 In, Through, and Beyond
If
I were to tell you a story of an eccentric ship captain and
his plot to live out his days without dealing with mankind,
you would likely think I am talking about Jules Verne's
20,000 Leagues Under the Sea. What I didn't learn until
I was much older than I should have been, is that this is
also the exact plot of 1979's The Black Hole.
 Riding on the coattails of Star Wars Episode IV: A New
Hope, Disney jumped on the sci-fi bandwagon and produced
this wonderful family space adventure. It consists of a
small crew of astronauts/ scientists who come across the
Cygnus, a missing space ship that was thought to be lost
years before. The ship is fully intact and the captain of
the ship, Dr. Hans Reinhart
(Played by Maximilian Schell)
has plans to run his ship thorough the center of a black
hole. Unfortunately, he needs the group of scientists to
document the event, and keeps them captive until his journey
begins. They do not like this idea and spend much of the
film trying to escape before things go really wrong, and
believe me, things go very wrong.
 About five years ago I felt like watching Disney's 1954
version of 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea. I had
certainly seen it several times as a child, but it was this
viewing of it that I realized that The Black Hole is
just a space version of this story. All of the features are
there. The once great, but now crazy captain, the intrigued
but disturbed heroes, the creepy crew of the ship, the
constant man versus nature conflicts, all of these are in
both movies and The Black Hole pulls it off very
successfully. I just hadn't made the when I was a kid.
 Maximilian Schell isn't the only star in the movie either.
Robert Forster, Anthony Perkins, and Ernest Borgnine make up
part of the crew of scientists. Roddy McDowall, and Slim
Pickens supply voices for their robots, V.I.N.Cent (Vital
Information Necessary CENTralized) and Bob. These droids are
obvious comparisons rip offs of the very fun R2-D2, but
again, pulled off well. They are smart, funny, and very
capable droids. I constantly hear the soundtrack in my head
when I am thinking of something heroic. Written by John
Barry, it's an exceedingly heroic soundtrack that is still
heard today when watching commercials and trailers for
sci-fi adventure movies.
 Even though I recognize the fact that this was Disney's
attempt at capturing the success of the Star Wars Movies,
and that it is a very accurate retelling of the 20,000
Leagues story, I don't think these things take away from its
innovation. The movie is really fun to watch. It does a good
job of capturing what makes the movies it is based on
exciting like laser battles, space ships, truly eccentric
and dark villains, a lot of robots, and let's not forget the
black hole itself. Visually, it's beautiful to see. Though I
haven't seen it on DVD yet, I imagine if they have
remastered it, it will look even more impressive.
 The Black Hole is one of the treasures of my childhood; my
friends and I had the audio picture book and would act it
out along with the movie. Due to the success of the sci-fi
genre since Star Wars, it has been set aside by several
newer, louder and 3D rendered movies. This does not take
away from the quality that is this movie. It helps prove a
point that I have been building all my life, no matter how
great the effects, if the story isn't there, it isn't going
to be good. Well, The Black Hole has a great story that has
been successful for over 100 years. It's just as insightful
today as it was then, and by having Disney move the story
into outer space, it helps to solidify its timelessness. The
same problems will affect us in the future have always
affected us. Whether it's under sea or above the heavens,
the same people and problems exist yesterday, today and
tomorrow.
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