FILM 1919: FIRST MAN

FILM 1919: FIRST MAN

TRIVIA: Neil Armstrong's sons Mark and Eric say First Man is the most accurate portrayals of their father and mother Janet.

Some of the voices heard in the film are actual recordings from the space program. For example, when Apollo 11 lands on the moon, the reply from Houston is the original. It's the voice of astronaut Charles Duke, who had the job of communicating with Apollo 11 during the landing. Neil Armstrong (Ryan Gosling) says "Houston, Tranquility Base here, the Eagle Has Landed", then Charlie Duke says "Roger, Tranquility, we copy you on the ground. You've got a bunch of guys about to turn blue. We're breathing again. Thanks a lot."

Actor Ryan Gosling first discovered Armstrong's love of the theremin during his background research with Armstrong's family and friends. He brought it to Damien Chazelle and Justin Hurwitz's attention, who later chose to include the strange instrument in the score.

Ryan Gosling suffered an injury while filming one of the many shuttle sequences. His partner Eva Mendes told him to go to the hospital after noticing the bizarre behavior of his passionately ranting to her about national doughnut thieves. It was later discovered he had suffered a concussion and Mendes had unknowingly saved his life.

Damien Chazelle was particularly attached to making his film as authentic as possible. This care for detail was maintained, until it came to the reproduction of the space capsules. He and chief designer Nathan Crowley agreed that no ship would be enlarged by more than 10%, even if it sacrificed the comfort of the actors. This also caused complications for framing. The solution was to create a decor that fit in several detachable parts. In fact, the technicians had to break the seats in two to be able to integrate the cameras with the capsule.

Armstrong's famous quote as he stepped on the moon is the subject of historical controversy. The movie quotes accurately what was heard on Earth and in all recordings: "That's one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind." Armstrong later revealed that he intended to say "... one small step for [A] man ..." and that he thought he did, but all efforts to extract this from the recording, even with electronics, have been inconclusive.

Pablo Schreiber plays Jim Lovell, another pilot of the Gemini program and Apollo programs, a character that audiences have already met in Apollo 13 (1995) as played by Tom Hanks.

American flag controversy: On August 31, 2018, it was reported that the film would not include a scene of Armstrong and Aldrin planting the American flag on the Moon. Florida Senator Marco Rubio described the omission as "total lunacy". Chazelle responded with a statement, saying: "I show the American flag standing on the lunar surface, but the flag being physically planted into the surface is one of several moments (...) that I chose not to focus upon. To address the question of whether this was a political statement, the answer is no. My goal with this movie was to share with audiences the unseen, unknown aspects of America's mission to the Moon." Following the film's below-expectations opening of $16 million, some analysts speculated that the flag controversy was in part to blame. 

Jon Bernthal was cast but dropped out due to scheduling conflicts. He was replaced by Christopher Abbott.

FILM 1880: APOLLO 13

FILM 1880: APOLLO 13

TRIVIA: In a commentary track, Marilyn Lovell comments that Tom Hanks exactly portrays Jim Lovell's mannerisms and style of movement.

The famous understatement was actually made twice by two astronauts. Jack Swigertsaid, "OK Houston, we've had a problem here." Mission Control said, "This is Houston. Say again, please." Then Jim Lovell said, "Ahh, Houston, we've had a problem." On the recording, Swigert is garbled at the beginning, while Lovell is clear, so the recording of Lovell is often heard, leading to the impression he said it, even though Swigert said it first. It's commonly misquoted as, "Houston, we've got a problem," or "Houston, we have a problem." Because "we've had" implies the problem has passed, Ron Howard chose to use "we have".

Jim Lovell wore his old Navy Captain's uniform in the scene where he greets the astronauts aboard the U.S.S. Iwo Jima. When Ron Howard asked Lovell if he'd like to be in the film as the ship's Admiral, Lovell agreed, but pointed out, "I retired as a Captain; a Captain I will be."

In some scenes where the Earth can be seen from the windows of Apollo 13, it is one of the photos taken by Jim Lovell and Bill Anders on the Apollo 8 mission.

Marilyn Lovell really did lose her ring down the drain, but eventually found it again.

Ron Howard's favorite of his own films.

John Cusack and Charlie Sheen were originally offered the role of Fred Haise (played by Bill Paxton), but turned it down.

The Mission Control set was nearly a carbon copy of the original one in Houston. The production crew originally wanted to film in the original Mission Control room in Houston, which is now a historic landmark. However, the original room was found to be too small to be used for a film production. The production crew took precise measurements of every part of the room and replicated it on a Hollywood set. One of the real Apollo 13 flight controllers, Jerry Bostick, left the Mission Control set one day looking for the elevator, convinced that it was the real thing (the original Mission Control is on the third floor of the building).

Many of the actors in Mission Control were being fed lines directly from technical advisers on set.

CAMEO:Jean Speegle Howard: Ron Howard's mother plays Blanche Lovell.

FILM 1646: HIDDEN FIGURES

TRIVIA: While John Glenn did specifically request that Katherine Johnson review all of the numbers for the Friendship 7 mission before he would agree to go through with it, he did so weeks before the mission actually took place, not when the countdown to launch was nearing at Cape Canaveral.

When Taraji P. Henson signed on for the lead role, she met with the real-life Katherine Johnson, who was 98 years old, to discuss the character she was about to portray. Henson learned that Johnson had graduated from high school at age 14 and from college at age 18, and was still as lucid as anyone years younger. After the film was screened for Johnson, she expressed her genuine approval of Henson's portrayal, but wondered why anybody would want to make a film about her life.

The issue with the bathrooms was not something Katherine Johnson personally experienced. It was actually encountered by Mary Jackson instead. In fact, it was this incident, as a result of Jackson ranting to a colleague, which got her moved to the wind tunnel team. Johnson was initially unaware that the East Side bathrooms were even segregated, and used the unlabeled "whites-only" bathrooms for years before anyone complained. When she simply ignored the complaint, the issue was dropped completely.

One of the ways that Katherine experiences workplace discrimination is when her coworkers require her to use a separate coffee pot. Whenever the office's coffee area is shown, the brand of coffee that they use, Chock Full o'Nuts, is also visible. The use of this brand in the context of segregation is historically relevant. In 1957, Chock Full o'Nuts was one of the first major New York corporations to hire a black executive as a corporate vice-president. The man they hired, retired baseball legend Jackie Robinson, had made history by being the first person to break the color barrier in professional baseball.

On the day that the scene was filmed in which Paul Stafford is speaking to the NASA engineers in the Space Task Group office about needing to develop the math for re-entry, there was an extra face in the crowd. Mark Armstrong, son of Apollo 11 astronaut Neil Armstrong, had been invited by actor Ken Strunk to make a cameo appearance in the scene, and joined the other actors who were playing the NASA engineers.

Several of the control console props in the Mercury Mission Control set were originally built for the Mission Control Room set for Apollo 13 (1995). They were modified for use in the later films, including The Hunger Games: Mockingjay - Part 1 (2014) and The Hunger Games: Mockingjay - Part 2 (2015).

This marks the second time Taraji P. Henson and Mahershala Ali have played love interests. The first was The Curious Case of Benjamin Button (2008).

Producer Pharrell Williams also oversaw all musical elements, and the soundtrack.