''Cosmic Voyage'' or ''The Space Voyage'' () is a 1936 Soviet

science fiction Science fiction (often shortened to sci-fi or abbreviated SF) is a genre of speculative fiction that deals with imaginative and futuristic concepts. These concepts may include information technology and robotics, biological manipulations, space ...

silent film A silent film is a film without synchronized recorded sound (or more generally, no audible dialogue). Though silent films convey narrative and emotion visually, various plot elements (such as a setting or era) or key lines of dialogue may, w ...

produced by

Mosfilm Mosfilm (, ''Mosfil’m'' , initialism and portmanteau of Moscow Films) is a film studio in Moscow which is among the largest and oldest in the Russian Federation and in Europe. Founded in 1924 in the USSR as a production unit of that nation's fi ...

. It was one of the earliest films to represent a realistic spaceflight, including weightlessness as well as one of the last Soviet silent era films.

Plot

In the year 1946, the Soviet space program is undergoing turmoil. Professor Sedikh, who is planning to lead the first crewed exploration to the Moon, is denounced by his rival Professor Karin as being too old and too mentally unstable for the mission. Professor Sedikh, aided by his assistant Marina and a youth named Andryusha, disregard Professor Karin's authority and make a successful landing on the Moon. Although a few problems occur at the Moon, including the discovery of a damaged oxygen tank and Professor Sedikh's becoming trapped under a fallen boulder, the expedition is a success and the cosmonauts return to

Moscow Moscow is the Capital city, capital and List of cities and towns in Russia by population, largest city of Russia, standing on the Moskva (river), Moskva River in Central Russia. It has a population estimated at over 13 million residents with ...

Cast

* Sergei Komarov as Pavel Ivanovich Sedikh * Ksenia Moskalenko as Marina, Karin's assistant * Vassili Gaponenko as Andryusha Orlov * Nikolai Feoktistov as Capt. Viktor Orlov * Vasili Kovrigin as Professor Karin * Andrey Karasyov * Sergey Stolyarov

Production

''Kosmicheskiy reys: Fantasticheskaya novella'' was initially conceived in 1924 by Russian filmmaker Vasili Zhuravlov, but it was not pursued for production until 1932, when

Komsomol The All-Union Leninist Young Communist League, usually known as Komsomol, was a political youth organization in the Soviet Union. It is sometimes described as the youth division of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU), although it w ...

(the Communist Union of Youth) recommended the creation of film that would spur an interest in space studies. Zhuravlov consulted with

Konstantin Tsiolkovsky Konstantin Eduardovich Tsiolkovsky (; rus, Константин Эдуардович Циолковский, p=kənstɐnʲˈtʲin ɪdʊˈardəvʲɪtɕ tsɨɐlˈkofskʲɪj, a=Ru-Konstantin Tsiolkovsky.oga; – 19 September 1935) was a Russi ...

, the noted aeronautical theorist and rocket science engineer, on the screenplay. Tsiolkovsky died shortly after the film was completed. Two spaceships in the film were named after the Soviet leaders

Joseph Stalin Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin (born Dzhugashvili; 5 March 1953) was a Soviet politician and revolutionary who led the Soviet Union from 1924 until Death and state funeral of Joseph Stalin, his death in 1953. He held power as General Secret ...

and

Kliment Voroshilov Kliment Yefremovich Voroshilov ( ; ), popularly known as Klim Voroshilov (; 4 February 1881 – 2 December 1969), was a prominent Soviet Military of the Soviet Union, military officer and politician during the Stalinism, Stalin era (1924–195 ...

. The film's cosmonauts enter liquid-filled chambers to buffer the impact of takeoff and landing, and they communicate their landing to the Earth by spelling out "CCCP" (the Russian-language acronym for "USSR") with reflective substances spread across the lunar surface. ''Kosmicheskiy reys: Fantasticheskaya novella'' was shot as a silent film and had only a brief release in early 1936 before being removed from circulation by Soviet censors, who felt that stop-motion animated sequences of cosmonauts hopping across the low-gravity lunar surface were antithetical to the spirit of " socialist realism." It was not widely seen again until the 1980s.

References

Sources

*David Christopher, "Stalin's "Loss of Sensation": Subversive Impulses in Soviet Science-Fiction of the Great Terror," ''

Journal of Science Fiction The Museum of Science Fiction (MOSF) is a 501c(3) nonprofit museum that originally had plans to be based in Washington, D.C. It was founded in the spring of 2013 by Greg Viggiano and a team of 22 volunteer professionals with a goal of becoming the ...

'', Vol. 1, No. 2 (May, 2016), 18-35.

External links

* * (English subtitles)
Space Flight intertitles
1936 films 1930s Soviet films Soviet science fiction films Mosfilm films Konstantin Tsiolkovsky Soviet black-and-white films Soviet silent feature films 1930s science fiction films Films about astronauts Films set in 1946 Films set on the Moon Films set in the future Films set in outer space {{1930s-USSR-film-stub