Russia's State Cinema Committee chief has been summoned before the Duma to explain why he allowed the distribution of the American action film Armageddon.

Some members of Russia's lower house of Parliament, the Duma, think Armageddon "mocks the achievements of Soviet and Russian technology," but its distributors are claiming a huge success with Russian audiences.

The film depicts how an American super-hero, played by Bruce Willis, saves the planet from destruction - with a little help from his friends, including Russians.

But one scene depicts a dilapidated Russian space station manned by incompetent cosmonauts which disintegrates because of a leaky pipe.

This has sent nationalist MPs in the Duma, led by the chairman of its Geopolitical Committee Alexei Mitrofanov, on the warpath.

"For five years the Americans have used our Mir space station and now they send us this insult," he is quoted as telling a Reuters correspondent.

Mr Mitrofanov is the foreign affairs spokesman of Vladimir Zhirinovsky's ultra-nationalist Liberal Democratic Party.

He is associated with strongly anti-western positions and consistently argues against any Russian co-operation with the West.

Among Mr Mitrofanov's favourite ideas is the need to block anglo-saxon domination of the world by the creation of two Russian-led alliances - one Germany and Japan, the second with India and China.

Some of his views are a bit extreme even for most Duma members.

But there is some sensitivity about the way Russia is portrayed in certain western films, and the Duma has voted to summon Armen Medvedev, head of the State Cinema Committee to explain himself.

The film's distributors, however, argue it's been a box office hit with Russian audiences.