LIDF

Touch the Sky

Adrian Wills | Canada, Kazakstan, Russian Federation, United States | 89 min mins

TOUCH THE SKY is a feature documentary for anyone who has ever wanted to travel to space. Using a fly-on-the-wall-style we follow the owner and founder of Cirque du Soleil, Guy Laliberté, as he makes his way to the International Space Station. Ever the maverick, Guy has allowed the company Space Adventures to broker a deal with the Russian space agency ROSCOSMOS, the equivalent of NASA, to complete the shortest training session ever allowed for spaceflight. Preparation will take place in Star City, the centre of Russia’s space program. Guy, a respected entrepreneur who never finished high school, will complete his training in five, rather than the usual twelve, months. To compound matters, instruction will be conducted entirely in Russian.
Many of the astronauts and cosmonauts training at Star City, picked from elite space programs around the world, grumble at this folly. But Guy is determined to become part of the team. There are also those, like crewmate NASA astronaut Jeffrey Williams, who believe that space tourists are taking seats that should rightfully go to astronauts. But Guy’s playful charm, steely determination and boyish curiosity begins to override these reservations, and the barriers between the space flight participant – ‘space tourist’ – and fully fledged astronaut, start to crumble.
What does it take to join the exclusive club of cosmonauts and astronauts who have experienced the majesty of space? As we follow Guy, the 511th person to voyage to that frontier, we are introduced to a growing cast of extraordinary real-life heroes, people like: septuagenarian painter Alexie Leonov, the first man to ever “space walk,” who strives to capture the colours he saw when first opening his capsule; cosmonaut Mikhail Tyurin, who emotionally recalls passing over New York during 9/11 as the drama unfolded below the ISS, and Alvin Drew, chosen for the final Space Shuttle mission, explains that at the age of four he wanted to be a test pilot, at five, an astronaut.

From the thrill of watching sparks as we re-enter the atmosphere, to floating through the confines of the ISS as filmed by the ‘Guy cam,” in TOUCH THE SKY viewers follow Guy as he lives the risks and are touched by some of the people that make up the global space community. What emerges is an unprecedented insight into the world of space travel.

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