Today’s quick review: Orbiter 9. Helena (Clara Lago) has lived her entire life alone on a colonization ship bound for the planet Celeste. Years into the voyage, she has her first contact with another human being: Alex (Alex Gonzalez), an engineer sent to fix a malfunction in the ship’s oxygen system. Though Alex’s time on her ship is brief, it has an unanticipated effect on both of them, prompting Alex to take drastic action to be with her.
Orbiter 9 is a sci-fi romantic drama about an isolated colonist and the man who is her only link to the world beyond. Though nominally a movie about space travel, Helena’s decades-long journey serves merely as a backdrop. The heart of the movie is Helena’s connection to Alex, which allows her to explore an Earth she has never known. The film packs a couple of good twists, but it’s not quite up to the task it has set for itself.
Orbiter 9 benefits from solid fundamentals. Helena and Alex never quite cross over into the rich, nuanced characters they could have been, but the movie handles them with skill just the same. Their unusual relationship ties in well with the movie’s plot and gives it a clear emotional core. However, the plot doesn’t have much meat on its bones. The exclusive focus on Helena and Alex drives out the film’s auxiliary themes, and its climax is unsatisfying.
Give Orbiter 9 a watch if you’re interested in the personal side of science fiction. Neither its characters nor its ideas are enough to earn it a place with the best of the genre, but both are handled competently enough to make the movie a fine watch. For a minimalistic sci-fi drama with a deeper mystery, check out Moon. For a heartwrenching look at the cost of relativistic space travel, try Interstellar.
5.8 out of 10 on IMDB. I give it a 6.5 for a good premise and well-handled characters, but missing the extra quality needed to come into its own.