History and Film: Apollo 13

Should have posted this yesterday, but I was traveling. Also, no picture this time.

• Think this one is largely workable. The consensus is that it creates suspense even though you know the outcome.
• Hanks gives some expositional dialogue in the beginning that works because it has a couple of purposes. It gets across the exposition, but it also expresses Lovell’s frustration. Ditto with the tour. Is it a sales pitch? Yes, to the overseers to keep the program going. “If there is an Apollo 14.” There’s your stakes.
• Some of the “isn’t it quaint?” moments stick out, though. Computer that fits in room. “Is she still mad because the Beatles broke up?”
• Some natural advantages. Apollo 13 makes for nice foreboding. (And they keep the bad omens to Marilyn Lovell, which is smart.) The “it actually happened” part of the story works here, particularly when it needs to lend weight the additional crises that come in by the end. In a purely fictional movie, having to land through a storm would just be too much. Knowing that was what actually happened? The tension ratchets that much more.
  Small glitch with the launch (“the clock is running …”) keeps it from being clichéd, even though Howard uses the expected beats. (He also cuts inside, and to Sinise’s POV, which switches it up a little.) The glitch also helps with tension against the facts. (“Looks like we just had our glitch for this mission.”)
• The themes in the movie are grand, but the execution is earthy at points. “How do you go to the bathroom up there?” “Flight surgeon horseshit.” “Eat the ass off a dead rhinocerous.” “Constellation Urine.” “No more waste dumps.” “It hurts when I urinate.” It works. It keeps it from falling for its own bullshit. Getting too lofty.
• There is some highly technical stuff to deal with in this movie. That could have been boring, but it’s not. The actors help in selling some of it. Howard also cuts back to ground – built-in Greek chorus, sells us on danger from reactions. The earthier tone also works in delivering technical dialogue. There’s some rough poetry to learning that the rockets have developed a “Wicked bang and shimmy.”
• Showing the problem as it occurs works. Keeps the audience grounded, even if the astronauts don’t quite know what’s going on yet. Plus, we know it’s coming, so why be coy?
• The cigarettes in Mission Control are a nice way of indicating what a different time this was. As are the low-tech wonders. When the engineers pull out slide rules to double-check Lovell’s math, my reaction was: Slide rules? They did their navigation with slide rules?
• People with common goals but cross-purposes. Good example, as he tries to come up with a power-up procedure, Ken Mattingly talks about needs, his tech talks about what they have. They’re all after the same thing, but that interim conflict keeps tension high.
• The voiceover at the end may be a little too much. I know it comes from the book, and I know it’s making a good point, but it just feels like too many tacked-on voiceovers before it.