| | | "HD-DVD, The Look & Sound of Perfect."
Features: DVD, Collector's Edition, Widescreen, Aspect Ratio 2.40:1
A dutiful robot named Robby speaks 188 languages. An underground lair offers evidence of an advanced civilization. But among Altair-4's many wonders, none is greater or more deadly than the human mind. Forbidden Planet is the granddaddy of tomorrow, a pioneering work whose ideas and style would be reverse-engineered into many cinematic space voyages to come. Leslie Nielsen plays the commander who brings his spacecruiser crew to the green-skied world that's home to Dr. Morbius (Walter Pidgeon), his daughter (Anne Francis)...and to a mysterious terror. Featuring sets of extraordinary scale and the first all-electronic musical soundscape in film history, Forbidden Planet is in a movie orbit all its own.
"Every subsequent sci-fi movie and TV show is indebted to Forbidden Planet." Charles Matthews, Oscar A To Z
"An unusually intelligent sci-fi yarn with nifty F/X, goodscenic design..." Find-A-Video
"...remains one of the most ambitious and intelligent films of its genre..." Leonard Maltin's Movie & Video Guide
Editor's Note
Shakespeare's THE TEMPEST is transformed in this landmark science-fiction film. Spacemen travel to a planet ruled by Dr. Edward Morbius (Walter Pidgeon), who has built a kingdom with his daughter and obedient robot Robby. The good doctor is plagued by his mad quest for knowledge through his "brain booster" machine, and by Freudian "monsters from the id" as his daughter discovers other men and learns to kiss.
| Features | 2 Follow-Up Vehicles Starring Robby The Robot: The Invisible Boy & The Thin Man TV Series Episode Robot Client | | 3 Documentaries: Amazing! Exploring The Far Reaches Of Forbidden Planet, Robby The Robot - Engineering A Sci-Fi Icon & The TCM Original Watch The Skies! - Science Fiction, The 1950s & Us | | Additional Scenes | | Audio: English Dolby Digital Plus | | Audio: French, Spanish Dolby Digital Mono | | Dubbed: French, Spanish | | Excerpts From The MGM Parade TV Series | | Interactive Menus | | Lost Footage | | Scene Selection | | Science-Fiction Movie Trailer Gallery | | Subtitles: English, French, Spanish | | This Is An HD-DVD Made For HD-DVD Format Players Which Produce Higher Quality Picture And Sound |
| Technical Info
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Release Information
| | Studio: Warner |
| Release Date: 11/14/2006 |
| Running Time: 98 minutes |
| Original Release Date: 1956 | | Catalog ID: 79634 | | UPC: 00012569796348 | | Number of Discs: 1 |
Audio & Video
| | Original Language: English | | Available Audio Tracks: English [CC], English | | Video: Color |
Aspect Ratio | | Widescreen 2.40:1 |
| Cast & Crew
| Awards |
Nominee (1957) | | | Oscar, A. Arnold Gillespie, et. al., Best Effects, Special Effects |
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| | Professional Reviews | Entertainment Weekly
"...Sci-fi classic....[Nielsen does] a man's-gotta-do-what-a-man's-gotta-do..." -- Rating: A- 09/16/1994 pp.126-8USA Today
"Filmed in CinemaScope and color and given a lofty sci-fi budget for its day....[A] perennially popular outer space variation on Shakespeare's THE TEMPEST..." 08/01/1997 p.3D Premiere
"[A]n irresistible blend of the sublime and the silly....[With] magnificent galazy scapes...[and[ colorful futuristic interiors..." 12/01/2006 p.130 Ultimate DVD
5 stars out of 5 -- "FORBIDDEN PLANET is a feast for the eyes....This definitive Science Fiction movie has really never looked better..." 08/01/2007 p.83 Empire
"Over 50 years on, FORBIDDEN PLANET still looks like the future....An oddity that would change the face of science-fiction on film." 08/01/2008 p.161 Variety 8 of 10
Imaginative gadgets galore, plus plenty of suspense and thrills, make the production a top offering in the space travel category. Best of all the gadgets is Robby, the Robot, and he's well-used for some comedy touches...With all the technical gadgetry on display and carrying the entertainment load, the players are more or less puppets with no great acting demands made. Leslie Nielsen, space cruiser commander, lands on Altair-4 to search for survivors from a previous flight. He finds Walter Pidgeon, super-scientist, and the latter's daughter (Anne Francis) who, with Robby, are the planet's only inhabitants.
Reel.com 9 of 10
Before Star Trek, before Star Wars, and before Leslie Nielsen went funny, there was Forbidden Planet. This revolutionary sci-fi adventure shocked 1956 audiences corn-fed on Commando Cody episodes, and made The War of the Worlds look like Plan 9 from Outer Space. And while Warner Bros. bypassed their special edition treatment for this classic's DVD release, it's a retro treat all the same...the film's sci-fi conventions - primarily the "space mission" scenario and Cruiser C57D's Naval-based command structure - filtered into more progressive venues, most importantly Gene Rodenberry's stereotype-shattering Star Trek. Forbidden Planet comes on a dual-layer disc, with both standard and 2.35:1 widescreen formats; the latter thankfully preserves the film's original Cinemascope aspect ratio. - Marc Fortier
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