The great gift of The Last Man on the Moon is that it collects a lot of the footage Cernan and his team got during the Apollo 17 mission.
History, science, and / or military buffs. We weren’t very good fathers, either.” Photo courtesy of NASA As Apollo 12 pilot Alan Bean puts it in The Last Man on the Moon: “We were not very good husbands. The astronauts worked late, and even around the house, the stress of their jobs distracted them from their families. It wasn’t just a fear of death that kept these women awake at night, either.
Cernan and Armstrong had a lot in common: arriving at NASA as the public’s interest in space travel was starting to wane, piloting multiple missions that had near-catastrophic errors, approaching their jobs with intellectual rigor, and carrying their affection for their daughters with them to the Moon.īoth movies also honor the sacrifices made by the astronauts’ wives, who had to deal with a lot of the same public relations grind as their husbands, while also raising kids, keeping immaculate houses in case TV reporters happened to drop by, and worrying every day that their men might not come home. It’s an exercise in empathy, too, with Gosling’s quietly moody performance and Claire Foy’s more dynamic take on Armstrong’s wife Janet working together to make NASA’s strange, demanding culture more down-to-earth and relatable.Īnd yet while The Last Man on the Moon is more hushed and elegiac, the story it tells is remarkably similar to First Man’s. The structure is episodic, focusing heavily - and with nerve-jangling intensity - on those moments when equipment malfunctions and momentary miscalculations put people’s lives at risk.įirst Man is a “you are there” kind of experience, putting audiences inside the tight confines of a space capsule as it rockets to the stars. The film begins a little before Armstrong’s application to become an astronaut, and ends a little after he returns from the Moon.
Ryan Gosling plays Armstrong as an emotionally reserved, doggedly analytical pilot and scientist who joins NASA before the Gemini program and pushes himself hard, in part as a way of coping with his grief over the death of his young daughter.
Oscar-winning La La Land director Damien Chazelle and Oscar-winning Spotlight co-writer Josh Singer take an intimate, impressionistic approach to the story of Neil Armstrong, the commander of Apollo 11 - NASA’s first time sending astronauts up to the surface of the Moon. The film is threaded with reflective interviews, and framed by scenes of the retiree’s daily life, as a member of one of the most exclusive clubs: the dozen people who’ve walked on the Moon.īecause First Man opens in theaters everywhere this weekend. Drawing on home movies and vast archives of NASA footage, Craig tells a fairly complete story of Cernan’s life in the space program, detailing his earlier missions (including the problem-plagued Gemini 9A) and the stress the astronaut lifestyle put on his family. The Last Man on the Moon, Mark Craig’s documentary about Gene Cernan, the commander of the Apollo 17 mission - which as of right now marks the final time America’s National Aeronautics and Space Administration sent astronauts to the lunar surface. Each Friday, The Verge ’s Cut the Crap column simplifies the choice by sorting through the overwhelming multitude of movies and TV shows on subscription services, and recommending a single perfect thing to watch this weekend. There are so many streaming options available these days, and so many conflicting recommendations, that it’s hard to see through all the crap you could be watching.