Nebo Zovyot (Battle Beyond the Sun) (The Heavens Call) (The Sky Calls) (1962)

Featured Audience Ratings

• AJ V

  
  This is an interesting sci-fi movie directed by Coppola, but I'm not sure if it's a Russian movie or what?

• Eric B

  
  Like many contemporary viewers, I was interested in this silly, Russian-made flick purely because I heard the young Francis Ford Coppola had a hand in editing it down to its tighter American counterpart (which is 13 minutes shorter). Reportedly, Coppola also directed a couple of late… More
  Like many contemporary viewers, I was interested in this silly, Russian-made flick purely because I heard the young Francis Ford Coppola had a hand in editing it down to its tighter American counterpart (which is 13 minutes shorter). Reportedly, Coppola also directed a couple of late scenes uncredited. To put it mildly, Coppola could not salvage this dismal bit of sci-fi hokum. The story concerns a future Earth, where the post-atomic world has banded together into two large country conglomerates: North Hemis and South Hemis. The two factions are engaged in a space race to Mars, but the crews of two rival spaceships end up having to join forces to save themselves and return home. You may have heard amused talk about how the Martian monster resembles a toothy vagina, but the bad news is that this campy payoff doesn't really arrive until the final 11 minutes. And it's just one scene. Until then, there's nothing to enjoy except stiff, dubbed Russian actors and some low-budget simulations of rocket travel.