82. Among the stars

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I.

Over the past few years, I have made it a point of honour to write as much as possible about space travel for the media outlets I worked for, whenever possible. So many exciting things are happening that it is hard to keep up, and for that we can thank the rise of commercial space travel. SpaceX, in particular, actually. Ten years ago, we wouldn’t have believed it possible for a rocket to return to Earth after launch and land neatly on a cross in the ocean. Now we don’t even bat an eyelid at it.

Right, this week I met some of the Polaris Dawn crew. Three weeks ago they were further into space than humanity has been since 1972; now they were in Noordwijk for a day for the astronauts’ conference hosted by André Kuipers. I was able to speak to them for exactly 14 minutes about their experiences. Because the journey wasn’t just about distance. They also tested SpaceX’s new suits and became the first civilians to go on a spacewalk.

In the video in which Jared Isaacman (the billionaire who largely funded the mission) steps out of the capsule and looks at Earth, he says: “We still have a lot of work to do back home, but from up here, Earth looks like a perfect world”. He sounds calm, but he was anything but, he says. “Because of the change in pressure, my voice sounds much lower than normal, which is why I might not have sounded very enthusiastic. But believe me, we were all incredibly elated.”

All crew members experienced a ‘sensory overload’ when the capsule’s hatch opened and they were overwhelmed by the black void of space. “The adrenaline is racing through your body,” says Isaacman. “You know there’s nothing between you and an incredibly threatening environment, except a visor.” Read the full story on NU.nl (though you do need to log in for free).

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II.

I met the very likeable artist Jan Vriends a week ago at the Breda Comics Festival, where he was awarded the Willy Vandersteen Prize for De Kosmonaut as the best Dutch-language comic book of the past year. Vriends was kind enough to sign my copy and we got talking about space travel. Even as a child, he used to sit in front of the TV, fascinated by the Apollo missions – and that love of science and discovery has stayed with him.

De Kosmonaut is a warm and sweet story about a cosmonaut who is selected for a space mission. Once in space, something goes wrong, forcing him to make an emergency landing on Earth. There, he gets to know and appreciate farm life, whilst hoping to see the love of his life again.

Vriends has created a colourful and playful book full of jokes for the whole family, yet with room for drama (and a cameo for Bialetti coffee). The author told me about his fascination with space travel in the Eastern Bloc. Whilst the Americans are innovating with commercial space travel and the latest gadgets, the Russians’ Soyuz rockets have been around since the 1960s. “Rock-solid stuff,” says Vriends.

But that’s not the only reason he chose a cosmonaut for the lead role. Vriends simply finds the title ‘cosmonaut’ – the name for a Russian space traveller – more appealing than ‘astronaut’. It appeals more to the imagination. “Because it contains a derivative of the word ‘cosmos’.”

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III.

It’s October again! Spooky season. In the coming newsletters, I’ll be highlighting a few horror films I’ve seen.

This time, I’ll start with The Substance, the recent hype film that has seen quite a few people walking out of the cinema. The film is about a washed-up film star (Demi Moore) who, thanks to a special substance, can split herself in two. Her new body is younger (better?) and regains a place in the spotlight. There’s just one rule: the substance only works if you spend one week in one body and the next in the other. That rule is, of course, broken, resulting not exactly in a scary film, but certainly a deliciously gory body horror film, with audible shivers regularly running through the cinema.

All the *Final Destination* films are now on Netflix. I’d never seen any of them before, so I watched the first one. It’s about a group of young people who escape a plane crash, only to discover that no one can escape their fate. And so, one by one, they end up in freak accidents. Both mind-numbing and entertaining. HBO Max has a new adaptation of the Stephen King classic *Salem’s Lot*. The story is about a vampire who moves to a small town in Maine and starts a bloody killing spree there. You’d be better off reading the book again. ---

PS.

Jan Mulder is the best Volkskrant Magazine guide in ages. He doesn’t really get up to much in the Groningen countryside anymore, he says himself. So one of his tips is: the Husqvarna 536LiB leaf blower. “Oh yes, that’s the one,” he says. “It’s battery-powered, not petrol-powered. You’re actually supposed to hang it over your shoulder with a strap, but I don’t do that. I hold it like a diplomat’s briefcase. I could never have imagined what a pleasure that is. I’d like to pass that on to the Volkskrant readers.”

Mulder also has some kind words for Jan Cremer, whose death, in his view, received far too little attention. You hardly see charming characters like that anymore. Perhaps in a very pale imitation in someone like Wout Weghorst, he says. “Sorry, Jan Cremer, up there in heaven, that I’m comparing you to Weghorst here.”

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The Smile are releasing their third album: Cutouts. For those who have been following Thom Yorke, Jonny Greenwood and Tom Skinner’s new band for a while, there is little that is truly new on it. So you can take the title quite literally: this was still sitting on the shelf from earlier recording sessions. To dismiss it as a ‘leftovers’ album is therefore a bit of a cop-out. Especially given brilliant tracks like Foreign Spies, Tiptoe and Bodies Laughing.

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Fifteen years ago, director David Lynch travelled tens of thousands of kilometres across the United States for his Interview Project. In it, he portrayed dozens of people he encountered along the way. “Everyone we interviewed was different,” says Lynch. “It’s something human you can’t escape.” All those short videos are on YouTube.

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Let’s also take a moment to look at the channel Wheelie Yellow, which was recommended to me by the YouTube algorithm. In these videos, a yellow doll in a tiny RC van races through the streets at breakneck speed. No idea why exactly, but I find this highly entertaining.

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Writer Peter Buurman decided a few months ago to go to the cinema a bit more often. And he might as well write about it. This has resulted in some delightful pieces, in which he combines his cinema experiences with his everyday life. You can read them on his website. My current favourite is his piece on the Nicolas Cage film Arcadian.

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I’m glad the film about Robbie Williams is doing things differently from all those other (mediocre) biopics about artists. In the first teaser trailer for Better Man, Williams is played by a monkey. I wasn’t necessarily looking forward to a biopic about Williams, but now I’m actually looking forward to it.

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Kodak’s first camera changed the world of photography. From then on, people without technical knowledge could take photos. “You press the button, we do the rest,” wrote Kodak. And that’s how spontaneity was born, argues Vox.

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A particularly lovely match: Fontaines D.C. covers Lana Del Rey.

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