Movie: Rubikon to the Rescue, Maybe

Posted on by onespaceman2000
Credit: IFC Films

With the fourth of July weekend upon us, we still lack a Hollywood blockbuster space adventure film. However, an Austrian space drama arrived this weekend – Rubikon. Here is the basic plot in the year 2056:

Following a catastrophe on Earth, the planet is covered in a toxic fog. The crew in the space station, must decide whether to risk their lives to get home and search for survivors, or stay safe in the station’s “algae symbiosis system”.

It sounds a lot like another film with George Clooney from 2020. Do you remember The Midnight Sky?:

This post-apocalyptic tale follows Augustine (George Clooney), a lonely scientist in the Arctic, as he races to stop Sully (Felicity Jones) and her fellow astronauts from returning home to Earth, where a mysterious global catastrophe has taken place.

Yes, astronauts are looking down on a dying planet, again. Didn’t Interstellar also having a dying Earth? Makes you kind of miss Star Trek with its hopeful story lines.

So far, Rubikon has 30 percent on Rotten Tomatoes, so don’t get your hopes too high. Some of the reviews are shown below. Yet if you need a space adventure film this weekend, you now have one.

Image (Credit): Comments on the film Rubikon. (Rotten Tomatoes)

Supernova: One Ring to Rule Them All?

Posted on by onespaceman2000
Image (Credit): Supernova Remnant J0624–6948. (NASA/CXC/A. Hobart)

Astronomers recently reported that a strange ring just outside of the Milky Way galaxy that may be an intergalactic supernova remnant. SciTechDaily had a story on the discovery first reported in the journal Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society.

Initially detected by the Australian Square Kilometre Array Pathfinder (ASKAP), the object (later named J0624–6948) is believed to be located in the Large Magellanic Cloud, which is a satellite galaxy of the Milky Way.

Professor Miroslav Filipovic from Western Sydney University stated:

The most plausible explanation is that the object is an intergalactic Supernova Remnant due to an exploded star that resided in the Large Magellanic Cloud outskirts that had undergone a single-degenerate type Ia supernova which involves the explosion of two stars orbiting each other.

If you are a fan of The Lord of the Rings films, the image may remind you of another ring and accompanying poem:

Three Rings for the Elven-kings under the sky,
Seven for the Dwarf-lords in their halls of stone,
Nine for Mortal Men doomed to die,
One for the Dark Lord on his dark throne
In the Land of Mordor where the Shadows lie.
One Ring to rule them all, One Ring to find them,
One Ring to bring them all, and in the darkness bind them,
In the Land of Mordor where the Shadows lie.

I have not sought comments from NASA on this connection just yet.

Image (Credit): Ring from the Fellowship of the Ring movie. (Warner Bros. Entertainment)

In Case You Missed It: Farming on Mars

Posted on by onespaceman2000
Image (Credit): Matt Damon on Mars in the film The Martian. (20th Century Fox)

Back in a November 2020 article, Science News discussed the difficulties of farming on Mars, noting it was not as easy as Matt Damon’s character made it seem in the film The Martian. In fact, toxins discovered in the Martian soil has proven that growing potatoes with a bit of man-made manure is not possible.

In the article, “Farming on Mars will be a Lot Harder Than ‘The Martian’ Made it Seem,” the author noted that researchers put together a variety of soil samples to match the surface of Mars and determined that the soil that most closely matched the Martian soil was unable to grow vegetation for any length of time. Once that soil was modified to include calcium perchlorate, which makes up about 2 percent of Martian soil, nothing could grow at all. In other words, Matt Damon would have starved if he only had a latrine to support him.

The researchers are testing other possible soil types using materials that can be found on Mars, so Martian potatoes (or at least legumes) may be possible. We will just need to send Mr. Damon back to Mars to test these new approaches.

Extra: The BBC’s Science Focus website posted a more hopeful article around the same time highlighting what can be grown on Mars, but it also outlined a number of problems that will impact Martian farming, including less sunlight, lower temperatures, thinner atmosphere, radiation, and extreme seasonal variations. We don’t always realize how good we have it back here on our home planet.

Movies: Apollo 10 1/2

Posted on by onespaceman2000
Image (Credit): Scene from Netflix’s film Apollo 10 1/2. (Netflix)

Last week’s film was about young adults in space, but now we are hitting elementary school for the right stuff. This Nextflix film, Apollo 10 1/2: A Space Age Childhood, is a good weekend movie for the whole family if you are looking for something light. The basic story is that NASA flubbed its Apollo program and created a lunar spaceship that is too small for adult astronauts. Hence, instead of sending a dog into space like the Russians, NASA goes to elementary school for what it needs. Here is a clip of the film narrated by Stan, the astroboy, and directed by Richard Linklater (from other films such as Boyhood and Before Sunrise).

Rogerebert.com, which notes that the films does a pretty good job providing context on American life in the late 60s, gives the movie three stars (out of a possible four), stating:

…Stan is a thoroughly likable storyteller, and there’s something to be said, in an era when Hollywood couldn’t care less about any idea not based on an pre-existing property, for intimate, personal films that don’t take you where you think you want to go.

It may be a silly plot, but given the state of the world at the moment it might also be a nice diversion. And don’t worry – it is my understanding that the Artemis lunar mission is being planned for full-sized adults.

Movies: A Romance Set on Mars

Posted on by onespaceman2000
Image (Credit): Upcoming HBO movie Moonshot. (HBO)

On March 31st you can can watch another space-related movie, though this one has a misleading name. Called Moonshot, the setting is actually a space colony on Mars. You can watch a trailer of the HBO Max movie here.

While its just a platform for a young adult romantic comedy, it will be fun to see how the film portrays life on the Red Planet. Given that it includes a stowaway on the trip to Mars, you have to wonder what kind of space program these people are running when every pound of extra weight is critical.

Of course, Netflix already did the Mars mission stowaway story in last year’s film Stowaway.

So don’t think too hard. Just enjoy the spacecraft and scenery.