Sputnik is a Russian spoken movie about an astronaut who comes back from one of his missions but seems to have brought back something dangerous back with him. Below is my Sputnik (2020) movie review
While the movie premise is not new by any means, it’s not a bad submission into an ever growing field of aliens threatening our way of life. For a good portion of the movie we don’t even see the actual alien. It’s implied that they are brought back with cosmonauts but it is kept in the dark. The scientists try to lure it out and find out as much about it as possible. Once we see it, a good portion of it is seen through video. This saves on special effects. In terms of the look of it, it looks kind of stupid. The best way to describe it is a slimy worm that had an anvil dropped on its head.
Once the action starts it slowly builds up into a disappointing ending. The ending itself is not bad but there is no big shootout or exciting conclusion to it. Throughout the movie we see humans observing the alien and the rest is spent arguing or talking about life (lots of conversations between two main characters and the military/scientist guys). Not a lot of action in the movie overall. The action that is present is not very exciting and it is very short. On top of that none of the things we anticipate is surprising.
The movie plays it safe and whenever you think somebody will die, they will most certainly die. The director felt like it needed to have a certain number of kills and he didn’t care how or when it would occur. A lot of these kills are not necessarily violent and are shot in a way that makes them either short or shot in smoke. Some look like they are shot through something like binoculars that make it look fake.
One thing that is annoying is that a lot of times when characters refer to other characters, they say both their first name and last name. I know it is common in Russia and probably other countries but it’s still annoying. Also, this is filmed on one location so not much in terms of colorful cinematography, just dark walls and dark corridors. In this case it kind of works as even the alien itself is kind of gray-ish and depressing-looking. It also doesn’t help that the whole base looks like a giant prison. If I am not mistaken, the actual location is a remnant of the Soviet era.
There was also a kid subplot which was unnecessary. It didn’t not contribute a lot, if anything, to the plot. Director wanted to have some family drama in an alien movie, it seems. Again, this, combined with the weak ending makes this movie average. It is worth seeing, but don’t expect anything amazing to come out of it. In terms of foregn movie production, it was still fun to watch.
Thanks for reading my Sputnik (2020) movie review
