Worth: $12.50
FilmInk rates movies out of $20 — the score indicates the amount we believe a ticket to the movie to be worth
Cast:
Lyubov Aksyonova, Ilya Andryukov, Pavel Deveyanko
Intro:
...the SFX are good without being showy, and there are a few fleeting moments of gripping human drama.
This film is “based on” events in 1985, when Salyut-7 – an unmanned Soviet space station – suddenly stopped communicating with Ground Control. If it crashed to earth it could be devastatingly destructive – and there was the also the less serious but real consideration of damage to the Soviet Union’s international image at a fairly tense stage in the Cold War. Two cosmonauts were sent to ‘dock’ with the station and (hopefully) solve the problem. It’s been alleged that the movie is somewhat factually inaccurate, which means that one of two unsatisfactory situations will pertain. Either A: you already know what ensued, and there will be a complete lack of suspense; or B: you simply won’t know which bits to believe.
Be all that as it may, Vladimir Vdovichenkov – who plays the ‘ship’s captain’ and bears an uncanny resemblance to Roy Scheider – has a considerable presence. Whilst trying to carry off the rescue mission/repair job, he and his one-man crew float around a lot, bond with each other and deal with extreme cold. They chat with Ground Control, and we are given glimpses of the anxiety felt by their loved ones back on Earth. Time is of the essence, mainly because of the cosmonauts’ finite and ever-dwindling supplies of oxygen.
The ending is unbelievably corny, there’s a fair swag of (admittedly unavoidable) tedious technical talk, and the whole thing is too long and slow moving. That said, the SFX are good without being showy, and there are a few fleeting moments of gripping human drama.
Not an unqualified success.
