12/12/08: "The Day the Earth Stood Still" Broadcast To Outer Space

Seeking the ultimate red carpet, or perhaps a chance to get a good word in for humanity to whoever might be Out There watching, the makers of the new movie "The Day the Earth Stood Still" arranged for it to be beamed into space on today, on the same day the movie opened here on planet Earth.

The movie, starring Keanu Reeves as the alien Klaatu, who comes to warn mankind to change its warlike ways or be destroyed, is of course a remake of the 1951 classic starring Michael Rennie. No official translation of them exists, but the words "Klaatu barada nikto" were sufficient in the original movie to save the Earth, or at least postpone its day of judgment from Klaatu's robot enforcer Gort. And they have been a touchstone of science fiction and alien sociology ever since.

So what better words to broadcast to the stars?

The movie was broadcast in real time, starting at noon on Friday, by Deep Space Communications Network, a Florida company that has beamed whale songs and the Craigslist Web site, among other things, into space in the three years of its existence. According to its Web site, the company will transmit a five-minute signal into space for anyone for $299.

In this case, Jim Lewis, Deep Space's director, said the company had to satisfy 20th Century Fox, the film's producers, that the transmission could not be intercepted and pirated on Earth or in the air. The movie will be beamed in the direction of Alpha Centauri, a triple star system about four light-years from here. That means it will take four years for it to get to Alpha Centauri. (There is plenty of time to get popcorn, whoever you are.)

The reviews will take longer to come back, if they ever do, and we could hope they are kinder than Klaatu's. As an interstellar broadcast, the movie at least beats a Doritos commercial, which was broadcast into space by a set of European radar stations in June in the most recent high-profile space transmission. Whether it lives up artistically to the Beatles song "Across the Universe," which NASA sent off in February as part of the agency's 50th anniversary, remains to be seen.

The biologist and writer Lewis Thomas once suggested that if we were going to send anything to the stars, we send Bach. It would be bragging, he admitted, but we are allowed to put our best foot forward.

Television and radar signals have been leaking from the Earth out into space for most of a century, creating a bubble of football games, the Vietnam and Iraq wars, political conventions, quiz shows and "Howdy Doody" that is more than 100 light-years in diameter and growing.

That outpouring is one reason astronomers should not be perturbed about sending movies or commercials into space, said Seth Shostak, an astronomer at the SETI Institute in Mountain View, Calif., which is engaged, among other things, in searching for extraterrestrial signals.

We've already advertised our presence. Dr. Shostak, who was a consultant for the new movie, is chairman of a committee of the International Academy of Astronautics devoted to SETI.

There are some people, he acknowledges, who might worry that broadcasting "The Day the Earth Stood Still" could be inimical to our interests. He added, "I think that if these people are truly worried about such things, they might best begin by shutting down the radar at the local airport."

Walter

Picture: Klaatu, played by Keanu Reeves, is subjected to a polygraph test in the 2008 version of "The Day The Earth Stood Still." Courtesy 20th Century Fox