Official Synopsis
“Oscar®-winning director Damien Chazelle and star Ryan Gosling reteam for the riveting story behind the first manned mission to the moon, focusing on Neil Armstrong and the decade leading to the historic Apollo 11 flight. A visceral and intimate account told from Armstrong’s perspective, based on the book by James R. Hansen, the film explores the triumphs and the cost—on Armstrong, his family, his colleagues and the nation itself—of one of the most dangerous missions in history.” (https://www.firstman.com/synopsis/)
On July 20th, 1969 Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin were the first humans to set foot on the moon. While this is a part of American history known worldwide, not many people know about the Commander of this mission, Neil Armstrong. First Man aims to correct that common gap in people’s understanding of the events.
With the current headlines about the advancements of NASA, SpaceX, and Blue Origin, understanding the brevity of the decisions those before us made can help us understand what it means for those who will lead the way.
First Man is a film about Neil Armstrong. It is not about the Apollo Missions. The film follows his life from piloting X-15 aircraft, to being hired for the Gemini missions, and finally focusing on his work with the Apollo missions. It portrays his friendship with Ed White, his apprehensions raising his sons, and the strain his work put on his marriage.
In this way, First Man stands aside from other space-biopics I can recall. For example, Apollo XII felt as if it pulled some punches when portraying the astronauts themselves because it was about the mission alone.
Special Features
The Blu-Ray has a variety of short interviews with the cast and crew talking about how the film was made and what they wanted to show with this film:
Shooting for the Moon
Preparing to Launch
Giant Leap in One Small Step
Mission Gone Wrong
Putting you in the Seat
Recreating the Moon Landing
Shooting at NASA
Astronaut Training
Video
The majority of the shots in the film are extreme close-ups. During the scenes in the cockpits it helps to highlight the claustrophobic tension permeating the act of flying a rocket. There are even some POV shots inside the cockpit as well, literally putting the audience in the seat. However, most of the film isn’t in the cockpit. Without the ebb and flow of a variety of shots, the claustrophobic tension isn’t as strong when it needs to be. The constant close-ups almost abstract the actors entirely so that they are objects painted on a canvas of film. It doesn’t allow the actors to act. The first time in the film I felt like I saw Ryan Gosling acting as Neil Armstrong was during his interview for the Gemini missions.
The shots using models of the spacecraft were wonderful. They had the nearly cliche shots from the side of the craft and the dark expanse of nothing filling the rest of the frame. Which is exactly what I want. In one of the extras on the Blu-Ray, they talk about using a large LED screen for the backdrops of these (and the cockpit) shots instead of green screens. This allowed the actors to react to actual visuals and the screen helped to light the scene with appropriate color. This is a fascinating innovation for doing these types of scenes.
Audio
The music and sound was well done. The music for the space scenes focused heavily on harp and theremin to portray the gentle beauty of space and immediately placing the audience aesthetically in the ‘60s era of space influenced music, respectively. During my first watch I was surprised at how little the film portrayed space with complete silence. When the film did cut to silence during the landing scene, however, that was the perfect time and a repetition of silence would have devalued the breathtaking sublime of landing on the moon.
Narrative
Since the film focuses almost solely on Armstrong, the scenes that don’t focus on him are terse and to the point. They show the audience everything they need to and nothing more. This isn’t necessarily a bad thing, but some scenes do anticipate that the audience can come to a conclusion with only a little information.
The exposition isn’t great. Like I mentioned earlier, the first time I felt as if I was seeing Ryan Gosling acting as Neil Armstrong was when he was interviewing for the Gemini missions. This is over 15 minutes into the film and after quite a few important scenes. A lot of the emotional scenes in the beginning have to try much harder because the audience doesn’t fully understand the characters. Even with this in consideration, these scenes can still fall flat.
Conclusion
My dad was 10 years old when the Apollo 11 mission took place. Therefore, during my childhood we would visit the Kennedy Space Center as often as we could. We would always make a point to visit the Apollo Exhibit. For those of you who have never been, the beginning of the Apollo Exhibit starts with an incredibly campy model recreation of the lunar landing accompanied by the actual audio transcript of the lunar landing.
Watching Ryan Gosling, Corey Stoll (Buzz Aldrin), and Lukas Haas (Mike Collins) reenact the lunar landing word-for-word was the most fun I have had watching a movie all year.
Watching these people being launched into space on a tin can strapped to some ordinances is terrifying, even though you know they survive.
My dad and I visited the Kennedy Space Center again this summer. Being there made me feel more patriotic than I had in years. The opportunity and the ability we have as Americans to do great things with other countries is one thing that keeps me looking forward to our future here.
This film didn’t instill me with that. It doesn’t wave flags. It shows you that this was hard. It shows that these individuals were truly risking everything for us to achieve something great.
