When an astronaut crash-lands back on Earth, a general puts her in quarantine for rehabilitation and testing. As disturbing events unfold, she fears that something extraterrestrial has followed her home. A film by Jess Varley, starring Kate Mara, Gabriel Luna, Ivana Miličević, Macy Gray, Scarlett Holmes, and Laurence Fishburne.

Returning from her first mission on the International Space Station, NASA astronaut Sam Walker’s space capsule is struck by what appears to be meteor debris during re-entry, puncturing the hull and shattering her helmet. Sam loses consciousness during the free fall, and the capsule crash-lands deep in the Atlantic Ocean. Miraculously, she survives.

The U.S. Coast Guard rescues Sam (Kate Mara) from the wreckage. When they find her, she’s unconscious inside the punctured capsule, her face and shattered helmet coated in a strange blue tint and white particles. She’s rushed to a hospital to recover, where medical teams scan her body for injuries and run tests on the mysterious particles covering her spacesuit.

Sam wakes up in a quarantine ward, startled to see a pen floating in midair. But when she glances away for a moment as Dr. Ethan Marshall (Reza Diako) and a medical specialist (Daiana Madeira) enter to check on her, the pen is resting motionless on the table. They tell her the scans reveal deep tissue swelling but no fractures. When Sam mentions feeling heavy and dizzy, and seeing the pen float, they brush it off as normal anti-gravity hallucinations. Dr. Ethan asks what she remembers, since they lost contact during re-entry. Sam explains she got the splashdown coordinates from Mission Control and everything was on track until she hit something.

Later, her husband Mark (Gabriel Luna), their daughter Izzy (Scarlett Holmes), and her adoptive father General William Harris (Laurence Fishburne) visit her in quarantine. They speak through a glass partition while she undergoes decontamination. They’re all relieved she’s okay. Will mentions that the Pentagon is working with NASA to analyze strange electrical frequencies detected during her re-entry. He’s arranged for her to recover at a secluded location, away from the press coverage of the crash. Once the medical team clears her, she’ll be moved there.

Shortly after arriving at the house, Sam is hit by a sharp, high-pitched ringing in her ears. Then a strange vision flashes through her mind: a group of people searching for someone or something in the dark. When Dr. Michelle Aiden asks if something’s wrong, Sam only mentions the ringing and keeps the vision to herself.

Dr. Aiden (Ivana Miličević) reassures her that tinnitus is common after spaceflight and will fade over time. She also warns Sam to expect various symptoms like nausea, dizziness, fever, nosebleeds, and even hallucinations as her body readjusts to gravity. The more Sam reports back, the better they can assess whether future missions should be delayed, particularly if she shows any unusual or severe side effects.

That evening, Sam receives a video call from her NASA colleague Val (Macy Gray), who’s visibly relieved that Sam survived the crash. During the call, Sam is briefly distracted when she thinks she sees something moving in the darkness outside. The camera lingers after Sam leaves the dining area, and a shadowy figure slowly shifts out of frame, suggesting someone is watching her. Sam confides in Val that she’s desperate to get back to space and has never felt more at home than she did up there. When she mentions experiencing symptoms and getting a nosebleed, Val warns her to stay quiet about it. If she reports everything, they’ll ground her permanently. Sam agrees to keep it hidden.

After hanging up, the lights in the house start flickering. Sam is startled by the sound of objects banging in the kitchen. She goes to investigate and finds dirt scattered across the floor, a trail leading to an overturned chair. Looking around, she notices the back door standing open, as though someone left in a hurry. Rather than alert anyone, Sam walks onto the balcony into the rain. Using a telescope, she scans the tree line and spots a shadowy figure lurking at the edge of the nearby forest. Unsure if it’s real, she searches for it again, but it’s gone. This isn’t a coincidence. Dr. Aiden mentioned the nearest neighbor is miles away. Sam heads outside to search. As she moves through the darkness, the high-pitched ringing returns, bringing with it another vision.

The next morning, Sam wakes up in her bed. (Now I don’t know if she had a nightmare, since the scene cuts off abruptly, but she apparently did have a nosebleed and a conversation with her friend Val, so nothing suggested she was dreaming. How she got back to bed is a mystery with no explanation.) Sam notices the dark purple bruising on her left hand, which she was told happened during impact, has now spread across a wider area. While making breakfast, an egg slowly lifts from the counter as if there’s no gravity. She reaches out and touches it with her fingers, but the egg continues floating even after she lets go. When Sam is distracted by voices as Dr. Aiden and her team arrive to run tests, the egg suddenly drops and shatters on the kitchen island.

Sam calls her husband Mark and suggests a family beach trip with their daughter once she’s cleared to leave. Mark isn’t enthusiastic, arguing it’s not healthy for Izzy to see them together if that’s not how things will really be. He knows Sam will leave again to pursue her dream in space. It’s already been hard on him and Izzy with Sam gone for six months of training, and she’ll disappear again for the next mission. During the conversation, it’s revealed that Izzy is adopted since Sam can’t have children. Still, Mark says he’ll bring Izzy to visit tomorrow.

Later, Sam steps outside for fresh air and walks into the nearby forest. She notices a wire poking through fallen leaves on the ground. (the wire clearly isn’t buried properly, it just oddly lies under the fallen leaves) Following it, she discovers a hidden camera inside a fake rock, aimed directly at the house. Growing suspicious, she examines the area and uncovers a second wire connected to another camera, also facing the house. Realizing she’s being watched, Sam rushes back toward the house but catches her foot on a tree root and slams her head against a rock, blacking out.

Waking up in her bed, Sam learns that her dad stopped by for a surprise visit. When he couldn’t find her, they swept the property and discovered her unconscious in the forest and brought her back. When Sam confronts him about the security cameras, General Harris admits the property isn’t actually a diplomatic residence like NASA told her. It’s actually a safehouse. He shows her a secret passage hidden behind the bookshelf that leads to a control room beneath the house. He explains the cameras monitor the entire perimeter. In an emergency, the house locks down completely, sealing everything behind three layers of Kevlar and copper paneling.

That night, the house detects a breach and activates full lockdown, plunging everything into darkness. Sam tries calling her dad, but the signal won’t go through. She experiences another episode of high-pitched ringing, but no vision this time. Instead, she hears creature-like growling and objects banging.

Frightened, she doesn’t go to the control room. Instead, she goes to the power switch panel and flips the switches, hoping the lights will come back on. Nothing happens. A door knob begins to turn as if someone is trying to enter, then suddenly stops. Sam opens the door and steps into the hallway to check, but finds nothing there. (Why on earth does she do that? It makes no sense.)

Shortly after, she hears a strange noise from beyond the glass window. Sam aims her flashlight toward the sound, scanning the darkness. She’s startled when a creature’s limb appears and presses against the glass. Panicked, she finally heads to the control room beneath the house and uses the security cameras to search for the creature. She spots it standing outside before it mysteriously vanishes.

Written and directed by American filmmaker Jess Varley, The Astronaut is a sci-fi thriller about a NASA astronaut who survives a crash landing on Earth.

The premise is intriguing, and Kate Mara, Gabriel Luna, and Laurence Fishburne all deliver strong performances. The sound design and cinematography are beautiful, elevating the narrative throughout.

As a science fiction fan, I really wanted this one to work. Unfortunately, the story gets bogged down by unrealistic behavior and illogical decisions that drain the film of its momentum and believability.

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The ASTRONAUT premiered at SXSW on 7 March 2025. The film was theatrically released in the United States on 17 October.