He seeks out his friend Professor Mannfeldt, a visionary who wrote a treatise claiming that there was probably much gold on the Moon, only to be ridiculed by his peers.

Turner then presents Helius with an ultimatum: the gang knows he is planning a voyage to the Moon; either he includes them in the project, or they will sabotage it and destroy his rocket, which is named Friede ("peace").

After Friede blasts off, the team discovers that Gustav, a young boy who has befriended Helius, has stowed away, along with his collection of science fiction pulp magazines.

They reach the far side of the Moon and find it has a breathable atmosphere, per the theories of Peter Andreas Hansen, who is mentioned near the beginning of the film.

When returning to Germany in the late 1950s, he sold his extensive collection of Astounding Science Fiction, Weird Tales, and Galaxy magazines.

The film was popular among the rocket scientists in Wernher von Braun's circle at the Verein für Raumschiffahrt (VfR).

The first successfully launched V-2 rocket at the rocket-development facility in Peenemünde had the Frau im Mond logo painted on its base.

Thomas Pynchon's 1973 novel Gravity's Rainbow, which deals with the V-2 rockets, refers to the movie, along with several other classic German silent films.