Danielle Solzman
Premiering at Sundance earlier this year, Love, Antosha serves as a beautiful and moving tribute to the late Star Trek star, Anton Yelchin.
It’s hard not to feel heartbreak in viewing this film especially during the closing minutes. One cannot help but feel sadness for his family and friends. Here is an actor who was taken away from us when he was only 27 years old as a result of a freak accident.
Anton Yelchin was more than just an actor. He was also a musician and the film’s soundtrack is full of his many original compositions. Through the many interviews with family, friends, and co-workers, we get a full portrait of who he was. If it hadn’t been for his father’s foresight, we could hav potentially been robbed of his acting talents altogether. This is because of the anti-Semitism that was taking place in Russia during the late 1980s. Victor Yelchin knew that as soon as Anton was born, the family needed to move to the United States. Unfortunately, they had to sell many of their possessions because jewelry was considered to be state property. This isn’t right but it is what it is. Six months after giving birth to Anton, Victor and Irina Yelchin would relocate to the United States.
Anton would later start his acting career when he was nine years old. Delivering Milo would be one of his first feature films in 2001. What’s fascinating about this movie is that John Cho is one of his co-stars nearly a decade before the duo would join the Star Trek reboot. An interview with the legendary Leonard Maltin during the Charlie Bartlett press tour segues into the many memories from Yelchin’s Star Trek colleagues. Both Yelchin and Chris Pine play guitar so the two could be found jamming together on set.
This is a well-made documentary and it’s very easy to get emotional. The closing minutes are when it hurts you the most and know that he’s never coming back. In interviews, Irina tells us that Victor suggested that they should pretend he’s gone away on a very, very long film shoot. What makes this so hard in particular is that he would still be calling a million tomes while shooting on location.
The film especially benefits from the amount of material that Victor and Irina already archived. Garret Price just happened to be the filmmaker to come calling. Many of Anton’s writings get read by Nicholas Cage. Yelchin co-starred with Cage in The Dying of the Light.
Love, Antosha is a beautiful way to celebrate the life of the late actor.
DIRECTOR: Garret Price
FEATURING: Irina Yelchin, Viktor Yelchin, Paul David, Mary Lester, Dr. Parush Rao M.D., John Cho, Richard Wicklund, Ryan Dean, Avy Kaufman, Frank Langella, Kristen Stewart, Ben Foster, Ian Cripps, Luke Shaft, Jon Poll, Marlon Clark, Nick Jones, J.J. Abrams, Simon Pegg, Zoe Saldana, Chris Pine, Zachary Quinto, Dave Glowacki, Bryce Dallas Howard, Jodie Foster, Jennifer Lawrence, Gena Tuso, Sophie Simpson, Drake Doremus, Craig Gillespie, Willem Dafoe, Martin Landau, Joe Dante, Jon Voight, Sofia Boutella, Mark Palansky, Anya Taylor-Joy
