On February 6, the digital release of the sci-fi thriller “International Space Station” took place. Nick Shafir’s script was on the Blacklist of the best scripts at the end of 2020, and literally in January 2021, LD Entertainment gave the green light for the production of the film. In this review, we tell how the local confrontation between the USA and Russia went and how interesting it is to watch.

Pros:

decent performance of the technical component; several tense moments; showing some characteristic characteristics of Russians

Cons:

the film definitely fails as a topical statement and almost entirely as a suspenseful claustrophobic thriller; lack of characters you want to empathize with; the plot causes indifference to almost everything that happens on the screen; overall a boring movie

“International Space Station” / ISS

Genre science fiction thriller
Director Gabriela Cowperthwaite
In roles Ariana Debos, Chris Messina, John Gallagher Jr., Masha Mashkova, Kosta Ronin, Pilou Asbeck
Premiere digital services (Vudu, Prime Video, Apple TV+)
Graduation year 2023
Site IMDb

Two American astronauts arrive at the International Space Station — engineer Christian Campbell and scientist Kira Foster, for whom this is the first flight. They join the four colleagues who are already working on the ground – compatriot Gordon Barrett and three Russians – one woman and two male brothers. This space mission “beyond politics” was started as another work that will take place in a pleasant atmosphere of camaraderie and mutual understanding, even in spite of language, mental, cultural and any other barrier.

But soon the teams witness how the beautiful blue planet undergoes a series of powerful flares, very similar to nuclear explosions. The American message from Earth does not delay in arriving, which informs that a war has broken out between Russia and the United States, and the ISS serves as an important object and must be taken under control at any cost. As the fiery delirium grows on the body of the planet like a cancerous tumor, the situation will escalate on the station, where both teams receive identical orders.

The director of the International Space Station, Gabriela Cowperthwaite, specializes mainly in documentaries, and also made a critically acclaimed biopic about American military officer Megan Levy. Her new fantasy thriller broadcasts a quite obvious pacifist message, but the creators are clearly late with their really useless maxims about the senselessness of bloodshed. Such fairy-tale plots will definitely not have any effect on the ferocious aggressor, who has been destroying Ukraine for almost two years.

In today’s context, it is impossible to simply look at Russian characters and react to them in the way the authors intended. There cannot be even the slightest desire to see something good in them, when literally on the eve of writing this text, the occupiers once again attacked Kharkiv and killed innocent children.

The episode when Kira Foster, who is new to the ISS, who can tentatively be called the main character, cannot understand the actions of yesterday’s friends, with whom she drank alcohol, looks telling. “Are they really the kind of people who can kill Gordon?” the girl asks. But nowadays it is rhetorical and irrelevant, since the whole civilized world has long known the answer to it.

In general, the film has enough episodes that can confuse the Ukrainian viewer. The opening credits mutter something about space collaboration between Russia and the USA after the Cold War, while the world is already experiencing a new round of geopolitical crisis, and here we are reminded again that the tape was released somehow out of time.

Scenes where Russians and Americans calmly part to the symbolic Wind Of Change and phrases like “It’s important that we stick together” are heard are difficult to perceive. Of course, we could not do without the singing of the Soviet song “And we are not dreaming of the rumble of the cosmodrome”, which is also quite telling.

The icing on the cake is a photo of Sergei Pavlovich Korolev, a native of Zhytomyr, hanging directly above the Russian tricolor. And let the disputes about the nationality of the “father of cosmonautics” continue until now, even at the level of the official accounts of Ukraine and Russia in the former Twitter (there, as always, Musk inserted his useless 5 kopecks), now it is well known where the brilliant designer was tortured and what happened to him avoided the Soviet government of the Stalin era.

If you look at the film with an emotionless, cold look outside of the actual political context, then everything does not look very good here either. First of all, the film does not work well as a claustrophobic spectacle, whose electrified atmosphere should keep the tension constantly increasing. This practically does not happen: urban star wars cause complete boredom, at most just indifference.

In the cast, you can see the Russian Masha Mashkova, the daughter of the staunchest Putinist Volodymyr Mashkov. However, the actress moved to the States, where she obtained citizenship and is now building her career there. She publicly spoke out against Russia’s full-scale invasion and condemned her father’s position. Before appearing in the “International Space Station”, Mashkova had time to star in one more space-themed project – in the fourth season of “For the sake of all mankind” from Apple TV+.

There is nothing to say about the performers of other roles, except that the broken Russian Pylu Asbek is somewhere on the level of “what are your proofs”, or even “I will win for myself” from the steroid-filled Ivan Drago.

As a result, the viewer will find very few reasons to start watching “ISS”. The film has many unpleasant moments and narratives, which, let’s be honest, look the most fantastic. Russian characters are conflicted and suffer because they have to go to crime. poor people

It didn’t turn out to be an exciting hermetic thriller, which is impossible to look away from. All that remains is to observe the beautifully shown burning Earth from space, which, probably, became a victim of the actions of one that has already reached all the countries in order. It is not difficult to guess which one.

Conclusion:

Gone are the days when the Cold War was in the past and Michael Bay humorously portrayed the cartoonish Russian cosmonaut Lev Andropov in his Armageddon. The creators of the “International Space Station” are far from frivolous caricatures and are trying to seriously approach the topic of modern world geopolitics, which is at a fever pitch. But their call for the unity of peoples looks at least strange against the background of the tragedy that happens every day in Ukraine.