More on Mars (and elsewhere), from half a century ago

This is a bit weird, but it's from Adam Curtis's blog so one might expect a certain degree of weirdness. He posts a half-hour archived BBC documentary, introducing it thus:

To celebrate today's successful landing on Mars I thought I would show a film of a man who claimed to have got to Mars a long time ago. He did this back in the late 1950s by communicating telepathically with the beings who inhabited the Red Planet. He also claimed that his mother went there on a UFO. And what's more the BBC took him very seriously.

The clipped British accents are as interesting as the subject matter, which naturally includes bog-standard flying saucers, but also multi-faith religious messages. Check it out here:

Adam Curtis has more information and comment.

Journey to the Other Side - Robbie Williams and Jon Ronson

In this BBC Radio 4 half-hour documentary, ex-Take That pop star Robbie Williams goes to a UFO conference in Nevada to talk to alien abductees.

RealPlayer stream available via 'listen again':*
http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio/aod/shows/rpms/radio4/robbiewilliams_jonronson.ram


Download RealPlayer here

From the BBC website:
(http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/factual/robbieandjonjourney.shtml)

Robbie Williams is taking time out from being a pop star and wants to get out and have adventures in the world of the paranormal.

He has a genuine interest in UFOs and has been researching sightings, abductees and the possibility of extra terrestrial life.

During the course of the day, Robbie and Jon meet a doctor who claims to have 15 metallic objects which are not earthly, as well as a British woman, Ann Andrews, who believes that her youngest son Jason is an 'indigo child' - a child abducted by extra terrestrials while in the womb and sent back to Earth to save the planet.

The documentary was recorded on location over 3 days in LA and Nevada. The programme is a radical departure from the usual pop star interview and Jon Ronson brings his own incisive take on proceedings with Robbie at the UFO conference.

I can't decide whether this is a send-up or intended to be taken seriously. But the tenor of the show was effectively summed up early on, when Robbie Williams says, "Don't show me any debunking stuff, you know, because I want to believe."

*UPDATE:

The 'listen again' link above has expired. Get the mp3 from RapidShare here:

http://rapidshare.com/files/226461720/Journey_to_the_Other_Side.mp3