STX Entertainment

The director of Hannah Montana: The Movie and screenwriters with connections to 1990s young adult television series “Charmed” come together to deliver The Space Between Us, one of the most baffling and inane films of recent memory.

The notion that a boy born on Mars, curious about and wanting to visit Earth, is an intriguing premise which, with the right writers and proper handlers, could be really all you need for a compelling movie. However, because we are marketing this movie to teens, we get what essentially plays like a pilot episode of a young adult television series on basic cable. And I don’t think this series would get picked up.

There is a decent enough, if not logically wacky, beginning: an astronaut (Janet Montgomery) discovering she is pregnant, while in flight to Mars, dies on the Red Planet moments after giving birth to a baby boy. When we cut to 16 years later, the baby, now a teenager named Gardner (Asa Butterfield), is surrounded by a bunch of scientists, a robot, and astronaut and mother-like figure Kendra (Carla Gugino), all on a colonized Mars.

Britt Robertson and Asa Butterfield in “The Space Between Us” | STX Entertainment

The colonization is the brainchild of Nathaniel Sanders (Gary Oldman), a lifelong lover of space who turned his youthful dreams into his life’s work, the billionaire scientist keeping Gardner’s existence a secret from the public the entire time.

Join Carole P. Roman when she blasts off to colonize the planet Mars, in the newest book of her informative series. Learn about how life would be living on the Red Planet. Travel to Olympus Mons, the largest volcano in the solar system. Look into the sky and watch Phobos and Deimos, Mars’ two moons. Discover what you would wear, and how the seasons change. See Mars through the eyes of an adventurous youngster like you and understand what life is like in a trip of a lifetime. Don’t forget to look at the other books in the series so that you can be an armchair traveler

The movie is a Musical Sci-Fi Comedy and is currently under production.

Director Pritish Chakraborty has claimed that his forthcoming film “Mangal Ho” will be the first Indian science fiction comedy on planet Mars.

“It is the first entertaining comedy film in India on the topic of Mars. Our tag line revolves around the theme first Indian civilisation on Mars,” Chakraborty told IANS.

He added: “We are showing a time period that is 25 years ahead. The character of an Indian scientist has been played by Annu Kapoor who has a major role in the film. The technology we are using in the film is 50 to 100 years ahead of time. We are showing that if Indian brain is used rightly, they can achieve a lot.”

“Mangal Ho” is the story of an attempt to send a couple to Mars and to create a civilisation there, and has been portrayed in a light-hearted and humourous manner. Annu is the scientist who spearheads this ambitious mission. Actor Sanjay Mishra plays a Bengali businessman in the film.

Chakraborty wants to release the teaser of the film on January 26, 2017.

Making a documentary with crews in 19 locations around the world is tricky. Making that doc intertwined with a drama set on two planets and over two decades is out-of-this-world complicated.

“Mars” is National Geographic Channel’s most ambitious solo project. Premiering Nov. 14, it features scientists explaining how humans will colonize the Red Planet. Dramatic scenes are set in 2033 when a diverse crew lands.

It’s a tough voyage. The show’s journey was almost as challenging.

RadicalMedia initially wanted to do a documentary about Elon Musk, the visionary behind Tesla and SpaceX, who is making rockets to go to Mars.

“Elon wanted to tell a bigger story about why, as humanity, we need to leave this planet and become an interplanetary species,” says Justin Wilkes, president, entertainment, RadicalMedia.

Musk suggested Ron Howard and Brian Grazer become involved in making this a major production. Luckily, Jon Kamen, RadicalMedia CEO, and Wilkes are friends with Imagine Entertainment’s Academy Award-winning team.

Mars 2030 at iii Points from III Points on Vimeo.

From October 7th through the 9th, Miami’s III Points Music, Art, & Technology Festival will premiere the debut of Mars 2030, an immersive virtual reality production designed by FUSION. Participants will slip on a spacesuit and helmet and effectively fly to Mars, where they can explore a topographically accurate landscape. Though the experience feels magic (you’re on Mars!) it’s functionally realistic, both a simulation and an adventure. Mars 2030 is filled with details from real missions to Mars, thanks to Fusion’s Space Act Partnership with NASA. This partnership allowed FUSION to explore NASA’s research labs (including their Hybrid Reality Lab) and create an ultimately symbiotic project: as project designer and FUSION Virtual Reality Developer, Julian Reyes, explains, “We gave NASA all of our information so they could convert it and use it as a training simulation for their astronauts.”