The Big Space Travel 1975 | Boys in movies [BiM]

The Big Space Travel (1975)

– The Big Space Travel 1975
– Bolshoe kosmicheskoe puteshestvie (original title)
– 1h 6 min. | Romance, Sci-fi | 5 November 1975 (Soviet Union)

Storyline:

Three teens are selected for a space flight on the spacecraft Astra. The children are subjected to crises and breakdowns, they have to deal with all sort of problems in outer space.

User review:

The plot involves three kids (13 year olds) who are chosen (based on their aptitude) to become junior cosmonauts aboard a spaceship. Their back-stories are quite murky, but what little is shown about their interaction with parents is bizarre.

Before you know it, they’re in space and the only adult on board has some unexplained sickness and is quarantined. Of course this leads ground control to make one of the 13 year olds “commander” of the mission, with the other two kids as his crew?!? This is played very straight and melodramatic…the gravity of the position (pun intended) weighs heavily on the kid who is portrayed as a cross between Mr Spock and Stalin.

I’ve seen plenty of Commie Sci-Fi (both Soviet and East German), but this film stands alone in its abject oddity. It’s almost as if they attempted to make a kid’s version of Solaris whilst retaining all the dark, bizarre elements but on a limited budget. Oh, and there’s dancing. And it is glorious.

In summary, this is a great film that any fan of Psychotronic cinema should seek out. It is really entertaining and fascinating. If nothing else, that such a kid’s film exists, is proof-positive of the dystopian nature of Soviet life, art, and entertainment.

Director: Valentin Selivanov
Writers: Sergey Mikhalkov (play “Pervaya trojka, ili God 2001”), Valentin Selivanov
Stars: Ludmila Berlinskaya, Sergey Obrazov, Igor Sakharov
Country of origin: Soviet Union
Language: Russian.

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0321492/