Dawn and The Husband will be spending the next few days attending the Toronto International Film Festival, known to the locals as TIFF. No longer rookies, they still have selected a modest number of films (5) because Rosh Hashanah is putting a crimp into their movie-viewing schedule this year. TIFF still serves as a tremendous distraction from the world's ills, the impending High Holidays, and asshole would-be dictators whose names rhyme with Dump and Thug. The next several posts will focus on TIFF and offer very quick bullet point reviews for the movies seen.
I admit, I just love this festival. I am still such a neophyte in so many ways and we still only have time this year for five films (I wish it were more) but there is something invigorating about seeing movies in the dark on the widescreen with an intelligent audience. There is no rustling of food containers, no cell phones ringing, almost no talking, (I'm excluding the rude industry assholes chatting amongst themselves) and few, if any, people leaving for reasons unknown. Even if the movie is a singular piece of shit, most of the crowd sits in their seats until the credits roll. Unless of course, you happen to attend a morning screening where the audience is filled to capacity with retired teachers (yup!) and most of them suffer from a middle-aged bladder. Such was our lot at this morning's screening of the new Damien Chazelle (La La Land, Whiplash) movie First Man.
Technically a biopic about cosmic explorer Neil Armstrong and his journey to the moon, First Man is really more of a character study and interpersonal coming of age about the first human to set foot on a different celestial body. It is actually quite amazing and a feat of real talent that Chazelle is able to create a sense of drama and wonder about a story every schoolchild knows the ending to. Unlike its many space story predecessors, First Man reminds of the inherent dangers of space travel and the fear and trauma that so many at NASA faced then and still do today. We who have lived in a time when space travel has always existed and become commonplace, tend to forget that these men, and by extension their families, were true explorers. The scene when Armstrong is actually setting his foot down on the lunar surface is so tortured and drawn out so as to remind all that nobody knew what to expect up there. There are several prolonged scenes inside aircraft, capsules, and lunar modules that were filmed with handheld cameras at eye level and jerk viciously enough to cause this theatre patron massive bouts of motion sickness. Listening to the creak of the ancient metal capsules or seeing the "balsa wood toys that these men played with" drives the dangers faced by Armstrong and his colleagues directly home to the audience. The film is a master-class in sound editing, film editing, and music scoring and all of that is directly attributable to its director.
The cast is pretty fantastic as well. Ryan Gosling impeccably captures Armstrong's well-earned sense of tortured focus and Claire Foy is definite Oscar bait as his suffering wife, Janet. Their relationship, which withstood much, was one of mutual respect but also with a prescient understanding that their marriage wouldn't last the long haul post-NASA. Gosling gives real depth to this quiet and sometimes tortured man and seems intent on portraying him as a man who just did his job. Gosling plays Armstrong with such an even keel that when his emotions do finally break through, it is such a relief for the audience.
I was 6 1/2 when Apollo 11 landed on the moon. I have distinct memories of my parents waking my brother and me up so that we could witness world history in real time. I remember the parades and the Life magazine covers and my parents keeping the newspapers from those days. Rarely, does the world unite together for such a singular experience. I can't imagine what it must have been like for Neil Armstrong and his family before, during, or after that event but First Man certainly does try to put it into perspective. Dawn and The Husband's recommendation for this film: Two enthusiastic Yups!
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| The director and cast of First Man |
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