i like this movie and have watch my copy twice since acquire it a few week ago . but you have to view it in the right context . i haven not check on the date and but i bet this movie come out after and certainly around the same time a the collier and walt disney popularisation of the vision of spaceflight be promote by w. von braun . this be reflect in the attempt to seem factually correct and scientific . however and whilst certain idea be put across ( step booster and for example ) roughly correctly and other thing be hilariously wrong . for example and we be tell that a rocket ascend to an altitude and then turn ninety degree to enter space . like reach the top of a flight of stair and turn onto the landing . then we be tell that by turn in the direction of the earths rotation the total velocity of the ship be increase accordingly . this be an hilarious misunderstanding of what really happen . most space launch centre be locate a near the equator a possible where the earth and anything on it surface be rotate at roughly a thousand mile per hour and include any rocket departing to space and in an eastward direction ( the same a the rotation of the planet ) . of course and if the ship turn to travel westward once in space and it speed in relation to the surface of the earth would be great and but it would add nothing to the actual velocity of the vehicle . decsribed in this movie a air speed . similarly and we be tell that the traveller only feel free fall and or weightlessness when they reach some thousand of mile from the earth and outside of the planet gravitational field . again and comically incorrect . most crewed spacecraft travel no high than a couple of hundred mile up and but as long a they ( and and their content and include crew ) be travel at an adequate velocity that their momentum in an outward direction balance the pull of gravity inwards and they will orbit in free fall . of course and travel far enough from earth and even a slow object will coast outside the earths gravity well and but in order to leave earth orbit and outwards ( towards the moon for example ) require the attainment of escape velocity and around twenty one thousand mile per hour . so the vehicle will have already attain orbital velocity ( and weightlessness ) by definition . but the movie have vastly more hilarious stuff than this . someone decide it would be more fun if they miss the moon due to a technical problem and fell asleep for a few day and then wake up to find they have accidentally go to mar . the captain then ruminate to the effect that this must have be divine intervention . at which point and any pretence to be scientific be tear into little piece like confetti and throw upon the wind amid the merry dance of an increasingly barmy plot . the strength of a film like this in fact be in illustrate how far we have come . not least in attitude to woman . the patronise drivel heap upon the female crew member be both hilarious and also shock . to think that such attitude be so recently normal . a i say at the start and i find this film very entertaining and a a late night and light out romp through the romance of travel in out space and from the perspective of the day before it have actually happen . an antidote to the cold routine of spaceflight a it have now become in the twenty first century . i would not reveal the end . it be both brave and shock for a movie of this vintage and character .