Rating: G
Runtime: 1 hour, 33 minutes
Director: Todd Douglas Miller
Quick Impressions:
This is probably the second buzziest documentary of the year so far (after that disturbing Michael Jackson exposé that I’m not sure I can stand to watch). In fact, since Apollo 11 heavily features second man on the moon Buzz Aldrin, it’s also probably the second Buzziest movie of the year period (after Toy Story 4, coming to a theater near you in June).
The point is, it’s very buzzy. I promise. Since Apollo 11 screened at Sundance, every human on the entire earth has been raving about this movie which documents our first trip to the moon fifty years ago and uses never before seen footage (restored and remastered).
Well maybe not everyone on the entire earth has been talking about it…
It probably just seemed that way to my husband and me as we heard about it weeks ago and waited impatiently for a chance to see it for ourselves. Imagine my dismay when this week we had to choose between Apollo 11 and Jordan Peele’s Us (the other film I’ve been dying to see for half my lifetime).
I love the moon, but I also love Lupita Nyong’o (and Jordan Peele impressed me with Get Out). For logistical reasons (and because my husband is not a fan of horror movies), we decided to see Apollo 11 first and Us next week. (To be clear, I’m not a fan of horror movies, either. They give me nightmares–while I’m still awake at the theater. But have you seen Lupita Nyong’o in those trailers? Or even in stills from the film? Both versions of her are so captivating. I’m also intrigued by this emerging fad of horror prestige pictures. Our older children are trying to convince us to take them to Us, too. Meanwhile, I’m trying to convince them that they want to see Dumbo. We’ll see who wins out in the end.)
Honestly, the film our kids should have watched is Apollo 11. Everyone should see this movie. Go see it. Right now. I could end the review here. You know two American astronauts landed on the moon in 1969. (While poor Michael Collins had a slightly more anticlimactic trip.) If you see Apollo 11, you can watch their actual voyage. You can see the Eagle land. You can hear everything they’re saying.
The Good:
Here’s the big surprise of this documentary. Going in, we knew it showed restored footage, some of it never seen before. My husband said, “I wondered how they would present it.” So did I. Would there also be interviews? A narrator? Would we get a look at archive footage but also reexamine significant locations or objects in the present day?
Nope.
There is nothing in this movie but footage from the Apollo 11 mission to the moon in July of 1969. We don’t even get invasive narration. Everything we see and hear was filmed, photographed, or recorded in July of 1969. Everything.
Well, I take that back. The film does feature original music by Matt Morton that I believe was composed present day (though it does sound like it was ripped from a trippy 1970s space adventure).
The score is excellent. At first I wasn’t sure I liked it, but it grows on you. Initially, I couldn’t help but compare it to the eerily lovely strains of Justin Hurwitz’s First Man score (so unjustly and bafflingly snubbed at the Oscars). Hurwitz should have won Best Score last year. The Academy’s failure to nominate him was the most egregious snub since Tom Hanks was ignored for Captain Phillips. It was even worse than the snub of Won’t You Be My Neighbor in documentary feature. (I’ve heard speculation that some documentary film makers looked down on Won’t You Be My Neighbor because it used hardly any original footage. I wonder what that might mean for Apollo 11.)
Hurwitz’s First Man score presents the moon as a mysterious, romantic, elusive figure, twinged with mystery, revealed in majesty. The music in this film gives us an entirely different feeling about the astronauts and their mission. The emphasis here is on the awesomeness of our innovation, the advanced nature of our technology, the space-tactic boldness of the men who pilot rockets. It sounds so…electronic. I don’t have the education to describe music in the proper terms. Just imagine the Stranger Things theme, but tweaked a little for a cool 1969 show about space adventures. That’s what this music sounds like.
The entire time I watched Apollo 11, the ghost of Damien Chazelle’s First Man haunted my thoughts. My husband and I were so stunned by the ugly (and borderline ridiculous) smear campaign against that film. (I’m positive some rival studio like Warner Brothers or Netflix started that viral flag controversy to hurt the movie’s Oscar chances. “Who else would benefit from a smear campaign like that?” I said to my husband. “Russian bloggers,” he suggested, “to draw attention away from an American achievement?” I still think such a focused (and baseless) attack must have been the work of somebody who wanted a different film to win Oscars. (Unless the upcoming work of Justin Timberlake, Britney Spears, and Christina Aguilara is similarly sabotaged. Then we know somebody’s out to get former members of the 90s era revival of The Mickey Mouse Club.)
By the way, First Man does show the American flag planted on the moon (though it does skip over the actual moment of planting). Plus there are a number of American flags featured in the film and heavy emphasis on the Americans’ determination to win the space race with Russia, and the frustration felt when the Russians appear to be ahead. The only person I see who has a legitimate bone to pick with Chazelle’s movie is Buzz Aldrin, whom First Man does depict as a bit of a jerk. I’ve always liked Aldrin because he sportingly agreed to say that amusing, “Second comes right after first,” line on The Simpsons. And also because he walked on the moon. That’s pretty cool. I don’t know him personally, though.)
In some ways, the footage shown in Apollo 11 repudiates attacks on Chazelle’s film since we see the astronauts and various NASA representatives emphasize the global nature of the achievement that the entire earth (except probably the Russian cosmonauts) can celebrate.
But I will admit that tonally, this movie is very different from Chazelle’s. First Man has the spooky, brooding quality of a project made by people with fifty years to reflect on the meaning of walking on the moon. Apollo 11 feels much more immediate. Everyone is excited. The mood is tense, then triumphant. When the astronauts leave, everyone expects success. When they succeed, everyone rejoices. Nobody is staring wistfully out into space brooding. Nobody is tossing sentimental, personal objects into craters. (At least not that we see.) The vibe is very much, “Yes! We conquered space!”
This isn’t about the moon. This is about the greatest nation on earth reaching the moon through group technological breakthroughs and individual courage. At one point, a stirring period song plays. It might as well be the “America” song from Team America: World Police.
Apollo 11 does a brilliant job of recapturing what the people involved in the Apollo 11 mission felt in the moment. Actually, “recapturing” is the wrong word. The cameras are, in fact, capturing what is really going on as it happens. And then the documentary filmmakers are restoring and combining this footage and audio, presenting it to us in a coherent order, so these primary sources can lead us through the highlights of the event.
Honestly the results are stunning. It does feel like stepping back into history. (I kept thinking of Disneyland while watching since so many Disney rides try to simulate moments in the past this way.) The footage is priceless. I would be content just to watch the scenes of the crowd of spectators milling around near the launch site. I love watching the past come alive this way. (On the first season of the Netflix revival of MST3K, there’s this film called Carnival Magic. As I watched it, I thought, “Who cares about the ridiculous plot! This movie is a treasure because of all its captivating footage of people wandering around carnival grounds in 1981.” I got similar tingles of excitement while watching these strangers from 1969.)
I did experience a few huge shocks while watching. One came when I saw a man dressed exactly like my late Grandpa. (“I guess his ensembles were fashionable–twenty years before I saw him wearing them,” I marveled. Polyester lasts forever!)
Then my husband and I both turned to each other at the same moment to exclaim, “It’s Kevin Costner!” One guy looks exactly like Kevin Costner. I didn’t catch his name, but he was standing near Jim Lovell. We racked our brains on the way home trying to remember which NASA movie stars Kevin Costner.
“He’s not in Apollo 13 is he?” asked my husband.
“No,” I said, wondering, “Is he in The Right Stuff?“
He’s not.
But from the looks of things, he’s in Apollo 11. I mean, he literally looks exactly like this guy at NASA. Somebody needs to get Kevin Costner on the phone, ASAP. Attention casting directors, if you are making a film about 1960s NASA anytime soon, please give Kevin Costner a call. You will not regret it.
Another huge surprise came when we realized that a certain notorious scandal occurs during the Apollo 11 mission as the astronauts are on their way to the moon. I won’t spoil it by telling you which one. Try to guess. (For those of you jumping the gun, it’s not Watergate. That’s not until 1972. But it does involve a prominent, household-name-type American politician.) Both my husband and I felt incredibly stupid for not realizing these events overlapped. (We should have watched the movie that came out last year. Then we would have known. But we can’t see everything!)
I wish so much that footage like this existed of every major moment in history. Wouldn’t it be amazing to say, “I wish I could experience the cacophony and confusion of the Battle of New Orleans real time. Roll the tape!” (Well, I guess you would say, “Roll the film!” “Roll the tape” would be more appropriate for re-living the Gettysburg address or some other audio-driven moment.) But who wouldn’t love to have a private screening room where you could experience any moment of recorded history any time you wanted?
Now granted, this film doesn’t give you the interiority of the astronauts. It was made for scientific purposes (and some of it for broadcast). This is the official story of what happened. It isn’t the personal story about how the people involved actually felt about what was happening. Still, it’s a historical artifact, and film restoration has made it feel so present, so immediate. That’s really cool.
As I watched, I could not stop wondering how Todd Douglas Miller got permission to make this film. I mean, it’s fifty years after the Eagle landed. Clearly someone was going to make this movie. Did NASA and the National Archives choose Miller? Did he pitch the idea to them? Did a bunch of different people approach NASA? How did this work?
For nerdy reasons, I’d also love to learn more about the cameras that captured this footage back in 1969.
If you know a flat-Earther or moon landing denier, be sure to refer them to this film. I feel like there’s quite an abundance of evidence that these events took place. I’ve seen films with special effects from 1969. None of them looks as real as this.
Best Scene:
The most amazing part of the movie comes when the Eagle rejoins Columbia. I have never seen anything so spellbinding. Surely somebody like Alfonso Cuarón would die to get such a gorgeous, captivating, inventive shot, and this is real!
At first I was disoriented. I thought, “Is there some kind of dust on the lens? Wait. It’s getting bigger.”
I’m telling you, it’s just amazing.
I can only conclude that Hollywood needs to begin actually filming movies in space. If astronauts and machines fitted with cameras could capture images like these, imagine what highly trained, experienced, award winning cinematographers could achieve in space.
When you consider the staggering special effects budgets of some films, it might even be cheaper actually to film them in space. Then if the film is over budget, and the director is creating a bunch of drama, just jettison him.
Best Scene Visually:
The scene I’ve just described is also the best visually, and the best action sequence. But I also love the brief glimpse of re-entry just before everything goes dark.
Best Action Sequence:
This is more like a montage of various actions than a true action sequence, but I love the way Apollo 11 incorporates a song from the period. We see (and with difficulty hear) Buzz Aldrin inside the spacecraft listening to a song on a floating tape recorder on the trip home. Then we get to hear the song full blast for ourselves, as a backdrop to the events unfolding onscreen.
“What is this song?” I wondered. “It sounds like Johnny Cash covering Bob Dylan!” (It’s actually “Mother Country” by John Stewart.) Much like the film’s electro-tastic score, the song presents the astronauts as a bunch of awesome heroes. It gives us great insight into how Buzz Aldrin conceived of his mission.
(And they are heroes, by the way. I’m not saying they aren’t. I could never complete an astronaut’s training. Plus venturing into space is scary and difficult. Landing on the moon in 1969 was an enormous achievement.)
The Negatives:
Until they get to the moon, they’re just waiting to get to the moon. We see shots of the control rooms in Florida and Houston, shots of crowds, shots of the rocket, shots of machinery. We hear voices narrating what’s happening as its going on. Some, like me, will be hooked by this unique premise and presentation style. Others may find this type of immersive film making boring, particularly before the launch.
That’s the major weakness of the film. As I watched, I thought, “My parents should see this. My children should see this. Everyone should see this.” Then I worried to myself, “But would they watch it?” You have to watch. You have to pay attention. I keep calling to mind my mother’s strong aversion to Roma which she found extremely boring and even “pointless.” This truly is a slice of life. There’s one “story.” They’re going to the moon. No one is telling us the story. We’re just experiencing it as it happens. If you do not sit and actively watch this movie, you will not know what is going on.
Some audience members will find the early scenes so boring they may not make it to the moon landing.
Overall:
Getting to see actual footage of the moon’s surface as the Eagle lands is certainly stimulating. My husband and I were discussing this after the film last night. Then we walked out of the theater to be met with what seemed like a close-up of the moon right in our faces. That Super Worm Equinox Moon was stunning. The film
Apollo 11 contains many such astonishing views of the moon, but it also gives us something we’ll never see in the parking lot of a movie theater in Texas, a similar view of the Earth. If you’re interested in seeing what happened on the
Apollo 11 mission, then see this film because that’s exactly what it will show you, no more, no less.
