The Challenge, the first film shot in space: it’s Russian and it “takes Tom Cruise’s face off”

Russia has released a trailer for The Challenge, a film shot 400 km above Earth on the International Space Station.

The launch, which is scheduled for April 20, will make The Challenge the first feature film in which the actors and director are transported into space for filming.

This will come as a disappointment to Tom Cruise, who is set for a project for which he had hoped to get the title, directed by Doug Liman.

The Mission: Impossible star has revealed for the first time that he is participating in filming alongside Elon Musk’s SpaceX and NASA. May 2020.

In May 2020, NASA Administrator Jim Bridenstine tweeted, ‘NASA is excited to be working with @TomCruise on a film aboard @Space_Station!’

He explained, “We need the media to inspire a new generation of engineers and scientists to make @NASA’s ambitious plans a reality.”

Russia’s first feature film shot in space puts a woman in the lead role

In the past, the Russian space agency Roscosmos announced that it would choose a “superwoman” to lead “the first feature film to be shot on the International Space Station”.

That actress ended up being Yulia Peresild, who plays heart surgeon Zhenya, who is transported to the ISS to save an astronaut’s life.

In addition to performing a complicated procedure in zero gravity, the character must struggle to be taken seriously by the rest of the male crew.

All stages of preparation for the film were broadcast on the state-controlled TV channel Channel One in an attempt to “popularize Russia’s space activities and glorify the cosmonaut profession.”

It was filmed aboard the ISS in October 2021, just months before the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

Dmitry Rogozin, the head of Roscosmos, has appointed himself producer of the film “The Challenge”.

Although it would be the first film in which the cast was taken into space, Return from Orbit, a 1984 Soviet science fiction film, also contains scenes filmed aboard the Salyut 7 space station.