continue with their mission of landing on the moon. The return trip back to Earth gets rough as the kid almost freezes but does survive as they make it back to Earth. He ends up becoming somewhat of a hero at the end.

Yes, it pushed the boundaries of realism but, hey, the Appolo program was still going when this came out so it was easy to overlook the small details.

9 out of 10.

I loved this movie as a kid and still remember it

[khmeehan · 10/10 · 27 August 2022]

It's absolutely 70s made for tv shlock but so great. I still remember the stowaway kid vacuuming the astronaut vomit scene. And i read this year that astronauts left vomit and poop on the moon as a weight exchange to bring home moon rocks. Scientists plan to retrieve the 50+ old vomit and poop for study. So there is some validity to this story I guess. No one thinks about the stomach churning life of an astronaut. Anyway, this is a great movie to watch, filmed shortly after the space race era. Who says you can't stowaway on a US Apollo mission? This was the 1970's man, almost any absurdity was possible.

A guilty pleasure

[logicology · 8/10 · 13 July 2022]

When this movie was released I was the same age as the stowaway to the moon. Like many pre-teen boys of this period I dreamed of going to the moon. My youthful mind was filled with fantasies nurtured by 2001 ... Forbidden Planet ... Star Trek ... Planet of the apes ... Space 1999 and many other sci-fi films and books. I really enjoyed this TV movie despite its flaws. Yes, the science doesn't work in some parts and it's made on a budget. Still, in the days prior to STAR WARS this fired the imagination of boys who thought of themselves as Tom Swift and dreamed of the adventures awaiting humanity out among the stars.