Often lost in casual consideration of what it will take to send humans to Mars, a mission that is expected to occur within the next decade, is the psychological effect of such a long, isolating journey. The science behind such a mission is itself so mind-boggling to lay people that the human element can take a back seat in how we conceive of what it will take to achieve such a goal. As one of NASA behavioral psychologists even says, the engineers are so singularly focused that they might know the strength of each bolt and rivet but they aren’t concerned with the “squishy humans” when they’re designing spacecraft. But Space: The Longest Goodbye certainly is, and director Ido Mizrahy’s documentary explores the challenges posed by the profound isolation of protracted space travel, with mixed results.
The Longest Goodbye makes its deepest impact when it focuses specifically on the plans for a mission to Mars and the sacrifice the space pioneers who make such a journey will have to endure as they make history and reach toward the future. The mission will take three years, with the vast distances the astronauts will travel from Earth making real-time communication impossible. Untethered from our planet, the crewmembers will need to maintain interpersonal cohesion in their mission, but also persevere in a small space where they will interact only with each other for years and will rarely get a moment alone.
Various strategies to help the astronauts cope are discussed, such as the benefits of virtual reality headsets to allow them some mental escape from the confines of the spacecraft, and an A.I.-powered robot conversationalist and quasi-therapist named Cimon to whom crewmembers can vent. The logistics of developing a safe and effective means for human beings to hibernate for much of the travel time to the Red Planet is closer to reality than science fiction, and offers another possible method to combat the psychological effects of prolonged isolation.
Ironically, it’s in telling the human stories that The Longest Goodbye falters. A great deal of time is spent on astronaut Cady Coleman, who over 15 years ago spent nearly six months separated from her husband and son while aboard the International Space Station. Not only does her situation not especially apply to the Mars mission – it was one-fifth of the anticipated duration and she was afforded frequent real-time video calls with her family in an era before smartphones, when such calls were still truly space-age technology – but the conversations presented are too banal to be compelling. While having a parent “off the planet” was likely a strange experience for her son, whom we see interviewed now as an adult as well, it wasn’t much different than having a parent deployed in the military or on an extended business trip overseas.
Kayla Barron’s story is more forward-looking. She spent 176 days in space while working on the ISS in 2022, and could potentially be a candidate for a Mars mission. She and her husband talk separately about what it would mean for her to go on such a lengthy mission if they have started a family by then. So much changes in three years. But since this discussion is hypothetical, and the couple did not already have children as of the time of filming, it loses some of its impact as a result. Elsewhere, we hear from a volunteer for a simulated Mars mission here on Earth, where a group was expected to live in close quarters in a NASA-built structure in the desert for six months as though they were in a Mars outpost. Despite considerable buildup for what the interviewee anticipates to be a grueling experience, the simulation was aborted after just seven days due a serious injury to one member of the group, sapping the whole endeavor of any valuable insight into the psychological impact of such a mission.
The film’s more abstract considerations make up its most compelling moments. NASA operational psychologist Al Holland drives many of these discussions, and he recounts the challenges in this behavioral study within a highly technical, coldly clinical field. After all, many astronauts are reticent out of self-preservation, fearful of revealing some mental detail that could ground them or even jeopardize their career. This makes psychological study of the impact of a Mars mission all the more challenging. One of the film’s strongest points is the context given to how a three-year mission wouldn’t just separate the astronaut from their family, but all of civilization, cutting off a shared world history for them as they would return to a significantly altered society impacted by events that are suddenly alien to the astronaut’s own experience. Not only can families change drastically in three years, but so can the entire world.
Despite the occasional flaws in its presentation, the subject matter of Space: The Longest Goodbye fascinates because, as futuristic as a mission to Mars may seem, the science is here to make it happen. It’s the imperfect human mind, still rooted in its primal needs, that may provide the biggest obstacle.
Photo courtesy of Greenwich Entertainment
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