I never understood Space Force. Let me get this straight … even in space, nationality is still a thing? Has “Star Trek” taught us nothing?! Yeah, I understand that moon exploration was part of the Cold War, but … but … but the Cold War ended decades ago. You mean to say that by the time we actually put Earthlings on Mars, it will matter what their nationality on Earth is? That’s stupid.
The International Space Station is a testimony to the idea that space and cooperation is our collective future. Space Force is the exact opposite of that. So I suppose the film I.S.S. is more of a Space Force aligned entity, where border designations matter even in places where there are not borders.
The basic premise here is that the I.S.S. is currently occupied by three Americans and three Russians when WWIII, an all-out nuclear engagement between the United States and Russia, sparks up on the Earth below. And here’s the fun part – I have no idea why anyone on a ground reeling from nuclear fallout would give a spacefart about the I.S.S., and yet both the American and Russian contingents aboard get separate secret messages to take control of the I.S.S. “at all costs.”
Why? So you can prove the masters of cooperation? You think the people in the I.S.S. can tell you anything that satellites cannot? You do realize these people are astronauts, not soldiers, right?
Well, this is one of the big problems with the film. There are six actors on the I.S.S.: Ariana DeBose, Chris Messina, John Gallagher Jr., Masha Mashkiva, Costa Ronin, and Pilou Asbæk and not a single one reminds me of any astronaut I’ve ever witnessed. Ariana DeBose probably comes closest, while Chris Messina and John Gallagher Jr. don’t even make convincing NASA employees.
Alas, this is our movie: three unconvincing American astronauts with makeshift weapons against three unconvincing Russian astronauts with makeshift weapons. Oh, but is it purely West v. East? Are there some literal “Survivor” alliances to trump nationalism? I’m kind of alarmed at how ready you scientists are to kill one another and doubly so for people who have lived together in this tin can for months on end … if you were forced to live in the same room with somebody for a year, could you kill that person?
I know you think I’m joking here, like it would be easier to kill somebody you roomed with – Lord knows I ended up disliking most of the roommates I ever had. But I’m not talking about roommates; I’m talking about X and Y lived in the same 1,000 square foot space for a full year. Neither left the space. You’re going to tell me X didn’t learn everything about Y and
vice-versa … and they took from that knowledge, “Yeah, I could kill that guy.”
Clearly, I’m overestimating the screenplay here. In the film I saw, the six people may as well have been strangers for all they knew one another. I also couldn’t have been more disappointed by the views of Earth. It would have taken, what, 30 seconds max to show, “Hey, that’s where I live” or “uh oh, that bomb clearly destroyed _______.” Thanks to cloud-cover, poor cinematography, and poor editing, there isn’t a single shot of Earth -even calm shots of Earth- in which one can distinguish exactly what part of Earth we are looking at. At this point, I have to believe this was by design, but why would you design a deliberately confusing map?
Ah, but deliberately confusing is the feature here, not the bug. How else would one explain questions the film raises like:
“How do you lose something on a space station?”
“Can you check if the antenna works without going outside the space station?”
“How does somebody floating in free space away from the station manage to return to it?”
“Who the Hell would listen to the Scorpions in a space station?”
So many questions I will never get answered. Luckily, I do not care. I.S.S. had an intriguing premise, but followed with little other than confusion.
Six Earthlings aboard a space station
Were ordered to kill for their nation
For the war set below
Left the planet all aglow
And wanted to ensure no salvation
Rated R, 95 Minutes
Director: Gabriela Cowperthwaite
Writer: Nick Shafir
Genre: Why can’t we be friends? ♪
Type of being most likely to enjoy this film: WWIII wishers
Type of being least likely to enjoy this film: Astronauts, I imagine
