Moscow-Cassiopeia

Moscow-Cassiopeia (Москва — Кассиопея) is a Soviet science fiction film directed by Richard Viktorov based on a script by Isai Kuznetsov and Avenir Zak. Followed by Teens in the Universe (second part, 1975).

The film was released in the Soviet cinema on September 23, 1974. Then it was held at the box office in Poland, Germany, Yugoslavia, Czechoslovakia. The film was first showed on TV on November 7, 1976.

Synopsis
From the depths of the universe Earth can hear the radio signals of intelligent beings from a planet of the star system Shedar in the Cassiopeia constellation. A project is set up, proposed by the young inventor Vitya Sereda, to send a spaceship to reach the planet - but the flight will last for decades, so the crew of the spaceship ЗАРЯ or Zarya (an acronym for Spaceship (zvezdolet) Annihilation Relativistic Nuclear (yaderny); (the word 'zarya' means "dawn" in Russian), is to be recruited from teenage students.

The project is all carefully thought out but student Fyodor Lobanov stows away aboard the starship and unwittingly causes it to transcend the speed of light and so reaching its target 27 years ahead of schedule...

Cast

 * Innokenty Smoktunovsky as S.S.E. (Special Service Executive)
 * Vasili Merkuryev as academician Blagovidov
 * Lev Durov as academician Filatov
 * Yuri Medvedev as academician Ogon-Duganovsky
 * Pyotr Merkuryev as academician Kurochkin

Spaceship ZARYa crew

 * Mikhail Yershov as Victor Sereda, spaceship commander
 * Aleksandr Grigoryev as Pavel Kozelkov
 * Vladimir Savin as Mikhail Kopanygin
 * Vladimir Basov Jr. as Feodor Lobanov
 * Olga Bityukova as Varvara Kuteishchikova
 * Nadezhda Ovcharova as Yulia Sorokina
 * Irina Popova as Katya Panfyorova

Other cast

 * Anatoly Adoskin
 * Natalya Fateyeva
 * Nikolai Figurovsky
 * Artyom Karapetyan
 * Valentina Kutsenko
 * Sergei Radchenko
 * Raisa Ryazanova
 * Nadezhda Semyontsova
 * Natalya Strizhenova
 * Anna Viktorova
 * Nikolai Viktorov
 * Mikhail Yanushkevich

Filming
Initially, there was a single script, without dividing into two films, but when the amount of footage exceeded the standard timekeeping of a Soviet film, permission was obtained from the Goskino USSR to shoot two: "Moscow — Cassiopeia" and "Teens in the Universe". This did not affect the filming schedule, and as a result in the second film in some episodes the characters look younger than in the first one. Cosmonaut Georgy Beregovoy was a consultant for the film.

The costumes for the heroes were made of metallized nylon, high boots were equipped with magnetic suction cups, and the astronauts had a "sense collector" on their chests that translated from any language of the Universe.

The weightlessness scene was shot in 4 stages with the participation of Valery Pavlotos, a design engineer at the Yalta Film Studio. The movements of each actor along their own trajectory made a strong impression on the jury of the X "UNIATEC" International competition.

Awards

 * Prize for the Best Film for Kids of the All-Union Film Festival, Baku, 1974
 * Special Prize of the International Trieste Science+Fiction Festival, Trieste, 1975
 * Special Prize of the Moscow International Film Festival (in the Children's films category), Moscow, 1975
 * Platero Prize of the International Film Festival of Children's and Youth Films, Gijón, 1975.
 * Diploma of the Technical Contest of the Films at the UNESCO UNIATEC congress, Moscow, 1976
 * Vasilyev Brothers State Prize of the RSFSR, 1977.