Inquest of Pilot Pirx

Test pilota Pirxa
Film poster
Directed by Marek Piestrak
Written by Vladimir Valutsky
Stanisław Lem (story)
Starring Aleksandr Kaidanovsky
Music by Arvo Pärt, Eugeniusz Rudnik [1]
Cinematography Janusz Pawlowski
Production
company
Release date
  • 1979 (1979)
Running time
 104 minutes[2]
Country Soviet Union
Poland

Inquest of Pilot Pirx (Polish: Test pilota Pirxa, Russian: Дознание пилота Пиркса, translit. Doznanie pilota Pirksa, Estonian: Navigaator Pirx) is a joint Polish-Soviet 1979 film directed by Marek Piestrak; it is based on the story "The Inquest" by Stanisław Lem from his 1968 short story collection Opowieści o pilocie Pirxie (Tales of Pirx the Pilot; the story was translated into English in the second part, More Tales of Pirx the Pilot). It was adapted for film by Vladimir Valutsky. It is a joint production by Dovzhenko Film Studios, Tallinnfilm, and Zespoly Filmowe.

Plot summary

Spaceship pilot Pirx is hired for a mission to evaluate some nonlinears (androids with "nonlinear" characteristics) for use as crew members on future space flights. Pirx and his crew, made up of nonlinears and humans, are sent out to launch two satellites into the rings of Saturn. There is 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." In the end, it is found that one of the robots caused the malfunction in an attempt to kill the human crew members, with Pirx cleared of all charges.

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.[3] A similar idea is present in Isaac Asimov's Robot series, where putting a robot in a position where it cannot chose between the Three laws of robotics fries its positronic brain.

Cast

  • Sergei Desnitsky as Commandor Pirx
  • Aleksandr Kaidanovsky as Tom Nowak, neurologist and cyberneticist
  • Vladimir Ivashov as Harry Brown, 2nd Pilot
  • Tõnu Saar as Kurt Weber, nucleonicist engineer
  • Igor Przegrodzki as McGuirr
  • Boleslaw Abart as Jan Otis, electronicist
  • Janusz Bylczynski as head judge
  • Mieczysław Janowski as Mitchell
  • Jerzy Kaliszewski as Dr. Kristoff
  • Zbigniew Lesien as John Calder, 1st Pilot
  • Ferdynand Matysik as Green, the UNESCO Director

Reception

Inquest of Pilot Pirx was awarded the "Golden Asteroid" Big Prize on the XVIII International Cinema Festival at Trieste 1979.

References

  1. ↑ "Program/Film/ THE PILOT PIRX TEST DIR. Marek Piestrak"
  2. ↑ Inquest of Pilot Pirx on IMDb
  3. ↑ Swirski, P. (2008). The Art and Science of Stanislaw Lem. McGill-Queen's University Press. p. 161. ISBN 9780773575073. Retrieved 2015-04-04.


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