[MAN ON A MISSION screens Wednesday January 25th at 7:00 pm at the Cleveland Museum of Art.]
Review by Bob Ignizio
Have you ever dreamed of being an astronaut? Well now you can be, provided you've got an extra $30 million lying around and can make it through the 1 year training program, which includes a crash course in Russian. You'll need the language skills, because this opportunity isn't available through NASA. Only the Russian space program is willing to let “space tourists” fly on their rockets to the international space station at this time. RICHARD GARRIOTT: MAN ON A MISSION recounts the efforts of it's subject to become just such a space tourist.
Richard wants to follow in the footsteps of his father Owen, who spent time on board Skylab and Spacelab-1. The whole “second generation in space” thing makes for a nice angle, but there's still the matter of coming up with the money. Fortunately for Richard, that's not a problem for him. He started writing role playing computer games when he was in high school, and eventually make a fortune off of his best-selling Ultima series of games.
