Mike Oldfield & Tony Palmer
Space Movie
Studio: MVD Visual

With our readership, odds are you were pretty young or nonexistent when Tony Palmer’s Space Movie was released. Created in 1979 to celebrate the 10th anniversary of the moon landing, this was the very first time NASA and The United States National Archive released footage the lunar landscape, life on the spacecraft, Mars, Venus and beyond.

But any science teacher or sci-fi nerd will tell you, watching images of interstellar travel without a cool space-age soundtrack is like enjoying a movie without popcorn. Luckily minimalist composer Mike Oldfield was on hand to craft excerpts of “Tubular Bells” and “Hergest Ridge” into a compelling audio journey to match the out-of-this-world visual footage.

MVD Visual is re-releasing the film is a precious previously unseen six minutes of footage and an interesting 26 minute interview with Palmer on making of the project.

But the film and soundtrack are worth buying by themselves. Or heck, maybe mute the audio and try lining it up with the new Lightning Bug Situation album.