Even ten years after its release, Alfonso Cuaròn’s Gravity remains a visual-effects marvel which perfectly captures the terror and isolation of an astronaut stranded in outer space. However, the film could have been even more realistic as there were early talks of actually shooting it in space with the cooperation of NASA.
Alfonso Cuaròn told Empire that they did consider shooting the movie in space, but two main factors kept it from happening. “[Money] was number one,” Cuaròn said. “Number two, and the thing that killed the whole conversation, was Sandra. Because Sandra had already suffered two airplane accidents. Not one, but two. For her, flying is a big sacrifice. And for her the idea of getting into a rocket or something like that, it was a no-no, you know?” Perfectly fair; not everyone is Tom Cruise.
In order to achieve real weightlessness without the need to go to space, Alfonso Cuaròn and the Gravity team did test shots on the so-called Vomit Comet. The parabolic flights recreate weightlessness for around 30 seconds, which wouldn’t give them the long shots Cuaròn wanted. The director added that NASA was initially “very helpful” with the project, but as soon as they learned that it revolved around a disaster in space, they “could not support us anymore.“
I mentioned Tom Cruise earlier because it was announced three years ago that he would be teaming up with Doug Liman to shoot a movie on the International Space Station. Universal Pictures chairwoman Donna Langley even teased last year that the actor might even become the first civilian to do a spacewalk. “Tom Cruise is taking us to space. He’s taking the world to space,” Langley said. “That’s the plan. We have a great project in development with Tom, that does contemplate him doing just that. Taking a rocket up to the space station and shooting and hopefully being the first civilian to do a spacewalk outside of the space station.” However, Russia beat Tom Cruise to space with The Challenge, a space drama released earlier this year which shot in space for nearly two weeks.