Can you film a movie in space? Tom Cruise wants to try with NASA and Elon Musk’s help
Word on the Hollywood street is that Tom Cruise will be part of an action adventure movie to be filmed where no camera crew has dared to go: outer space.
The actor, known for being his own stunt dummy, will be working with Elon Musk’s SpaceX and NASA, according to Deadline, but details about whether Cruise himself will visit the zero-gravity world above us remain unknown.
“There has never been a leading man (Jackie Chan might dispute this) who puts himself at risk as often as does Cruise, in the name of the most realistic action sequences possible,” the outlet said. “If he is successful shooting a project in Musk’s space ship, he will be alone in the Hollywood record books.”
There have been films shot in space, but solely for the sake of science, such as documentaries like “A Beautiful Planet” filmed in 2016 onboard the International Space Station (ISS).
But is shooting an action-filled movie in space really possible? One former NASA astronaut says absolutely not.
“As long as NASA has purview over the space missions, I can pretty much tell you the answer is going to be no,” Marsha Ivins, a veteran of five space missions, told Thrillist in a 2019 interview. “Because that’s not what NASA’s funded space program is about. It’s about science.”
But NASA seems to be on board this time around. Another former space-goer feels differently.
“The [computer graphics] have come a long way, and, frankly, it’s usually cheaper to do CG,” NASA Astronaut Terry Virts told the same outlet. ”But at least as of 2018, real is better than a computer.”
But what exactly would it take to accomplish such a feat?
Zero-gravity training
To document their travels, astronauts are trained on how to use cameras, but training an actor to become an astronaut is a totally different ball game.
It can take up to two years to become qualified to fly in space, according to NASA.
Astronauts must learn the ins and outs of the Space Shuttle and the ISS, learn how to be a team player by flying training jets and be ready to perform medical procedures and give speeches in the event of an emergency.
Cruise might also have to learn Russian to speak with the Russian Mission Control Center, experience the “Vomit Comet” to prepare for the weightlessness of zero gravity or even spend up to seven hours underwater for potential space walks —or runs— depending on what Hollywood prefers.
Forget about floating actors and camera crew, equipment is vulnerable, too.
“You have to figure out how to brace yourself to take a shot,” astronaut Ivins told Thrillist, recounting her experiences with simple record-keeping film work. “Wrap your leg around something, slide your toe into a toe loop thing that we’ve got all over the vehicle, curl up around something, wedge in a corner… There’s a whole other layer of eliminating motion in just a regular snap that you don’t have to do when you’re on the ground.”
Costs
For about $52 million, SpaceX can fly you out to the ISS once the trips there officially begin, according to CNBC.
Richard Garriot, an entrepreneur and video game designer, wanted to follow his astronaut father’s footsteps and managed to make it to space in 2008 for $30 million, TIME reported.
On the Russian spacecraft Soyuz TMA-13, Garriot shot a short film called “Apogee of Fear” about “a mysterious oxygen crisis aboard the space station,” Thrillist said.
But imagine the costs flying up an entire crew of 20-plus members and all their heavy equipment.
“Just the mere fact of getting that much equipment and people up into space would be cost prohibitive in my mind,” Dylan Reiff, a producer who specializes in brokering insurance for entertainment projects, told Thrillist. “They’d have to just bring the director and the [director of photography] and the talent they were filming.”
On top of it all, there’s insurance.
Reiff said it “wouldn’t be impossible to insure a short scene shot in space,” but “the potential risk of moving a Hollywood production into orbit is difficult to calculate.”
This means the Cruise movie would likely shoot a stunt among the stars that would include spacecraft personnel and not an actor, which “would make it extremely, perhaps prohibitively, expensive,” Reiff told the outlet.
Spacecrafts are small
In 1959, the astronauts that were a part of Project Mercury —the first human spaceflight program of the U.S.— had to be shorter than 5 foot, 11 inches just to fit in the spacecraft.
Turns out Cruise, at 5 feet, 7 inches, might not have any issues during filming.
Technology has advanced since then, of course. The living and working space in the ISS is larger than a six-bedroom house, according to NASA, but it’s filled with technology and equipment needed to keep the scientists healthy, safe and prepared for any necessary missions.
It’ll be a tough decision to decide if camera materials for an action movie outweigh the value of space for more food or emergency medical supplies.
Even John Glenn, who was the first American to go in orbit, said the thought of bringing a camera “was an afterthought.”
But just the idea of ensuring an entire film crew’s safety on a commercial mission to space is the real problem, the Thrillist reported.
People will find a way, the outlet said, because “like Buzz Lightyear, we want to go to infinity and beyond.”
This story was originally published May 5, 2020 at 2:47 PM with the headline "Can you film a movie in space? Tom Cruise wants to try with NASA and Elon Musk’s help."
