STELLAR MIND is a new science fiction film release from Russia by KD Studios - and is the first attempt at this genre by a 38 year old director (Vyacheslav Liznetsky). It's arrival has been rumoured for some time and I was expecting it to be more of an Epic than it turned out to be. About this I am glad: I am no giant fan of Epics. the film is not a great one, but it is likeable and has a streak of romanticism that marks it out as a Russian product.
The earth in the near future is poisoned by a virus that is affecting all of the biosphere. A project - Project Gemini - has been set up to locate an Earth like planet which could be terraformed into a new home for humanity.
A team of 6 astronauts/scientists lead by Doctor Stephen Ross (the up and coming Egor Koreshkov) sets out to such a new planet. However, on arrival they are menaced by an alien being that resents their intrusion upon it's world.
In terms of plot, this begins as
Interstellar meets
Alien (although diverges from both a little bit as things proceed.) There are no surprises here: whilst in visual terms it can hold its own alongside any contemporary Hollywood product, the general look of everything borrows heavily from the
Alien rulebook set out way back in 1979: chunky iron doored interiors, extravagant looking computer consoles and a rocky, forbidding planet's surface (actually filmed in Khazakhstan).
One twist is that the alien monster - an otherwise predictable Lovecraftian tentacled bogey - is in fact a robot. (Actually, there were some other big twists in the plot which I think I missed owing to my pathetic Russian level).
One perplexing aspect of this film is that all the characters have Western names and the signs, the computer read outs and the insignia on their uniforms are all in English. I presume this is a rather desperate, and sad, attempt to ensure that this becomes an export product (as well as an unnecessary one: both
Sputnik and
Outpost have done well abroad, despite both being overtly Russian).
Another perplexing aspect of it is the strange mix of very near future and fantastical far future technology on show here. For example, the main spacecraft involved (Encounter) looks very much like the standard space shuttles that we have now - and it is launched by a standard rocket of the kind that we are familiar with in the present. Yet later we see it entering an interdimensional wormhole of the kind familiar to science fiction devotees but very far from our current technology.
There was one (pleasant) casting surprise. The all male /all white screw are joined by a black woman. She is played by one Liza Martinez, who is, in fact, a Russian*. Perhaps I ought not to be surprised, but in all honesty, I was.
Here we have straight down the line science fiction: it is not horror, not military nor adventure (although all of these elements do make brief appearances). It is a well-behaved 12+ film aimed (partly) at tweenies and teens. However, I sat in an almost empty cinema theatre - so perhaps the intended audience were all watching whatever the latest Disney blockbuster is out there at the moment.
In Russian cinemas NOW - or wait for the dubbed DVD to appear.
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*Likewise, I recently saw a Russian Black female stand up comedian on Russian TV. She was bringing the house down. So....