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It's supposedly the first full-length science fiction film made entirely in Serbia (almost every credit ends in '-ic', it's hilarious),
and it's the sexiest sci-fi recent sci-fi flick I've seen since I reviewed 'Wifelike' a few months ago, with somewhat of a similar premise
about an artificially intelligent female android (but not a scary one like M3gan).
With a very small cast of four, this is a mean, lean machine.
The story involves a single astronaut, Milutin, who is accompanied on the first interstellar voyage (to Alpha Centauri)
by a female android named Nimani, who is owned (along with the mission) by the Ederlezi Corporation [think Weyland-Yutani from Alien].
They are departing a world where corporations and government seem to have melded together into some kind of one-world socialist government.
The mission mentor (the only other actor in the production) is a cold-looking Slavic blonde who represents the interests of Ederlezi.
She inculcates in Milutin the importance of establishing 'juche' (which is the North Korean version of socialism) once they get to the planet.
So, here's why this is relevant to the Forum:
Nimani is portrayed by Serbian-American pornographic actress Stoya. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stoya
In neo-puritanical American, of course, that would be a no-no (see: Traci Lords), but in artsy Europe, that's perfectly OK.
I don't know how many people have even heard of Stoya - this seems to be her first mainstream feature - but she is still in the business.
The main thing she seems to be known for is helping blow the whistle on James Deen in the industry (along with several other porn actresses).
Stoya has an amazingly perfect body, although some might call her breasts a bit small, they are quite perky, and again, quite acceptable in both the European and Japanese style. Her retro haircut and face remind me a bit of the fetish actress Olive Glass, with whom I'm sure many are familiar on this Forum.
In the course of this voyage, Milutin and Nimani's relationship changes rapidly: first they are lovers and engage in consensual sex;
then he rapes her; then he somehow decides he wants to free her from a controlling master program called 'TIFA' (not sure what that stands for);
but upon doing so, she witholds sex from him, turning into a bit of a 'femdom', which sends him into a deep spiralling depression. In order to pull him out of it (and in order to keep the Ederlezi mission on track), she resorts to extreme measures; and in turn, he then resorts to extreme measures in response. You'll have to watch the movie to find out what those are.
So, all that is probably worth a look, but I have several questions with regards to the plot in general:
- Why does this relationship between a man and his android even have to take place on a spaceship? It could happen anywhere in the future.
I didn't see a whole of point in making all the spaceship graphics. A lot of the ship consists of gigantic wide-open blank spaces and very stark corridors. I'm a big fan of corridors but these ones look extremely boring and 'Soviet bloc'. How would a spaceship operate efficiently if it's too
unnecessarily big?
- The spaceship looks like it's going extremely slowly. There's no rapid movement and certainly no hyperspace. How long do they intend to take
traveling four light years?
- When Milutin goes outside the ship, there's danger of "sun radiation". Why is that, if they are so far from the sun that it should already be a dot?
- Why is forcibly fucking an android even considered "rape"? Why would she shriek (which she does) and resist? if her job is to keep him happy so the mission can be completed why wouldn't she just submit?
- And then after her "TIFA" programming is removed, and she supposedly becomes "her own 'person", why does she withhold sex? She's still obligated to keep the mission on track (her directive hasn't changed), so why would she make him depressed on purpose? (Does that mean that the android is making mistakes by learning? Not sure.)
- I'm a little disappointed, too, that the Nimani character doesn't have some kind of powers, like the incredible strength or agility you see in the Bladerunner replicants like Pris. It would have made for higher stakes and more tension if she had been able to pin Milutin up against a wall, and maybe even do something sexually torturous like edging him.
- Finally, why is there such a big mention of establishing 'juche'? Exactly whom would Milutin be establishing it for if there is nobody yet on the planet to which they are headed? (There is no mention of any kind of colony ship which they might be accompanying, or indications of a hiberating passenger manifest on board).
There's also a bunch of other weird graphics of planets roiling, suns burning, and algorithms and fractal liquids bubbling which seem like they are there mostly to take up time and show the world what Serbian CGI is capable of without having to resort to hiring out dudes in Bangalore. I guess in that respect, the graphic give the proceedings somewhat of a psychedelic 1970s/80s throwback mood (like Solaris, maybe?) with some music to match which at times approaches John Carpenter mode.
File this one under space porn with deep-meaning philosophies ('where only showbiz loses' - ha! I couldn't resist, for all the Antpeople out there).
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