IMDB metadata: 1 hour and 33 minutes of Dali time at 4.3/10 from 2197 time wasters.
Based on an early novel by Stanislav Lem, this is a Polish-East German production made at the height of the Cold War.
Stanislav Lem, the prolific Polish Sy Fy writer. Do not blame him for this mish-mash.
The original screenplay was, sources say, larded with anti-American pronouncements absent from the novel, and as a result Lem quickly disassociated himself from the project.
The title above translates as ‘The Silent Star’ but it has been released in several versions, each with a different title. On You Tube it goes by ‘First Spaceship on Venus.’ The edited versions are dubbed and the dubbing is also done in a way to fit the intended audience.
The You Tube version was bought, edited, and dubbed for an American audience at the bottom of a double bill or for the insatiable and indiscriminate drive-in audience. The import of the changes are many.
Set in far distant 1985, an international space program led by the Soviet Union is about to launch the first mission to Mars. The magnificent eight are multi-national, a black African, a Japanese, a Chinese, an Indian, an East German, an Italian red, and a Tom Cruise, and the Russian who is the leader. World peace prevails apart from the petulant ructions of Tom Cruise.
In the many cut and dubbed versions the identities of the Russian and American are reversed, and in France the East German becomes French, in Italy….
In the American version the Russian who has become an American by the magic of dubbing arrives at the assembly point in a Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-21. Sure they put telephone books on the seat so that Tom Cruise could see.
Assembled, the team mutters platitudes, and just below eye-level Tom Cruise struts.
Meanwhile, in far Eastern Siberia scientists have dug up something from the site of the Tunguska meteor impact of 1908. It is never clearly shown on screen but it is referred to as a wire. This wire has been fabricated, made of elements not of this Earth, and is a recording device. There is an incomprehensible signal on it. Many squiggles are shown on the Moog synthesiser. Meanwhile, the astronomers have gotten their imaginations to work and concluded from the angle of impact that the meteor came from Venus. Sure, after Tom got out of the MIG the astronomers stood on the telephone books and there was Venus. Morning star and all that.
In response to this evidence of an intelligent communication from Venus, the mission is changed from Mars to Venus. Out come the slide rules to chart a new course. Done!
Off they go. There are no tensions among the crew, though one of the crew tries to re-kindle a romance with the Japanese, who in the original has many things to say about the Hiroshima bomb dropped by those horrible Americans. These remarks are omitted in the American version. Oddly enough she does not discuss the Japanese Occupation of China or Korea.
At no time in this 1959 production does one of the men marvel at a woman who is a scientist as unnatural, odd, or against nature. Nor does any of them try to hit on these two women. It is unique in the annals of 1950s Sy Fy to lack sexism. Just the kind of perversion to be expected from the Russkies. They also take along a small robot tank that rolls around doing nothing much.
They land on a murky, dank, dark, gaseous Venus that must have been impressive on the wide screen in 1959 when the original version was released. This Venus is altogether other worldly.
No one is home.
Donning their credible spacesuits, they wander around using up fuel and oxygen until they stumble on to some feral USB sticks in the shape of small Northern Territory blowflies. They find a giant golf ball into which they plug the USB flies and set about learning Venusian, which is similar to Venetian so the Italian in the crew quickly masters it.
The ‘Ah ha’ moment arrives. The signal on the wire in the tundra was targeting data for a Big Bertha energy weapon on Venus. The aim was to blast Earth. Why? Because it is there.
Ever the peril with low bid contractors, Big Energy Bertha failed and the backfire depopulated Venus in one big bang, that no Earth astronomer noticed. What were they doing to miss this? We’ll never know.
There are some striking images of humanoid figures burned onto walls like some in Hiroshima from that atomic blast. This sight unhinges the Japanese woman. The design, art work, and travelling mattes were very well done on Venus.
The Venusians died to the last before they could safely eject all the peripherals from the big, old iMac golf ball. All the nosing around by the crew has awakened the equipment which starts an ominous IOS update and by some blink of the eye we are are transported to Yellowstone National Park, home of boiling mud, some coloured but most black. This sludge is enveloping everything. Not good.
They skedaddle but in the confusion the noble American (Russian) sacrifices himself to save others. Can any one picture that midget ego doing that? No? Moving on. Two others also get killed. The remaining change the D batteries and return home. They declare the mission a success. Sure. Why not.
They have learned that blowing yourself up is bad. Very bad. Don’t do it. No. Lesson learned. Moral: blow up others, not yourself.
The Cosmostrator later did duty on Liberace’s piano.
Pedantic note. Venus is a planet, not a star. It does not twinkle, as twinkle, twinkle little star. It is silent in that, since everyone is dead, no return phone calls.
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