First Man - Movie Review

Starring Ryan Gosling, Claire Foy, Jason Clarke, Kyle Chandler, Corey Stoll, Patrick Fugit, Ciaran Hinds, Olivia Hamilton, Shea Whigham, Pablo Schreiber, Lukas Haas and Ethan Embry.
Written by Josh Singer.
Directed by Damien Chazelle.

★★½

The good stuff first. Everything in space is great. This movie makes you feel like you are in that shuttle. That creeky "are you sure this thing will hold up?" shuttle. So half of the movie is good stuff.

The other half is a real drag. Neil Armstrong (Ryan Gosling) was a depressed guy, and here he is making history, but there doesn't seem to be much joy or wonder. Buzz Aldrin (Corey Stoll) is portrayed as a jerk, but at least he's stoked about space travel.

A lot of Neil's tightness is around the death of his young daughter. There's also the issues of accidents that kill some of his friends. Outside pressures ask NASA, "Is space travel really worth the cost?"

I saw it in IMAX, and that's the best way to see it. It has a lot of positive qualities, even if it's low on actual joy.