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The first dog in space. The first man and the first woman. Now Russia is on the cusp of winning another spaceflight before the United States: beating Hollywood in orbit.
A Russian actress, a director and their professional Russian astronaut guide are scheduled to take off on Tuesday morning aboard a Russian rocket to the International Space Station. Their mission is to shoot scenes for the first feature film in space. While cinematic footage in space has long been portrayed on large screens using sound stages and advanced computer graphics, never has a feature film been shot and directed in space.
When is the launch and how can I watch it?
A Soyuz rocket, the workhorse of the Russian space program, is scheduled to take off at 4:55 a.m. Eastern Time from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan. The MS-19 spacecraft carrying the three-person crew is expected to dock with the space station about three hours later at 8:12 a.m.
NASA, which operates the space station in partnership with Russia, will begin broadcasting the launch at 4:15 a.m. EST. Or you can watch the video in the built-in player above.
Another livestream for docking the spaceship will start at 7:30 a.m.
According to live coverage from the Russian space agency, the astronaut’s crew have boarded the spacecraft and are preparing for launch.
Who is on the flight?
Yulia Peresild, a Russian actress, and Klim Shipenko, a director, will join Anton Shkaplerov, a veteran astronaut who has made three trips to and from the space station since 2011. Ms Peresild has spent months training for the mission. She auditioned for the role earlier this year in a competition with dozens of other actresses. Competition finalist Alyona Mordovina is Ms Peresild’s replacement and would go into orbit if anything prevented the main crew from launching into space.
The film crew will return to Earth on October 17 with Oleg Novitsky, who has been at the station since April.
What movie are they making on the space station?
The film’s working title is “The Challenge,” and it’s about a surgeon, played by Mrs. Peresild, who embarks on an emergency mission to the space station to save the life of a sick cosmonaut. Few other details of the plot or the filming aboard the station were announced, although NASA said on Tuesday that Mr. Novitsky, one of the Russian astronauts currently aboard the station, would be a subject of the movie.
Why are they making a movie in orbit?
For “The Challenge”, cinematic storytelling can take a back seat to the symbolism of filming a movie in space. The production is a joint project involving the Russian space agency Roscosmos; Channel One Russia, a state-supported television channel; and Yellow, Black and White, a Russian film studio.
Like many private space missions these days, Channel One and Roscosmos are hoping the film can prove to audiences that space isn’t just for government astronauts. One of the main goals of the production is to show that “spaceflight is gradually becoming available not only to professionals, but also to an ever wider range of interested people,” Channel One said on its website.
Funding for the Russian space program is starting to decline. As of 2011, when the US space shuttle program ended, NASA could only send astronauts to the International Space Station by paying for expensive rides on one of Russia’s Soyuz rockets. But it ended in 2020 when SpaceX’s Crew Dragon was found to be able to send astronauts from American soil. And recently, the United States halted the purchase of a Russian rocket engine long used for NASA and Pentagon space launches, which generated billions in revenue for Moscow.
Is this really the first movie shot on the space station?
“The Challenge” is the first feature film to use scenes shot in orbit. The film will include around 35 to 40 minutes of scenes shot on the station, Channel One says.
Other types of productions have been made in space in the past, such as “Apogee of Fear”, an eight-minute science fiction film shot by Richard Garriott, a private astronaut, in 2008. Mr. Garriott, a video game entrepreneur, paid $ 30. million for his seat on a Soyuz spacecraft, which he booked through Space Adventures, a space tourism broker. The company is reserving future missions to the space station aboard the Russian Soyuz spacecraft.
Several feature-length documentaries have relied heavily on videos shot on board the station. “Space Station 3D,” a short documentary from 2002 about the construction of the space station, was the first IMAX production filmed in space.
Are there any other in-orbit filming projects?
Tom Cruise may be planning to film something on the space station, but it’s unclear when exactly. Deadline, a Hollywood news publication, reported in 2020 that Mr. Cruise would fly into space aboard one of SpaceX’s Crew Dragon capsules for an action-adventure film directed by Doug Liman. Jim Bridenstine, who served as a NASA administrator under President Donald Trump, confirmed plans on Twitter at the time and hailed them as a chance to galvanize the public around space exploration.
The Russian space agency has announced plans to send an actress to the space station shortly after Mr. Cruise’s plans emerge.
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