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Fantastic Voyage is a 1966 science fiction film written by Harry Kleiner. 20th Century Fox wanted a book that would be a tie-in with the movie, and hired Isaac Asimov to write a novelization based on the screenplay. Because the novelization was released six months before the movie, many people mistakenly believed Asimov's book had inspired the movie. The movie inspired an animated television series.
Synopsis
The United States and the Soviet Union have both developed technology that allows matter to be miniaturized using a process that shrinks individual atoms, but its value is limited because objects shrunk will return to normal size after a period of time - the smaller an object is made, the less time passes before it reverts.
Scientist Jan Benes (Jean Del Val), working behind the Iron Curtain, has figured out how to make the shrinking process work indefinitely. With the help of the CIA, he escapes to the West, but an attempted assassination leaves him comatose, with a blood clot in his brain.
To save his life, Grant (Stephen Boyd), pilot Capt. Bill Owens (William Redfield), Dr. Michaels (Donald Pleasence), surgeon Dr. Peter Duval (Arthur Kennedy), and his assistant Cora Peterson (Raquel Welch), board a submarine, the Proteus, which is then miniaturized and injected into Benes. The ship is reduced to one micrometre in length, giving the team only one hour to repair the clot; after that, the submarine will begin to revert to its normal size and become a target for Benes' immune system.
Many obstacles hinder the crew on their journey. They are forced to travel through the heart (a temporary cardiac arrest must be induced to avoid destructive turbulence), the inner ear (all in the lab must remain quiet to prevent similar turbulence) and the alveoli of the lungs (where they replenish their supply of oxygen). When the surgical laser needed to destroy the clot is damaged, it becomes obvious there is a saboteur on the mission. They cannibalize their radio to repair the laser. When they finally reach the brain clot, there is only five minutes remaining to operate and then follow the veins to the removal site.
The traitor, Dr. Michaels, knocks Owens out and takes control of the Proteus while the rest of the crew is outside for the operation. He then tries to run them down, but crashes and is trapped in the wreckage. After Duval successfully removes the clot, they swim desperately to one of the eyes, to escape via a teardrop. Michaels is killed when he grows large enough for antibodies to detect and attack him.
Logical flaw
In the original movie the crew (apart from the saboteur) manage to leave Benes' body safely before reverting to normal size, but the Proteus remains inside, as do the atoms of the saboteur's body (digested together by a white blood cell). Isaac Asimov pointed out that this was a serious logical flaw in the plot, since the submarine should also revert to normal size, killing Benes in the process. Therefore, in his novelization Asimov had the crew provoke the white cell into following them, so that it drags the submarine to the tearduct. The submarine then expands outside Benes' body.
Further novelization
- Fantastic Voyage II: Destination Brain, was written by Isaac Asimov as an attempt to develop and present his own story apart from the 1966 screenplay. This novel is not a sequel to the original, but instead is a separate story taking place in the Soviet Union with an entirely different set of characters.
- Fantastic Voyage: Microcosm is a third interpretation written by Kevin J. Anderson, published in 2001. This version has the crew of the Proteus explore the body of a dead alien that crash-lands on earth, and updates the story with such modern concepts as nanotechnology (replacing killer white cells).
Links to other motion pictures/television
The set design used for the brain has a strong resemblance to a set used in the Lost In Space series' second episode, suggesting that parts of Fantastic Voyage were filmed during 1965 and the brain set used for Lost In Space.
See also
External link
1966 films | Cult science fiction films | Science fiction films | 20th Century Fox films | Science fiction novels by Isaac Asimov
Die phantastische Reise | Le Voyage fantastique | Viaggio allucinante (film) | ミクロの決死圏
"Fantastic Voyage"