story identification - Space film about pilots and navigators

It is a space film set on the relatively near future. Earlier than Star Trek but probably later than firefly. It was made in the 80s, I think it was American.

It was on a space station, the setup is that pilots are 'jocks' and they each have a navigator who is a 'nerd'. The navigators stay in the space station as the pilots fly out ad get the glory.

The only scene I can remember is in a canteen. One of the pilots is poisoned and dies frothing at the mouth. The head pilot is livid and one of the navigators says he poisoned the guy deliberately. As the pilots get ready to cause a riot all of the navigators pull out poison capsules and threaten that if any navigator is bullied by a pilot they will poison a random pilot and kill him.

There is a standoff but the pilots need the navigators and cannot kill them all, whereas the navigators do not need the pilots.

Hence the pilots are unable to retaliate.

Answer

This is Moon 44 (1990) starring Michael Pare.

Several plot summaries can be found here

When all earth's natural resources are gone, huge multinational corporations wage war to defend mineral deposits on various mining planets. Moon 44 is key to one corporation's bid for a very hostile takeover. Convicts pilot helicopters in the planet's nasty atmosphere navigated by computer whiz kids. One of the pilots, Stone, is not a convict, though. Stone is an internal affairs agent sent to catch a traitor that is hijacking mining shuttles. Strong resemblence to "Aliens" production design sports tolerable effects, strange mix of action and teen comedy genres.

Additionally, I was able to find a YouTube montage scene clip which might help you confirm if this looks like what you remember:

Comments

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