Product Description

Written, directed, and starring Cory McAbee of The Billy Nayer Show, this space western musical uses flinty black-and-white photography, rugged Lo-Fi sets and the spirit of the final frontier to bring the film, set in the dirty, isolated vastness of outer space, to life. The film also stars Rocco Sisto and Gregory Russell Cook. THE AMERICAN ASTRONAUT follows the adventures of an interplanetary trader (McAbee) through his Homeric intergalactic journey to provide the all-female population of Venus with a suitable singular male, all the while being pursued by the cold-blooded and childish killer, Professor Hess (Sisto), an enigmatic figure from his past. The film features an original soundtrack by the The Billy Nayer Show.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #79232 in DVD
• Released on: 2005-02-22
• Rating: NR (Not Rated)
• Aspect ratio: 1.33:1
• Formats: Black & White, Dolby, DVD, Subtitled, Widescreen, NTSC
• Original language: English
• Subtitled in: French, Spanish
• Number of discs: 1
• Running time: 91 minutes

Amazon.com
Literally out-of-this-world, The American Astronaut is a post-Eraserhead, black-and-white comedy set on an asteroid that serves as an outpost for desperadoes, mad scientists, and paranoid travelers. Director Cory McAbee, frontman for the dynamic, experimental rock band the Billy Nayer Show, has constructed a seedy, surreal vision of conquered space that includes rocket ships operated by junkyard parts, barflies with a increasingly pathological sense of humor, and handguns that reduce people to a bucket's worth of sand. In this nightmarish, sometimes funny, sometimes tedious fantasy noir, a distressed astronaut (McAbee) agrees to swap a caged, embryonic female for a captive male on one planet and deliver the latter to the man-hungry (if peculiarly antebellum) women of Venus. The film doesn't necessarily hold up as a singular work, but there are several remarkable sequences, including a dance number in a scummy restroom and an unsettling comedy routine. Special features include an interesting interview with McAbee. --Tom Keogh

From The New Yorker
Cory McAbee's black-and-white feature début (which he wrote, directed, and stars in) has all the quirky kick of a budget-impaired independent film. The story, set in the future, tells of a shipping contractor chased by a deranged killer, but it's just an occasion for McAbee to run wild with his genre-busting ideas. The film is filled with psychotic Astaire-style musical sequences, Three Stooges-esque humor, slimy nightmare imagery, and hilarious Flash Gordon-inspired space scenes. The strange brew may not be to everyone's taste, but there's no mistaking the original and talented point of view McAbee brings to his grab-bag adventure. -Bruce Diones
Copyright © 2006 The New Yorker

Customer Reviews

Guy Maddin meets early David Lynch...in outer space!
The American Astronaut is the missing link between Guy Maddin and the early films of David Lynch. Cory McAbee's movie is shot in glorious black and white film stock with unabashedly lo-tech special effects that reside at the opposite end of the spectrum of another retro-SF film, Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow. The American Astronaut has the same grungy, industrial look and feel as Lynch's Eraserhead with the same fierce, independent spirit.

Writer-director-star Cory McAbee has created a unique movie quite unlike anything else out there. While he shares the lo-tech retro look of Guy Maddin's films he isn't interested in recreating the silent era of cinema. McAbee does share a fascination with industrial machinery and the `50s with David Lynch, but he isn't interested in exploring the dark underbelly. McAbee is far more optimistic. The American Astronaut is a fun, off-beat film for people who like something a little different. It has more energy and inventiveness than most of the big budget Hollywood films out there proving yet again that a lot of money can't make up for a lack of ideas and how necessity truly is the mother of invention.

There are several galleries that include a series of cool, sidewalk artwork promoting the movie on various city streets all over the country by Cory McAbee; on-the-set pictures; storyboards and the corresponding stills from the movie; a collection of movie posters; and production artwork.

"Ceres Jump Test Footage" is a brief clip of McAbee hopping around a city street trying to mimic the lo-gravity depicted in the movie.

There is an audio commentary by McAbee that was shot live at a screening in a Brooklyn bar. McAbee enthusiastically answers questions and recounts production anecdotes in this engaging, entertaining track.

Finally, there is a theatrical trailer.

In space, EVERYONE should see this movie!
American Astronaut is brilliantly imaginative. If you need to read reviews or watch clips then please do, but don't find out TOO much; You'll be constantly and pleasantly amazed by the strange and nuanced ideas packed into every well composed shot.
I like eccentric films but I have never seen a movie reinvent what movies can offer in order to create its own engaging world...not to get stodgy: It's still full of Rock and Roll, Space barns, ray guns, shaving and dance contests. Unreal.
Some movies off the beaten track are cheap vehicles for bizarre humor or gimmicks. This is just simply the most Original, Innovative and Imaginative movie I saw in 2004.

gloriously bizzare
Do not believe any of the reviews that state this movie is bad. This is one of the most gloriously bizzare movies you will ever see; a combination of "The Man Who Fell to Earth" and a spaghetti western, with the "7 Lives of Dr Lao" thrown in for good measure. No matter how many times you see this film, it always seems like you came in at the middle of a different movie. The camera work is as done by someone with ADD, sometimes obsessive, sometimes wandering but always mesmerizing. The plot is ... well ... loose. The acting reminds me of walking into a karioke bar. The combination will put a smile on your face and a thought in your head ... unless you are just a "spoil sport."