Russia releases first feature film shot in space
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A man takes a selfie in Moscow on April 18 beside the Russian Soyuz MS-18 space capsule, which brought back Russian actress Yulia Peresild to Earth on Oct 17, 2021.
PHOTO: AFP
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MOSCOW – The first feature film shot in space premiered in Russian cinemas on Thursday, as Moscow delighted in beating a rival Hollywood project amid a confrontation with the West over Ukraine.
The Challenge is about a surgeon dispatched to the International Space Station (ISS) to save an injured cosmonaut.
Russia sent an actress and a film director for a 12-day stint on the ISS in October 2021 to film scenes aboard the orbiting laboratory.
The Russian crew beat a Hollywood project announced in 2020 by Mission Impossible (1996 to present) star Tom Cruise together with the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (Nasa) and American business magnate Elon Musk’s company SpaceX.
At a Kremlin gala in April, Russian President Vladimir Putin lauded the film. “We are the first to have shot a feature film in orbit, aboard a spacecraft. Once again the first,” he said.
The Soviet Union pioneered space travel – sending the first dog, man and woman into orbit – and the film crew’s mission added to a long list of firsts for Russia’s space industry after several setbacks, including botched launches.
In The Challenge, a surgeon played by 38-year-old Yulia Peresild – one of Russia’s most glamorous actresses – is sent to the ISS to save a cosmonaut injured during a spacewalk.
Director Klim Shipenko, 39, who was in charge of camera, lighting and sound, brought back 30 hours of footage, 50 minutes of which were used in the final cut.
‘We are Russia’
Both underwent training for four months before going to space on a Soyuz spacecraft accompanied by a cosmonaut. The sequences were shot in the Russian module of the ISS and featured cameos by three Russian cosmonauts stationed there at the time.
The camera followed Peresild moving through the cramped space, her blonde hair floating in zero gravity.
Ahead of the film’s release, the Soyuz MS-18 capsule, which brought Peresild and Shipenko back to Earth, was put on display in central Moscow.
Ms Tatyana Kulikova, who works at a factory in the city of Ufa, said she looked forward to watching the movie.
“We are Russia, and Russia is always ahead,” the 45-year-old told AFP.
Ms Polina Andreyeva, a 24-year-old marketing specialist from Moscow, was proud of the actors who were not afraid of venturing into space. “That is so scary,” she said.
The ISS crew member and Russian actress Yulia Peresild after the landing of the Soyuz MS-18 space capsule on Oct 17, 2021.
PHOTO: REUTERS
The film was a joint project of space agency Roscosmos and top Russian TV network Channel One, whose boss Konstantin Ernst did not hide his joy in beating Hollywood.
“We are all fans of Gravity,” Mr Ernst told reporters this week, referring to the 2013 Hollywood blockbuster starring Sandra Bullock and George Clooney.
“But our Challenge shot in actual weightlessness shows that was just CGI” in Hollywood films, he said, referring to computer-generated imagery.
According to him, the film cost less than a billion rubles (S$16 million) to make, although the price tag of the entire project has not been revealed.
Space exploration has been one of the few areas where cooperation between Russia and the United States and its allies had not been wrecked by tensions over Moscow’s assault on Ukraine.
Many experts say Roscosmos is a shadow of its former self and stress that space science cannot flourish in a heavily sanctioned country. AFP
