After yesterday's viewing here's another film related to the current 50th anniversary which I might have let pass me by, but as I'm now within spitting distance of the pre-determined tally after which I start to wind down my cinema-going frequency, thought "Might as well!" just to get there all the sooner.
This film will be of most value to those who know little about the man though I gleaned nothing new of major import, certainly no revelatory facts.
Armstrong's own words are voiced through the warm, agreeable tones of Harrison Ford.
It's an impressive, fairly comprehensive overview of the subject's life from his birth in 1930 up to his death in 2012 - including a fair bit about his pre-astronaut days, then onto his training up to the moon landing and a further section on his post-space years, including his hardships in dealing with fame and the effect on his family. There's considerable contribution from his then wife, Janet, who died shortly before the release of this film. There are also generous contemporary inserts from his two sons.
Although his divorce in 1994 is covered there's strangely no mention of his second marriage to Carol.
Quite a bit of home movie footage is shown of his family when his children were infants - including a daughter who died of a brain tumour at the age of three, something I hadn't known.
If the film's intention was to inform and to fill in what might otherwise have been no more than a sketchy knowledge of the man's life then director David Fairhead has succeeded admirably.
But I think that the less you know then, obviously, the more you'll get out of this film - and you really have to be sufficiently interested in the man in the first place............6.
(IMDb......................7.2 / Rott. Toms.........N/A )
I'm getting the space thing a bit of a bore now which is a shame Raymondo
ReplyDeleteCan't blame you, JayGee. It's really gone into overkill, hasn't it?
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