Sputnik (film)

Plot

In 1983, two Russian cosmonauts hear movement outside their spaceship before it crashes in Kazakhstan. The sole survivor, Konstantin Veshnyakov, is taken to a military research facility run by Colonel Semiradov. Veshnyakov cannot remember the crash, and the facility's scientist Yan Rigel fails to cure his amnesia. Semiradov recruits controversial psychiatrist Dr. Tatyana Yuryevna Klimova, who quickly identifies symptoms of post-traumatic stress in Veshnyakov.

Semiradov reveals that each night an alien emerges from Veshnyakov's mouth while he sleeps. The creature is symbiotically bonded to Veshnyakov and responsible for his survival; separating them would kill both. Klimova agrees to investigate a permanent separation, provoking jealousy in Rigel. She tests Veshnyakov's stress response by accusing him of abandoning his son and causing his colleague's death, then arranges for him to stay in a normal room during daylight.

Veshnyakov tells her he learned of his son only a week before his mission. At night, Klimova observes the alien from behind protective glass and notices it fixating on a toy belonging to Veshnyakov. She removes the glass to give the toy to the creature, which plays with it but attacks her when she tries to touch it. Klimova theorizes the alien has merged with Veshnyakov and took interest in the toy because it reminds him of his son.

She requests to take Veshnyakov to Moscow, but Semiradov reveals his superiors want to terminate Veshnyakov and he has been lying about research progress. Reviewing surveillance footage, Klimova finds it edited. Rigel takes her to see Semiradov feeding live humans to the alien at night, explaining the creature needs cortisol from a terrified living human to sustain itself and Veshnyakov.

Release

Sputnik was scheduled to premiere at the Tribeca Film Festival in April 2020 before the festival was postponed due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Sony Pictures planned a theatrical release in Russia on April 16, 2020, but the film instead debuted on video-on-demand via More.tv, Wink, and Ivi.ru on April 23. IFC Midnight acquired North American distribution rights earlier that month, and the film was released in select theaters and on video-on-demand in North America on August 14, 2020. Over one million people streamed the film in Russia, making it the most-streamed title across those services in two years.

Reception

In its debut American weekend, Sputnik was the fifth-most rented film on Apple TV and grossed approximately $11,000 from 32 theaters. On Rotten Tomatoes, the film holds an 88% approval rating based on 121 reviews, with an average rating of 7/10; the critics' consensus calls it effective space alien horror with a Soviet-era twist. Metacritic assigned a weighted average score of 61 out of 100 from 19 critics, indicating generally favorable reviews.

Pavel Voronkov of Gazeta.Ru described the story as charmingly uncomplicated. Dmitry Shepelyov of Igromania commended the visuals but lamented that clichés drive the story, calling it a competent B-category film. Matt Zoller Seitz of RogerEbert.com gave it three-and-a-half out of four stars, praising the relationship between the two main characters and the soulful heaviness of the Russian vibe. Ian Freer of Empire gave three out of five stars, praising the creature design and gore.

Joe Morgenstern of The Wall Street Journal highlighted strong performances, spare production design, and somber cinematography. Glenn Kenny of The New York Times wrote that the film juices up its borrowings from other sci-fi pictures to yield a genuinely scary experience. Tomris Laffley of Variety called it a claustrophobic character study with gripping set pieces and praised Akinshina's charismatic lead performance. John DeFore of The Hollywood Reporter found the film's serious tone at odds with silly plot elements and summarized it as duller than it sounds.