Did you want to be an astronaut when you grew up? We never did, and we’re actually surprised any kid could have such a dream given the way spacemen are portrayed in the movies. Sure, there are some heroes here and there, but generally filmmakers tend to show us astronauts who are lonely, depressed, confused, self-doubting, jealous, guilt-ridden or otherwise miserable (not to mention they often wind up dead).

Sam Rockwell plays the latest of these unhappy astronauts in Moon, fittingly directed by Duncan Jones, whose father, David Bowie, gave us a somewhat sad song about a man potentially lost in space (“Space Oddity”). As the sole (human) resident of a station on the dark side of the moon, able to communicate with his family only through taped video correspondence, it’s not surprising that Rockwell’s character isn’t a happy camper.

But his mood actually has less to do with his situation than it has to do with film tradition. As much as Moon is garnering rave reviews it is also being lightly criticized for being derivative. And the unhappy astronaut convention is one of the overly familiar elements Jones and screenwriter Nathan Parker employs. To illustrate some of the convention’s history, we’ve selected ten of the unhappiest astronauts ever put on the big screen.
…Read more