Road to the Stars

Once the domain of oracles, astrologers, sooth-sayers, and writers of science fiction, the future is now much with many moderns. So much so that it takes half of Leningrad Popular Science Films Studio's production to get us out of the past. Billed as "Russian science fiction," the Brattle film is only partly that. After an account of the early struggles of the late Soviet scientist Konstantin Tsiolkovsky, a breathless rundown of recent rocket developments culminates at the magic date of October 4, 1957. As past becomes future, satellites flourish, Soviet citizens view the "other" side of the moon on TV, the planets unfold their secrets, and the narrator's tone loses none of its confidence.

Resting rock-like on the twin foundations of hindsight and inevitability, Road to the Stars is pretty dull entertainment. The future is offered as a fantastic but closed book. The invasion of the cosmos isn't as exciting as Walt Disney or George Pal might make it. More interesting is the account of the early struggles of the late Soviet creator (in 1903) of the multiple-stage rocket, Konstantin Tsiolkovsky, a schoolteacher "as modest as he was great." Half-deaf himself, Tsiolkovsky was able to gain no other ears than those of his young students until the October Revolution put an end to Russia's scientific backwardness. A typical scientist, Tsiolkovsky was ever-absorbed in the fantastical imaginings of his own mind. When we come on him, his head is generally raised towards the clouds. He is oblivious to life's petty details. In the movie's funniest scene, we find him out rowing with a young disciple. To demonstrate Newton's third law of motion, he pitches out first his own oar, then the student's, and, finally, their lunch. The role is amusingly played by G. Soloveyev.

To accompany Road to the Stars the Brattle has chosen two Soviet shorts. One shows the bears of the Moscow circus and the other the sea-creatures of Russia's far Pacific coast. The latter are described as "pugnacious and bellicose;" but so, indeed, are the bears.