Russia turns the International Space Station into a film set
The International Space Station has just been turned into a movie set by the Russian space agency Roscosmos.
Located 400 kilometres above the Earth and filled with laboratories, test equipment and technologies of all kinds sent from the United States, Russia, Japan, Canada and Europe, the lives of the seven astronauts who live there have just undergone a radical and revolutionary change with the arrival of Russian film and television star Yulia Peresild and leading producer, screenwriter, actor and director Klim Shipenko.
The blonde, slender 37-year-old actress and the 38-year-old filmmaker will spend 12 days on the International Space Station (ISS) to film the most realistic scenes in weightlessness for the Russian film "Vyzov". According to Roscosmos, Yulia Peresild was chosen from 20 finalists out of a total of 3,000 women aged 25 to 40, weighing between 50 and 70 kilos, who had to run one kilometre in three and a half minutes, swim 800 metres freestyle in 20 minutes, jump from a 3-metre diving board and pass medical examinations.
The role she plays is that of a surgeon sent urgently to the orbital station to perform life-threatening surgery on a Russian cosmonaut with a serious heart condition. The scenes will be shot in several of the Russian modules of the orbital complex, as well as in the panoramic dome on the North American component of the ISS. Around half an hour of the final footage of the Russian film takes place in orbit, surrounded by the cables, pipes, various test equipment, tools and computers attached to the walls of the modules, just as the ISS is in reality.
The intention is to convey to the viewers the movements and emotions of the actress in real weightlessness conditions during the critical situation she has to face and resolve. The rest will be filmed on sets and sets on the ground, once the two have returned from their space adventure. It anticipates a Hollywood blockbuster announced in spring 2020, in which American actor Tom Cruise is also due to play scenes on board the space station.
The renowned Russian director will act as illuminator, cameraman and even make-up artist. The effects of micro-gravity prevent powder make-up from being applied, but with a compact texture, so that it does not spread all over the orbital complex. On the other hand, there is no problem using cosmetics on eyes, eyebrows or hair.
Cosmonaut Elena Serova, 45, the fourth Russian woman to fly into space (2014), was responsible for mentoring Yulia Peresild during her training period at the Yuri Gagarin Cosmonaut Training Centre near Moscow. Over the course of three months, she received the training necessary to familiarise herself with the structure of the orbital complex, the Soyuz capsule and the life-support systems that enable her and Klim Shipenko to live and film on board the ISS.
During the filming, the seven professional astronauts cannot do their jobs or neglect the maintenance of the space complex, as some of its modules have been in orbit for more than 20 years and require continuous attention. However, Yulia Peresild will be accompanied in several scenes by some of them as extras or supporting actors: the Japanese Akihiko Hoshide, the Americans Mark Vande Hei, Robert Kimbrough and Megan McArthur, the Frenchman Thomas Pesquet. Of course, Russian actors Oleg Novitskiy, Pyotr Dubrov and newcomer Anton Shkaplerov will also appear.
Both the Russian actress and the film director departed early on Tuesday morning, 5 October, from Russia's Baikonur Cosmodrome aboard a Soyuz launcher. They were accompanied on their maiden voyage by air force colonel and veteran cosmonaut Anton Shkaplerov, who has spent 533 days in orbit and was acting as the spacecraft's commander on his fourth space mission.
Some three and a half hours after liftoff, the manned capsule Soyuz MS-19 reached the vicinity of its assigned docking port on the ISS. But then there was a hitch, which set the filmmakers' nerves on edge. The automatic Kurs system that was supposed to dock the Soyuz capsule to the ISS malfunctioned. Fortunately, experienced cosmonaut Anton Shkaplerov took control of the situation and manually anchored the capsule to the ISS.
If no malfunctions occur, the two filmmakers will return to Earth on 17 October in the Soyuz MS-18 space capsule, which, together with MS-19, remains docked to the orbital complex. On this occasion they will be accompanied by Russian cosmonaut Oleg Novitskiy, who will be the mission commander. Documentaries and large-format Imax films have already been shot in orbit, but "The Challenge" is the first major commercial blockbuster to be released in cinemas in Russia and around the world.
More than 40 films about space travel have received Hollywood Oscar nominations for best visual effects or even won, such as Canadian director James Cameron's spectacular 2009 film 'Avatar'. In it, only the impossible images on earth allow us to identify where reality begins and ends. But not so with other sequences, where it is very difficult to discern where the imaginary digital world begins and ends.
Stanley Kubrick's legendary film '2001: A Space Odyssey', based on a novel by science populariser Arthur C. Clarke, also won the 1968 Oscar for special effects. The work recreates a large orbital complex with a diaphanous, pristine white, minimalist interior governed by an intelligent computer, a far cry from the reality of the ISS.
Operational techniques for future space missions are in full development, especially for long-duration missions, such as future manned trips to Mars. Technology companies in the medical sector are working hard to develop robotic solutions and encapsulated environments to isolate patients, but which also allow health interventions to be carried out.