Too much of everything

Good movie but grossly overrated

Tells a fascinating and unsettling true story, and does so well, without pretending to have all the answers.

A great movie, one of the best of this year. There was a bit of confusion at one point in the plot, but nothing serious.

This movie is loosely based on biography of one of the fathers of Soviet cosmonautics - S.P.Korolev. Though definitely the heroic deeds of army of Soviet engineers worth all kind of awards, but this movie leaves me disappointed.This film is outdated today and looks more like propaganda movie, especially at the end - Lenin, communist party, revolutionary song in at the party in Kremlin.Name Bashkirtsev is used here not because S.P.Korolev was a top secret engineer, but because some episodes of the movie have nothing to do with S.P.Korolev. Before WWII he was in prison, in GULAG camp, then in sharashka - a secret research center under supervision of NKVD. Anyone interested in real facts of Korolev would read Wikipedia, and would not not watch this movie.Next is the main idea that is driving Bashkirtsev: flying into space to Mars and to Moon. This movie never says that the main goal of Korolev research center was to create an intercontinental ballistic missile. A space program was just a side project that was used later by Soviet government as another propaganda vehicle. Thsi movie shows as if Bashkirtsev is a lunatic driven by a single idea to launch rockets into space, and military usage of rockets has nothing to do with him or the whole Baikonur launch site. This is again a propaganda cliché.

This is a real epic about the developing of rockets and spaceships in the Soviet Union. The character called Andrei Bashkirtsiev is actually Sergei Koroliov, the "father of soviet spaceships". I don't know why they didn't use his real name, maybe some sort of "state secret"?. In this film there is also a scene where another famous scientific appears: Kurchatov the maker of the first soviet atomic bomb. Also the actor that does the role of Yuri Gagarin resembles quite much the real one. Photography here is excellent and also the music. It's a very well done score. I saw this film a couple of times more than 30 years ago and I still remember the scene when they take the big rocket out of the hangar en route to the launching pad. By the way, the dialog between Gagarin and Bashkirtsiev/Koroliov was the real one (as Gagarin told later): Koroliov: What would you think of a flight into space? just a small trip to and fro. Gagarin: It's OK if there's enough fuel. I still remember that phrase when he is shown the first prototypes of jet fighters: "Piervava liubov" ("First love") because he started thinking about building jets but then dedicated himself to rockets. The famous "Katiushas". Among the many historical characters depicted here there is a very important one: Konstatin Tsiolkovsky. He was interpreted by the famous classical Russian actor Innokenti Smoktunovsky.

An epic about Russian rocket scientists and the launches of "Sputnik" and Yuri Gagarin - the first man in space. Soviet secrets are unveiled and many facts are uncovered in this powerful film. The filming locations were top secret in the Soviet Union. Filming was made at the Soviet Space Research Centers near Moscow and at numerous launch sites of the Baikonur Cosmodrome in the deserts of Kazakhtan. Actors are playing the top secret characters, who's real names were not mentioned in the film credits and public media. The leading character and other rocket scientists seem like they were well coached by the real space staff.

First man in space was Russian... This movie depicts step by step evolution of Soviet space program from military rocket system "Katjusha" till first space ship "Vostok". Head character is based on real person Serguei Korolyov, the father of Soviet space program. Nice subject, nice music...