There was a new movie premiered in Indonesian theaters yesterday which was a biography drama about the first person on the moon. What surprised me though was the limited theaters showing this film as apparently audience were still flocking to see Venom and a lot of the cinemas still having more than 1 studio showing that movie. After going through the list of the theaters, my wife and I decided to see this at Kuningan City that had a 6.20 PM show. OK let's start with the movie now.
Brief Story Line
In 1962, Neil Armstrong (Ryan Gosling - La La Land, Drive etc) was trying to apply for the NASA astronauts program called Gemini in 1962. When he got accepted, Neil together with his wife Janet (Claire Foy - The Crown TV series, Breathe etc) were relieved as they felt they needed a fresh start due to prior tragedy involving their child. Neil was the only two civilian astronauts selected for the program with another one Elliot See (Patrick Fugit - Outcast TV series, Saved! etc). The head chief of Astronauts office was Deke (Kyle Chandler - Game Night, Zero Dark Thirty etc).
During the multiple testings that were mostly dangerous, Neil and the other astronauts that also included Ed White (Jason Clarke - Terminator Genisys, The Man with the Iron Heart etc), Buzz Aldrin (Corey Stoll - Ant-Man, House of Cards TV series etc) and many more had to endure the physical torments of the program, not to mention the complaints by some of the Americans who thought this program was a waste of fund.
With so much at stake, the astronauts program would culminate to the most dangerous mission of going to the moon and being the first men to land on it.
End of Brief Story Line
Just as I expected from a biography drama movie, this film had a lot of dramatic moments. The movie focused heavily on Neil Armstrong's struggle as the head of the family as well as succeeding in the Astronauts program to become the first man on the moon. Which was why the story started from the year 1961 rather than from his childhood years and did not continue to the period after that famous 1969 moon landing. From what I understand, the movie was based on the biography of Neil Armstrong titled First Man: The Life of Neil. A. Armstrong, written by James R. Hansen.
Apart from the dramatic moments, the movie also had the various testing & missions including 1 mission involving Neil Armstrong in outer space. Those scenes were actually done quite amazingly. I could not help but felt the suspense since they were shown from the perspective of the pilots/astronauts inside the very small "aircraft" (even my wife felt the need to hold her seat's hand firmly as though she was the one flying). I truly loved the sound effects and the musical score which I thought were awesome since they felt very emotional (like the piano music playing during the Apollo 11 mission) or sometimes the silence during the outer space mission. Even seeing this in a non Dolby Atmos theater was already a great experience.
The other factor that I felt was done excellently was the special effects & miniature effects which showed a quite realistic outer space scenes and obviously the moon surface. With a duration for more than 2 hours (140 minutes to be exact), I could understand if people may not be patient enough to wait till the ultimate climax scene. However, we really need to realize that this is a biography drama after all, which would mean a slow paced movie plus a lot of dramatic moments. So I was really disturbed by some of the audience in the studio whom I felt ruined the experience by playing their handphones all the time (probably because of boredom which I thought was inappropriate as they should have just left the studio if that's the case).
I think, this movie would not have been a great one without the solid performances from Ryan Gosling and Claire Foy as this couple. I also felt after watching this movie, I knew a lot better about Neil's family and the difficulties & challenges he and his wife had to face prior to that ultimate mission. And that climax part I thought was worth the wait (although there was 1 particular scene that my wife and I noticed was missing, which I found out later was purposely omitted by the director Damien Chazelle and created huge controversy). Btw, Damien was no stranger to strong drama movies since he was the director of multiple awards winner movies such as La La Land and Whiplash.
Since I already knew that this was a drama movie, I was not surprised by the lack of suspenseful or intriguing moments and the very serious theme. There were very few brief fun moments but there were also some powerful stuff but my most favorite part would certainly be those Apollo 11 mission scenes. I thought it was beautifully done. Oh before I forgot, there was no mid or post end credit scene to this movie, in case you are wondering, though I did noticed that the movie was specially formatted for IMAX. So yeah, I believed seeing this in IMAX would have given a much greater experience.
Overall, I had quite an enjoyable moment, watching a serious drama movie which I personally think might be good enough to qualify for awards nominations in coming months. For those looking to see this kind of powerful movie, or interested in seeing the story of Neil Armstrong, or just want to experience one of the most historic moments, then you definitely should give this one a try. But for people who are looking for an adventure or action movie, please stay away from this to avoid being uncomfortable sitting in a theater for > 2 hours and disturbing other audience. The choice is yours.
Mike's movie moments rating: 4 out of 5 stars
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