Space Recovery: Part Two

(United States)

* 20th Century Fox

(International)

(Avco Cinema)

* June 16, 1989

***Space Recovery: Part Two*** is a 1989 American adventure comedy film directed by Nicolas AVO and from a screenplay he wrote with Andres Vidal and Edward Rodriguez. It is the sequel to the 1987 film Space Recovery and the second film in the Space Recovery film series. The film stars Sean Astin as Miles Hidalgo, Winona Ryder as Jane Cromwell alongside Jeff Cohen and Corey Feldman. Set one year after the events of the first film, NASA began a new program that involved teens of the top 1% of intelligence and knowledge in engineering and mechanics to be launched into space, where Miles flies the Space Shuttle with his new friend and love interest Jane Cromwell, however, after an engine explodes, the crew has to work their way to get back to Earth in one piece.

After the success of the first film, Paramount Pictures executive Frank Mancuso, Sr. began immediate development on a new sequel, and phoned Nicolas AVO about their idea, AVO immediately accepted as he saw a sequel as an opportunity to expand the universe he was so fascinated with. Having developed a friendship with Sean Astin, he asked him if he was interested in reprising his role as Miles, Astin accepted and phoned Jeff Cohen and Corey Feldman about their interest in a sequel, and after reading a half-finished script, the two joined the project immediately. However, AVO had a significant reduction in time for pre-production, in order to compensate, Paramount funded them with a $57-60 Million budget. AVO wrote the first draft of the script in one month from November 23, 1987 to January 2, 1988.

In order to finish the script quicker, AVO brought back his co-writer Andres Vidal and his head of story Edward Rodriguez. They finished the final draft on July 7, 1988, Crispin Glover and Lea Thompson, despite having a significantly reduced role, joined the project on July 17, 1988, and were payed the same base salary of $375,000. For the roles of Kurt Connolly and Hugh Gomez, AVO hired Tom Hanks and Ed Harris respectively. Filming took place between November 2, 1988 and January 20, 1989. Post-Production was rushed compared to the first film's 8-Month post-production duration, as Paramount wanted a June release opposed to the first film's November 13 release date. During a test screening in May of 1989, audiences threw up a thunderous applause, despite the film's notoriously troubled production.

*Space Recovery: Part Two* was released on June 16, 1989 alongside Ghostbusters II to critical acclaim, with praise for it's visual effects, performances and story. As a sequel to the fifth highest-grossing space film at the time, *Space Recovery: Part Two* was expected to perform well at the box office, but it exceeded expectations and grossed $485.2 Million dollars worldwide, becoming the highest grossing film of 1989. Despite it's monumental success, it was considered responsible for triggering AVO's ten-year hiatus in his career, as he was too tired to make another movie and would take a break from filmmaking. Paramount Pictures deemed it a critical and commercial success. Despite it's troubled production, a second sequel was gradually developed from 1999 to it's release in 2013.

## Plot

On September 8, 1989, teen astronaut Miles Hidalgo hosts a party to watch a rerun of his now world famous Apollo 18 mission. He meets Jane Cromwell, a beautiful astronaut who immediately falls for Miles, despite him having feelings for Jane as well, he tries to ignore her crush on him and instead focus solely on work.

Three months later, as Miles conducts a tour of Nasa's Vehicle Assembly Building, his boss Kurt Connolly informs him that the first pilot for the mission STS-52-C with the intention of deploying a telecommunications satellite was infected with the measles, and that Miles had been appointed as the backup pilot for the mission alongside Jane, Chris and Nick. They train for the mission. Days before the launch on June 15, 1990, Chris is exposed to the measles, and the flight surgeon demands his replacement, despite his objections, he relents after being threatened with being moved to a later mission. As the launch date approaches, Miles suffers a nightmare in which he and his crew die in space. Emily, Miles' mother, informs him and Emmet, his father, that she won't attend the launch out of fear of witnessing his son's death. However, she changes her mind and attends the launch with Emmet.

On launch day, flight director Hugh Gomez in Mission Control Center gives the go for launch. As the Space Shuttle climbs through the atmosphere, Nick nearly throws up, causing him to be sick for the rest of the mission. Back on Earth, Chris sadly watches the trail of smoke dissipate in the air. After *Discovery* enters orbit, the crew enjoys the view. Three days later, by order of Mission Control, Miles tests the gimbal on the Orbital Maneuvering System's right engine, a spark on a cable causes the nearby fuel tank to explode, as well as over depleting 57% of their energy in fuel cells, veering them off their orbital alignment intended for the satellite. EECOM officer Bill Collins suggests shutting off the Space Shuttle's electric activities, including the flight computer, in order to save energy until a solution to the issue could be found. Hugh says that there is no other choice but to bring the astronauts back home within two days in order to prevent them from freezing to death. With *Discovery* running on minimal electrical power and rationed water supply, the crew suffers a significant drop in temperature, as well as Nick developing a fever, causing him to have to wear a face mask. Consumables manager John Aaron recruits Chris to help him improvise a procedure to restart *Discovery* for the landing on Earth.

As the crew enjoys a break from the stress as they stare out into the earth, they reflect on their mistakes and regrets, and confess to each other their dying wishes, as they see little hope from recovering from the dangerous mission. However, Chris speaks to them through the comms, revealing his plan on how to keep significant amounts of energy for reentry. Miles suits up and heads out into space as Nick opens up the midfuselage bay. Miles connects the satellite to the shuttle's fuselage, opening up it's right solar panel to provide energy to the cockpit, restoring the systems and flight computer. Chris later explains how they need to fix the hole the right OMS engine left by the explosion. Nick suggests taking away some of the satellite's 330 grade stainless steel panels and cover the explosion up while adding a layer of nomex felt fabric. With *Discovery*'s navigation systems shut down, the crew performs the final retrograde de-orbit burn manually steering their one remaining engine.

As the reentry phase nears, many people gather up to witness the Shuttle's reentry and landing. As they re-enter the Earth's atmosphere, no one is sure that *Discovery*'s heat shield is intact due to the unknown extent of the damage caused by the explosion. The tense period of radio silence due to ionization blackout is longer than normal, but the astronauts report all is well, and they begin preparations for the landing, but due to the makeshift reparation on the right OMS engine, the aerodynamic drag is way larger and the usual landing, however, Jane and Miles guide each other and land the Shuttle safely. Miles finally accepts his feelings for Jane and they share a kiss, walking away to the transport van holding hands. Chris and Miles work their issues and share a hug, vowing that they will always fly together a mission until they retire. The same night, Miles wonders about his future in NASA, and hopes he can keep being an astronaut.

## Cast

* Sean Astin as Miles Hidalgo, a teen who became the youngest and first person of Spanish descent to walk on the moon.
* Winona Ryder as Jane Cromwell, a teen and fellow pilot, Miles' love interest and eventual girlfriend.
* Corey Feldman as Chris Parker, Miles' best friend who assists him with the mission.
* Jeff Cohen as Nick Brown, Miles' other friend.
* Tom Hanks as Kurt Connolly, Miles' boss.
* Ed Harris as Hugh Gomez, the Mission Director.
* Crispin Glover as Emmet Hidalgo, Miles' father who was originally assigned as commander of Apollo 18.
* Lea Thompson as Emily Hidalgo, Miles' mother and Emmet's wife.
* Tom Selleck as Walter Hidalgo, Miles' deceased grandfather.
* Bryan Cranston as Jeremy, Chris' father.

## Production

### Development

After the success of the first film, Paramount Pictures began immediate development on a sequel even though the first film was produced as a stand alone project. Development on *Space Recovery: Part Two* was arduous, as Paramount's CEO Frank Mancuso, Sr wanted the film to be possibly released by June 1989. As Nicolas AVO had complete control over the franchise, a second film could not be made without his approval. In December of 1987, Mancuso gave AVO a call with the hopes that he would accept the idea of a sequel. AVO almost immediately accepted as we wanted to develop the world he was so interested in. AVO returned as writer and director for the sequel. Mancuso announced in January of 1988 that a sequel to *Space Recovery* was in early development. AVO developed a close brotherly relationship with Sean Astin, Jeff Cohen and Corey Feldman, and he organized a lunch with the three, together with his creative team, Edward Rodriguez, Liana Rodriguez, Mancuso, and Andres Vidal, though Astin had shown strong interest in making a sequel, Cohen and Feldman would be hesitant until a script was presented to them, despite AVO's doubts about Cohen and Feldman's terms, they both assured him since "he could make a script of amazing quality."

AVO's idea of the "Space Teenager" program came from random, rushed brainstorming in his office, he put the idea in the film with no hesitation, under Mancuso's request, shooting was scheduled for late-1988 for a mid-1989 release date, this pressured AVO to write the script based around his "Space Teenager" program, but then came across an article about Apollo 13's failed lunar landing and mission abortion, which gave him the idea of adapting the story into a Space Shuttle mission, in which an Orbital Maneuvering System engine exploded and drained over half of the spacecraft's energy, and that the crew would have to work their way to fix the damage, save energy and return home safely. He also adapted the idea of Apollo 13's original Command module pilot Ken Mattingly's dismissal due to the measles into the stories, however, he called the original crew for Jim Lovell's and Fred Haise's approval of adapting their mission.

After reading a text document of a half-written story, the two expressed their blessings, as they saw the first film and loved it. AVO finished an outline just one week after his reunion with the original cast. He decided *Space Recovery: Part Two* would reflect the one-year passage between the two films and aged each character accordingly, Miles, Chris and Nick went from being 13 to 14, and Emmet and Emily went from being 40 and 39 to 41 and 40 respectively. After watching *Beetlejuice* (1988), he was surprised by Winona Ryder's acting, and created the character of Jane Cromwell, a skilled, independent female pilot that would become Miles' love interest and backwards due to their age. "It was just natural for teens to become interested in relationships, and I thought this would be a realistic move." Said AVO in an interview in March of 1988 where he confirmed a sequel was coming.

AVO began the first draft by himself in April 1, 1988 with every idea and concept he had. He acted and sketched out each scene to to better develop the dialogue and actions, a technique AVO had learnt from *Back to the Future* (1985) director and writer Robert Zemeckis. The draft was somewhat similar to the final product, with two major differences, first, Miles was the commander of the mission, and second, Emmet was retired, but came back to help his son to return back home. After finishing the first half of the script, which was 60-70 pages long, he presented the half-finished script to Feldman and Cohen, and after reading it, the two joined the project immediately. In order to finish the script faster, AVO brought back Andres Vidal and Edward Rodriguez to assist with the second half of the script and that way, finish it faster. The first out of three drafts was finished on April 30, 1988.

### Writing

The writing trio wanted the film to be more lighthearted and comedic in tone than the first film in exchange for more slightly stronger profanity to reflect teenagers realistically. Mancuso supervised the script's continuity and dialogue in order to avoid excessive swearing. Their first draft was 130-140 pages long, Mancuso considered it too lengthy for the film, as he wanted to aim for a more breezy runtime of 100-105 minutes. Mancuso provided the $57-60 Million budget, pouring $16 Million into the script alone. AVO, Rodriguez, Vidal and Mancuso began reworking the script. Most of the time was at Mancuso's office, and other times it would be in one of the writer's office. AVO wanted to reduce the film's scope so that it could be set entirely on Earth, as he saw an opportunity to explore the planet's beauty from orbit. Mancuso expressed strong love for the idea, and considered that "this might be the most beautiful *Space Recovery* film in the franchise" and wanted the script to involve a spacewalk where Miles cried in awe witnessing Earth's beauty.

AVO, despite wanting the film to emphasize comedy over drama, refused to omit any emotional moments where the crew bonded over their shared love and passion for engineering and space travel. And on Mancuso's suggestion of Miles' personal moment in space, he went on a walk late at night to draw inspiration for the emotional moments in the film. As a self-proclaimed sensitive man, he cried endlessly during his trotting down in a forest. He brought back to his office the emotions he felt, for the scene where the crew thinks that their hopes of recovering are null, he wrote that scene outside in his backyard staring out into the stars, he conveyed the bittersweet feelings he felt when he walked out the forest, he wrote the scene by himself, drinking coffee and tuning his radio to quiet, white noise, the second draft was finished on June 2, 1988.

For the climactic reentry and landing sequence, AVO searched the technical and physical aid and guidance of the military test pilot Chris Hadfield in order to ensure it was as realistic as possible. Hadfield also made suggestions on the dialogue, time of blackout and landing speed. AVO asked Hadfield if he wanted to join the project as technical supervisor, Hadfield agreed. Mancuso determined the most expensive sequences to produce were the launch and reentry, as these both required extensive special effects and realistic visuals, so in order to save costs, AVO rewrote the sequences to take place mostly inside the spacecraft with brief cuts to the outside. The final draft was completed on July 7, 1988.

### Casting

Filming was scheduled for November 1988 to January 1989 including visual effects shots, Mancuso left as much creative control to AVO and his creative team at Sky Theory Studios as long as the film could be released by June of 1989. This left 11 months to complete the film, with no finished cast, effects studio or exact release date. AVO's script had Emmet and Emily in the film, and refused to proceed with production without casting Crispin Glover and Lea Thompson back in their roles of the previous film. Due to Glover's replacement for his role in *Back to the Future Part II* (1989), he became readily available and AVO approached Glover, asking him if he wanted to reprise his role for the same base salary as the rest of the stars, which was $375,000, despite his significantly reduced role in the sequel, Glover was given the script and joined the project on July 16, 1988, just shy of four months before production began.

For Lea Thompson's role, AVO met with Robert Zemeckis to ask him what was the soonest possible date Thompson became available, since she was cast in her role in *Back to the Future Part II*. Zemeckis replied that she was just filming her role for a week and she would be available soon after that, after she wrapped her shooting, AVO met again with Thompson, giving her the script, and after two hours, she accepted despite her significantly reduced role.

And for Kurt Connolly, AVO watched *Big* (1988) and liked Tom Hanks's serious performance. When he approached him with the script, he offered him the role of Kurt Connolly, Hanks accepted because of his knowledge of Apollo and space engineering. Finally, for the role of Hugh Gomez, AVO immediately wanted Ed Harris to take the role, since his stoic and relaxed acting was exactly what he wanted for Hugh Gomez, but Harris was committed to James Cameron's science fiction film The Abyss (1989), he approached Cameron and asked if as soon as shooting wrapped on *The Abyss*, Harris would commit himself to *Space Recovery: Part Two*. Cameron, having loved the first film, allowed Harris to read the script, and Harris himself being a fan of *Space Recovery*, accepted the role and promised to AVO to commit to *Space Recovery: Part Two* as soon as shooting on *The Abyss* wrapped.

### Filming

Principal photography began in Cape Canaveral on November 2, 1988. On the first day, Edward Rodriguez brought Hanks on set, unsure if he had read the script. Filming in Cape Canaveral lasted for approximately six weeks, finishing just before Christmas. AVO was conscious about finishing the Cape Canaveral phase since there were forecasts about snow hitting the East Coast. At the time, shooting in Cape Canaveral was considerably expensive, since Florida didn't offer economic shooting status. AVO was initially in frustration about not having Ed Harris on the set, since he wrote the script with much of his part present in the film. The Cape Canaveral phase finished on December 21, 1988. From then, the cast and crew took a one-week break for Christmas. Shooting resumed on January 1, 1989. Due to the short production schedule and looming release date, AVO was forced to cut down from ten takes to just three. He sent Edward Rodriguez to supervise construction of the sets, in order to save time, he encouraged his teen actors to perform improvisation, adapting multiple takes and keeping the cast creations that worked, but directing them back to the script.

Some guerrilla filmmaking took place, for the opening shot where Emmet's car drove by the streets of Melbourne, AVO used his own 1986 Plymouth Gran Fury. And the backyard used for the scene where Miles and Jane meet, that was Rodriguez's backyard. He wanted to save as much money as possible for the visual effects.

For the climactic reentry and landing sequence, AVO shot footage of a plane landing from the front cockpit's point of view. He filmed multiple images to compose one final shot, since the landing was filmed mostly from the inside, AVO struggled to align the footage with the Space Shuttle's own. He rushed back and forth from warehouse to warehouse to supervise multiple scenes. This took a toll on him, and during one night he phoned his wife and explained that "making this movie is killing me." Filming moved to Los Angeles. By this time, over 80% of the film had been shot, the only thing that was missing were minor pickup shots of the crew in the Space Shuttle. Principal Photography concluded on January 20, 1989.

### Post-production

The short production schedule and looming release date meant AVO edited the film while it was being shot. There was often only time for a few takes. AVO sometimes found making an effects-laden movie frustrating, as the special effects had to be storyboarded and filmed in advance; there was no option to go back and produce new scenes. As Rodriguez described it: "You storyboard in advance, that's like editing in advance. You've got a scene, they're going to approve that scene, and we're going to spend nine months doing that cut. There's no second takes, no outtakes, there's no coverage. You can cut stuff, but you can't add stuff. It made AVO so confined that it really bothered him."

A rough version of the film was cut together for a test screening at the Century 22 theater in San Jose, California, in mid-February 1989, just three weeks after filming concluded. Paramount Pictures had little faith in the film and was ready to cancel it in case the film disappointed, however, the audience was consistent in praise for the acting, production design and special effects. Paramount Pictures asked AVO what it would take for the film to be done by the mid-June deadline. AVO responded that it could be done with more cash. Paramount payed Industrial Light Magic an extra $5 Million for them to rush through effect shots, in which the shot where Miles lands the Space Shuttle was saved for last.

Due to a gas leak, the room in which the reels were kept burned up in a flame.

### Music

The *Space Recovery: Part Two* score was composed by James Horner and performed by the 72-person Hollywood Studio Symphony orchestra athttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The\_Village\_(studio) in West Los Angeles, California. It was orchestrated by David Spear and Bernstein's son Peter. Elmer Bernstein had previously scored several of Reitman's films and joined the project early on, before all the cast had been signed. Reitman wanted a grounded, realistic score and did not want the music to tell the audience when something was funny. Bernstein used the ondes Martenot (effectively a keyboard equivalent of a theremin) to produce the "eerie" effect. Bernstein had to bring a musician from England to play the instrument because there were so few trained ondists. He also used three Yamaha DX7 synthesizers. In a 1985 interview Bernstein described *Ghostbusters* as the most difficult score he had written, finding it challenging to balance the varying comedic and serious tones. He created an "antic" theme for the Ghostbusters he described as "cute, without being really way out". He found the latter parts of the film easier to score, aiming to make it sound "awesome and mystical".