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Roving Mars (2006)

Name: Roving Mars
Genre: Documentary
Released: 2006-01-27
Duration: 40 min
Rating: 7.2
Cast: Paul Newman, Steve Squyres, Rob Manning, Charles Elachi, Wayne Lee

Roving Mars (2006), directed by George Butler, starring Paul Newman and Steve Squyres.

01/27/2006 BR Documentary 40m

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Quiz about this movie

A Whole New World Awaits.

Synopsis

Join the Mars rovers Spirit and Opportunity for an awe-inspiring journey to the surface of the mysterious red planet.

T.C. ChristensenCinematography
George ButlerDirector, Producer, Writer
Nancy BakerEditing
Frank MarshallProducer

About the film

Roving Mars is a 2006 American IMAX documentary film about the development, launch, and operation of the Mars Exploration Rovers, Spirit and Opportunity. The film uses few actual photographs from Mars, opting to use computer generated animation based on the photographs and data from the rovers and other Mars probes. The film has been released on Blu-ray disc by distributor Disney.

Roving Mars has made over US$10 million as of January 25, 2009.

Roving Mars is also the title of a non-fiction book by MER principal investigator Steve Squyres about the rover mission.

Read the full article (2k characters)

Roving Mars has made over US$10 million as of January 25, 2009.

Roving Mars is also the title of a non-fiction book by MER principal investigator Steve Squyres about the rover mission.

Music

The musical score for Roving Mars was composed by Philip Glass. A soundtrack album was released by Lakeshore Records on June 27, 2006. The album also features the song "Glósóli" by Sigur Rós.

Reception

Roving Mars received positive reviews from critics. Rotten Tomatoes reports a 70% rating based on 37 reviews, with an average rating of 6.8/10. Its consensus states that "Roving Mars is a decent thrill ride even when it starts feeling like a commercial plug for NASA's failing space program."

Entertainment Weekly gave the film a B−, stating that "Only a series of pics featuring a set of strange little nodes that look like blueberries planted in a pile of red rocks carry any kind of translatable otherworldly kick." The New York Post called it a "splendidly photographed 2D IMAX film." The Boston Globe said "Despite audiences knowing the happy ending from the get-go, [director] [George] Butler manages to inject considerable drama."

Conversely, the Los Angeles Times claimed, "Not having a way to capture images of the machines at work means that too much of Butler's film... is disappointingly made up of computer simulations.", while the San Francisco Chronicle claimed that "There aren't enough pyrotechnics in the paltry 40-minute run time to justify the ticket price."

References

External links

Official website

Roving Mars at IMDb

Boston Globe article about the development of the film

Text from Roving Mars on Wikipedia, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roving_Mars

Trivia

It premiered on January 27, 2006, a Friday.
It runs 0h40 — short for a feature film.
As of September 20, 2026, it is available in Brazil by subscription on Disney Plus.
This film's quiz has 12 questions — enough to play more than once without repeats.

Production

StudiosWalt Disney Pictures, The Kennedy/Marshall Company, White Mountain Films, NASA, Lockheed Martin
CountriesUnited States
LanguagesEnglish
StatusReleased