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“The Challenge”: First Space-Shot Film by Russia

The film was a collaboration between the space agency Roscosmos and the leading Russian TV network Channel One, whose director Konstantin Ernst publicly expressed his delight at outperforming Hollywood.

Moscow, 21 April 2023 (GNP): First-ever Space-Shot Film “The Challenge” was deputed in Russian theatres on Thursday. Moscow found great pleasure in defeating a competing Hollywood effort as the first feature film to be shot in space in the midst of a dispute with the West over Ukraine.

The story of “The Challenge” centers on a doctor sent to the International Space Station (ISS) to treat a wounded cosmonaut. In October 2021, Russia dispatched a filmmaker and an actress to the International Space Station for a 12-day trip to shoot scenes.

Russia surpassed a 2020 Hollywood project proposed by “Mission Impossible” actor Tom Cruise alongside Nasa and Elon Musk’s SpaceX. 

Russian President Vladimir Putin praised the film at a Kremlin event this month. He said: “We are the first to have shot a feature film in orbit, aboard a spacecraft. Once again the first”.

The Soviet Union was an early pioneer in space exploration, launching the first man, dog, and woman into orbit. The film crew’s expedition was another first for Russia’s space industry, which had suffered from multiple failures, including failed launches.

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One of Russia’s most famous actresses, Yulia Peresild, 38, plays a surgeon in “The Challenge” who is taken to the ISS to treat a cosmonaut who got hurt during a spacewalk. 

"The Challenge"
Yulia Peresild, the lead actress of “The Challenge”

The final cut was made from 50 minutes of the 30 hours of video that director Klim Shipenko, in charge of the camera, lighting, and sound, shot in space.

Before traveling to orbit on a Soyuz spacecraft with a cosmonaut, Peresild and Shipenko received four months of training. Three Russian cosmonauts who were stationed there at the time made cameo brief appearances in the scenes, which were filmed in the Russian module of the ISS.

The Soyuz MS-18 spacecraft, which returned Peresild and Shipenko to Earth, was put on display in central Moscow prior to the movie’s premiere.

A 24-year-old marketing professional from Moscow named Polina Andreyeva expressed her admiration for the actors for not being frightened to travel into space. “That is so scary”, she remarked.

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