Space Cowboys

Space Cowboys is a 2000 American space disaster drama film directed and produced by Clint Eastwood. It stars Eastwood, Tommy Lee Jones, Donald Sutherland, and James Garner as four older extest pilots who are sent into space to repair an old Soviet satellite, unaware that it is armed with nuclear missiles.

In the present day, NASA is tasked to prevent a Soviet communications satellite, IKON, from decaying out of orbit and crashing to earth. The design of the satellites electronics are archaic and based on those of Skylab that Frank had developed. Bob, now a project manager at NASA, sends astronaut Sara Holland Marcia Gay Harden to request Franks help. Frank is initially hostile as he still despises Bob, but agrees to put aside his differences to help with the current situation. However, Frank insists that he have the help of his Team Daedalus including Hawk, Tank, and Jerry. Bob agrees to this, though discretely plans to have younger astronauts shadow the four and learn from them as to replace Franks team before launch. When the press learn of Franks team, the Vice President convinces Bob that Franks team must be part of the mission for good publicity. The old and young teams, though initially competitive, soon work together, with the older astronauts showing off skills learned without the aid of a computer. As they train and undergo examinations, Hawk is found to have pancreatic cancer and given only eight months to live, but is still considered flightworthy.The launch is soon scheduled, and the space shuttle Daedalus successfully launches into orbit. They find the satellite but all agree it looks nothing like a communication satellite. They secure the satellite with the shuttles loading arm and begin repairs, but soon find it houses six nuclear missiles, relics from the Cold War and a violation of the Outer Space Treaty. The mission is quickly put under secrecy. Frank discovers that the control system for the satellite originated from Bobs own files and stolen by the KGB, and that the satellites computers will launch the missiles at predetermined targets if the satellite falls out of orbit. NASA and the crew devise a plan to use the payloadassist rockets to push the satellite out of orbit and into deep space. However, as they prepare for this maneuver, one of the y

Source: Wikipedia