With James Gray’s Ad Astra out now, and the Natalie Portman drama Lucy in the Sky coming up, it’ll be tough for another space drama to set itself apart. Fortunately for Alice Winocour’s new film, Proxima, it has Eva Green in the leading role as an astronaut juggling her career with motherhood.
In that sense, it’s almost like an answer to Ad Astra, which deals with the relationship between a father and son. In Proxima, Green plays Sarah, an astronaut training for a year-long mission to a space station, while struggling to raise her 7-year-old daughter. Also in the cast are Matt Dillon, Lars Eidinger, and Toni Erdmann star Sandra Hüller.
Winocour is the director behind films Augustine and Discord. She also co-wrote the script for Oscar nominee Mustang in 2015.
SYNOPSIS: As the French member — and the only mother — on an international crew, Sarah balances the taxing physical training required for a year-long mission aboard the International Space Station with her daughter Stella’s routine of meals and bedtimes. Sarah’s powerful, protective love for Stella, only seven, sometimes pulls at her commitment to her profession. Her male colleagues include an old-school Russian and a veteran American space cowboy (Matt Dillon), both seemingly untroubled by their own family responsibilities. As the liftoff date approaches, Sarah must travel to the launch site and go into quarantine — away from her daughter, who is struggling with her mother’s conflicting priorities. Will Stella’s matter-of-fact counsellor (Toni Erdmann’s brilliant Sandra Hüller) bridge their emotional divide?
Proxima recently premiered at TIFF where it received an honorable mention from the Platform Prize Jury. However, it’s yet to score domestic distribution so who knows when we’ll see it in theaters. Hopefully a little later to get some distance from similar films.
