Opens August 4, 2000

Fly too high too fast, get too close to the Sun and you’re gonna get scorched. That’s what happened to Team Deadalus, the squad of hotshot jet pilots in the ‘50s who were on a straight trajectory to be the first men in space. Only problem, they annoyed the higher ups who replaced them with more a more malleable space traveler, a chimpanzee, and they drifted off into a disappointing horizon, going their separate ways. Some people do get second chances, and Space Cowboyis a soaring tale of guys whose lives were grounded getting a second shot at their dreams, albeit when they are semi-retired and considered senior citizens.

Starring Clint Eastwood and his crack crew of Tommy Lee Jones, Donald Sutherland and James Garner, Space Cowboys travels where most contemporary movies that shoot into outer space don’t care to go, or even know how to get there: It traverses and rotates in a human dimension, not merely streaking in a hardware-heavy narrative universe, and it’s radius is much wider than those geek-treks where everyone talks in technological-ese, with blasts of abstract philosophy junked in as ballast.

In this movie mission, outer space is now, of course, a joint effort, propelled by the cooperative relations of the United States and the former Soviet Union, and, as you’d expect in a cooperative effort, things are even more screwed up: The brain trusts of the old SU come to NASA with a bitty problem, one of their Khrushchev-era, Sputnik behemoths (a “communications” satellite) is plummeting toward earth. There’s an especially king-size one plummeting toward Earth, and the new-Kremlin crowd needs it to be fixed in outer space because it contains all their communications networks, etc.

NASA, being the cooperative entity that it is, agrees to help, but there’s a tight time deadline (it will crash down in 60 days) and it’s such an ancient contraption by techie standards, that the only engineers around familiar with its outdated technology is Frank Corvin (Eastwood), the former leader of the Deadalus team and now a cranky retiree with grudges against NASA for replacing he and his high-flying team with a chimp.

Frank’s old-school, not the kind of guy who pussy foots around or has wasted a lot of time in his dotage attending sensitivity or anger-management seminars. He’s razor sharp and hard driving and when NASA, under the aegis of his former boss (James Cromwell) who grounded him and his crew, approaches with their “offer” to go into space, he knows he’s got the program between a rock and a hard place. He knows he’s the only man for the job, which to his way of thinking makes his team the only crew for the mission. After huffing and puffing, NASA agrees, and Frank yanks, cajoles, and sweet-talks his old flyboys out of retirement. In the case of flight-test fighter pilot, Hawk (Jones), it’s especially tricky because there’s still bad blood and competitive wounds even after all the years, and neither of these guys is what you’d call even remotely diplomatic. The other two flyers are less cantankerous but nevertheless high-ranking on the eccentric scale: Astrophysicist Jerry (Sutherland) still fancies himself a ladies man, even when installing his false teeth, while robotics expert Tank (Garner) has gone off on an altogether different mission in life – he’s become a preacher and grandfather.

With their guts sucked in, but their attitudes still front and center, the once-fearsome foursome descend on NASA for their “training.” Not surprisingly, the new NASA regards them as relics, geezers from the pre-historic days of aeronautics and there’s more than a few who not so secretly hope they’ll land on their butts. And, these old dogs have to learn more than a few new tricks and, well, they’re not exactly as popular with ground control as John Glenn. AARP and NASA – together once again.

Hard-wiring all the right narrative components into the story mainframe, including political/thriller/personal/technological factors, the screenwriting twosome of Ken Kaufman and Howard Klausner has provided not only plenty of lift, but Space Cowboys kicks in squarely on all stages, continually boosted by the personality quirks and clashes of not only the four flyers but among the NASA bigwigs. And, it’s not one of those leaden missions where everyone stands around in their space suit yakking at each other: “Cowboys” rides a wild and dangerous path and like all good space missions, or cattle drives, these four rough riders encounter deadly obstacles on each new horizon.

There’s a lot going on here, even some budding romance, and Eastwood’s sure hand at the directorial helm demonstrates a dexterity, sensitivity and mission-control savvy that elevates this space odyssey to its fullest reach. He’s equally adept whether flying just under the radar with the smartly goofy personal scenes, as he is accelerating into the technological stratosphere as the story launches into space. With a massive boost from Industrial Light & Magic, Space Cowboys is a cutting-edge venture of seamless movie-making with all the marvels of space-age movie technology – motion control cameras, digitally-designed backgrounds, miniatures – in a natural constellation of stellar spectacle. Even a bean-counting systems analyst would be hard-pressed to find even minor glitches in this sleek and classic operation.

Having called his veteran moviemaking team once again into service, (editor Joel Cox, production designer Henry Bumstead, cinematographer Jack Green, composer Lennie Niehaus), Eastwood and the “boys” have launched a payload of heart, laughs and thrills.