A Glean movie guide
Beyond the Atmosphere
The ultimate space travel collection.
From grounded historical missions to mind-bending journeys across the cosmos.
Handpicked for this guide
The movie list
- 01
Interstellar
A visually stunning epic that blends theoretical physics with a deeply emotional father-daughter story.
The adventures of a group of explorers who make use of a newly discovered wormhole to surpass the limitations on human space travel and conquer the vast distances involved in an interstellar voyage.
- 02
2001: A Space Odyssey
An influential exploration of human evolution and artificial intelligence during a mission to Jupiter.
Humanity finds a mysterious object buried beneath the lunar surface and sets off to find its origins with the help of HAL 9000, the world's most advanced super computer.
- 03
The Martian
A smart, optimistic survival story about using science and ingenuity to return home from the Red Planet.
During a manned mission to Mars, Astronaut Mark Watney is presumed dead after a fierce storm and left behind by his crew. But Watney has survived and finds himself stranded and alone on the hostile planet. With only meager supplies, he must draw upon his ingenuity, wit and spirit to subsist and find a way to signal to Earth that he is alive.
- 04
Apollo 13
A gripping, true-to-life account of NASA’s most famous successful failure in the race to the Moon.
The true story of technical troubles that scuttle the Apollo 13 lunar mission in 1970, risking the lives of astronaut Jim Lovell and his crew, with the failed journey turning into a thrilling saga of heroism. Drifting more than 200,000 miles from Earth, the astronauts work furiously with the ground crew to avert tragedy.
- 05
Gravity
A relentless, immersive thriller that captures the terrifying beauty and isolation of Earth's orbit.
Dr. Ryan Stone, a brilliant medical engineer, is on her first Shuttle mission, with veteran astronaut Matt Kowalski in command of his last flight before retiring. But on a seemingly routine spacewalk, disaster strikes. The Shuttle is destroyed, leaving Stone and Kowalski completely alone-tethered to nothing but each other and spiraling out into the blackness of space. The deafening silence tells them they have lost any link to Earth and any chance for rescue. As fear turns to panic, every gulp of air eats away at what little oxygen is left. But the only way home may be to go further out into the terrifying expanse of space.
- 06
Alien
A tense, atmospheric horror film set aboard a commercial hauler in the deep reaches of space.
During its return to the earth, commercial spaceship Nostromo intercepts a distress signal from a distant planet. When a three-member team of the crew discovers a chamber containing thousands of eggs on the planet, a creature inside one of the eggs attacks an explorer. The entire crew is unaware of the impending nightmare set to descend upon them when the alien parasite planted inside its unfortunate host is birthed.
- 07
Moon
A quiet, thought-provoking character study about an isolated worker nearing the end of a long lunar shift.
With only three weeks left in his three-year contract, Sam Bell is eager to return to Earth. Stationed alone at a Moon-based facility with his computer assistant GERTY, an unexpected accident sets off a series of unsettling events that shake his isolation.
- 08
Contact
A grounded look at the scientific and philosophical implications of humanity's first brush with the stars.
A radio astronomer receives the first extraterrestrial radio signal ever picked up on Earth. As the world powers scramble to decipher the message and decide upon a course of action, she must make some difficult decisions between her beliefs, the truth, and reality.
- 09
The Right Stuff
An epic chronicle of the daring test pilots who became America’s first astronauts.
At the dawn of the Space Race, seven test pilots set out to become the first American astronauts to enter space. However, the road to making history brings momentous challenges.
- 10
First Man
An intimate, visceral portrait of Neil Armstrong and the immense personal cost of the Apollo 11 mission.
A look at the life of the astronaut, Neil Armstrong, and the legendary space mission that led him to become the first man to walk on the Moon on July 20, 1969.
- 11
Sunshine
A high-stakes psychological thriller following a crew on a desperate mission to save a dying sun.
Fifty years into the future, the sun is dying, and Earth is threatened by arctic temperatures. A team of astronauts is sent to revive the Sun — but the mission fails. Seven years later, a new team is sent to finish the mission as mankind’s last hope.
- 12
Ad Astra
A meditative journey across the solar system that explores the vast distance between fathers and sons.
The near future, a time when both hope and hardships drive humanity to look to the stars and beyond. While a mysterious phenomenon menaces to destroy life on planet Earth, astronaut Roy McBride undertakes a mission across the immensity of space and its many perils to uncover the truth about a lost expedition that decades before boldly faced emptiness and silence in search of the unknown.