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Inquest of Pilot Pirx
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Wikipedia article
'Inquest of Pilot Pirx' (, , ) is a joint Polish-Soviet 1979 film directed by . It is based on the story "The Inquest" by Stanisaw Lem from his 1968 short story collection 'Opowieci o pilocie Pirxie' ('Tales of Pirx the Pilot'; the story was translated into English in the second part, 'More Tales of Pirx the Pilot').[https://kultura.onet.pl/film/wywiady-i-artykuly/marek-piestrak-widzowie-nie-zawiedli/8dg53je Marek Piestrak: widzowie nie zawiedli], interview by DAREK KUMA It was adapted for film by Vladimir Valutsky. It is a joint production by Zespoly Filmowe, and Tallinnfilm. Some of the studio-based filming was done at the Dovzhenko Film Studios.
Plot summary
Spaceship pilot Pirx is hired for a mission to test probes to be placed in the Cassini Division, a gap between rings of Saturn, while the real secret goal was to evaluate some 'nonlinears' (androids with "nonlinear" characteristics) for use as crew members on future space flights. The mission meets with a near disaster and the human crew are almost killed. Upon returning to Earth there is an inquest to determine if Pirx was responsible for the accident. Pirx recounts the events and in the end it is established that one of the robots caused the malfunction of a probe and attempted to pass through the Division to launch the probe manually, an attempt which would kill the human crew members and prove the superiority of 'nonlinears' over humans.
Cast
* Sergei Desnitsky as 'Commandor Pirx'
* Aleksandr Kaidanovsky as 'Tom Nowak', neurologist and cyberneticist
* Vladimir Ivashov as 'Harry Brown', 2nd Pilot
* Tnu Saar as 'Kurt Weber', nucleonicist engineer
* Igor Przegrodzki as 'McGuirr'
* Boleslaw Abart as 'Jan Otis', electronicist
* Janusz Bylczynski as head judge
* Mieczysaw Janowski as 'Mitchell'
* Jerzy Kaliszewski as 'Dr. Kristoff'
* Zbigniew Lesien as 'John Calder', 1st Pilot
* Ferdynand Matysik as 'Green', the UNESCO Director
Discussion
In this tale Lem puts forth the idea that what is perceived a human weakness is in fact an advantage over a perfect machine. Pirx defeats the robot because a human can hesitate, make wrong decisions, have doubts, but a robot cannot., "Lem on Film". In:
Polish film critic Krzysztof Loska thinks that the film adaptation unduly shifted Lem's original focus on the definition of humanity to the trope of robot rebellion.
Reception
'Inquest of Pilot Pirx ' was awarded the "Golden Asteroid" Big Prize at the International Cinema Festival at Trieste 1979.Eva Nripea, [http://www.kinokultura.com/specials/10/pirx-naripea.shtml Transnational Spaces of Science Fiction: An Estonian-Polish coproduction The Test of Pilot Pirx (Test pilota Pirxa / Navigaator Pirx, 1978)], 'Kinokultura', 2010
References
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