The Right Stuff

Rating:
Summary: THE BEST MOVIE EVER!
Review: I love this movie so much... it is so patriotic! I am also a big history buff, so this movie caters to me particurly well. Casting is awesome... and acting is great!
GET THIS MOVIE... IT ROCKS!
-WHIT-
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Rating:
Summary: The Right Stuff-The Right Choice
Review: The Right Stuff combines the factual account of the beginning of the space race with wit and humour.Never ceasing to amaze me throughout its 2hour plus duration with fine acting,sharp oneliners,fast moving and interesting storyline and excellent special effects.The film lies in that murky area between movie and documentary.
All the characters are believable, the script sharp and most of all the story is interesting.
It puts Apollo 13 and other films of the same genre to shame.Recommended for all the family, but especially for those with a burning nostalgia for the paranoid world of the cold war.
Thankfully this films spares us from a jingoistic undercurrent.

Rating:
Summary: A great American film
Review: This is one of my favorite films about the American spirit. Kaufman and his cast accurately capture the feelings of an era with a wonderful balancing act of satire and reverence. An epic that's well worth watching. It's a triumph of filmmaking, from Kaufman's smart direction, a wonderful ensemble, the music, and almost ethereal special effects. I always tell friends from foreign lands that if they want to know something about America, they must watch "The Right Stuff."

Rating:
Summary: The Great Right Stuff
Review: The Right Stuff is a great American film that is based on Tom Wolfe's novel that chronicles the time that starts with America chasing records (breaking the Sound Barrier) to going into space (Mercury program) and it's a fine engagement on both levels.

The first part shows Chuck Yeager(Sam Shepard) challenging the Sound Barrier. Many test pilots died as a result of trying to reach the speed. Chuck doesn't and breaks the Sound Barrier. Then the pilots begin a speed chase, but all of this is dashed as America becomes more interested in Space. After Russia launches Sputnik, America realized it needs to get a Space Program. America then go looking for the best of the best, and get some fine pilots: Alan Shepard, John Glenn, "Gordo" Cooper, Gus Grissom, and Scott Crossfield. The movie is great in every aspect: the acting here is high caliber (except for the LBJ guy who goes over the top with his portrayal), the conversion from book form to movie is great, the directing has control, and the production is epic. It's a long movie, but it's well worth the time you put into it.

One problem is the DVD is a first generation disc so it lacks special features and it has to be turned over and the sound isn't as good as the DVDs they release now. It's still worth the buy though.

Rating:
Summary: one of the greatest movies about space travel ever.
Review: a beautiful movie, one of my all time favorites. i realy cant say too much about this without repeating what everyone else has said about it. the only downside to the dvd is (and its not a big one) it would have been great to see some extra features. like a making of and some trailers.

Rating:
Summary: Memorable movie and good DVD
Review: Philip Kaufman brilliantly wrote and directed this movie from a Tom Wolfe's book: the director offers in a rare mix history, drama, comedy and satire. It works!!
Many great performances.
Great music by Bill Conti and breathtaking cinematography by Caleb Deschanel.
This DVD edition is a good one: the anamorphic video track is clear and clean, but the real surprise is the DD audio track, your home theater will be put to the test!!

Rating:
Summary: The Right Stuff: Indeed!
Review: The Right Stuff is very long, at over three hours. Nevertheless, it earns its length. Viewers can question as to whether the depiction of the astronauts and test pilots is accurate or not. But they will most certainly agree that this a great movie.

I was amazed in this movie by the surprising attention to period details. Sets representing those of the era were built and period vehicles and uniforms were also found. But, with me being a big aviation fan, I was most impressed by the attention given to locating or replicating aircraft. An actual B-29 Bomber was utilized as the mothership of a replica X-1 aircraft. Various scenes feature '50's or 60's vintage fighters.

But the main highlight is in the acting. Almost all the main performances were done by newcomers or character actors. Sam Shepard received an Oscar nomination for his portrayal of test pilot Chick Yeager. Yeager is different in many respects from the Mercury Astronauts that went into space (Portrayed by the likes of Dennis Quaid, Scott Glenn and Ed Harris). Yeager is not a team player. He does important things, but only because it's his job. He also takes risks that the Mercury Seven wouldn't. For example, the evening before his X-1 flight, he cracks some ribs, yet still flies. The Mercury Seven do come close to danger (John Glenn's reentry for example), but the closest they came to physical injury was when Alan Shepard urinated in his suit (Though that scene is also very hilarious).

There is also another difference between the test pilots and the mercury astronauts. When Yeager broke the sound barrier, the matter was kept secret. When the Mercury Seven began flying into space, the event was nationally televised and recorded. The astronauts use the media to their advantage. They know that they can get the politicians to agree with them or can get support from the public with the quote "No Bucks, no Buck Rogers".

The film also stirs up controversy about a well-known mishap in the space program. After landing back to earth, the hatch on Gus Grissom's capsule blew off in the water, causing the craft to sink before it could be hoisted by helicopter. In the film, it is seen that Grissom panicked and activated the release lever. Grissom himself denied this happened, but many people disagree with him. The film's depiction will certainly add to the debate.

The DVD presents the film well, by my judgment, except for having to turn the disc over to watch part two. It's the extras where this disc disappoints, there being a trailer and some production notes (With a few film images). A movie this good demands a Special Edition.

Rating:
Summary: Right on Target
Review: This is the excellent film version of Tom Wolfe’s epic story of the dawn of the space age. While the book mixed an expansive history with perfect period flavor (postwar red scare, the space race, the burgeoning new military-industrial complex and the catch-phrases of astronauts, scientists and politicians) the film didn’t have the luxury of matching every detail and still coming in under three hours. (Wolfe confessed that he wanted to go as far as the lunar missions but thought the book would be far too large). If it misses many details, Phillip Kaufman’s film excels for covering a wide topic with a surprisingly tight narrative. Eschewing the Gemini program and the X-15 entirely, and giving little more attention to the flight test program at Edward’s AFB than the X-1 and X-1A, Kaufman opens with Yeager’s record breaking flight and closes with the last Mercury flight. Prior to Yeager’s flight, flight test was a civilian affair and (as Yeager describes in his book) an unproductive one. Flight test is a brutal business – statistically, you’re already dead the minute you drive past the gate for Edward’s AFB – but the pilots face the danger with aplomb, each convinced that he will make the record breaking historic flight. Once Yeager has flown both the X-1 and the X-1A (respectively breaking mach-1 and setting a speed record for straight wing aircraft), the Soviets touch off the space race by launching the first satellite (1957) and the first manned spacecraft (1961). The government selects NASA, a civilian agency, to lead the space race, but directs it to select military test pilots as potential astronauts. From the first Mercury flights (suborbitals meant as dress rehearsals for the orbital flights the Russians achieved on their first try) until the end of the program, Kaufman directs with a wry if sometimes dark humor. Jeff Golblume's hurried entrance into a White House meeting with breaking news is comedic and, when repeated later on, inspires terror. (The second entrance bears news of a new Russian spaceshot, one that will force the Americans to gamble John Glenn's life on the unproven Atlas missile).

Though cutting it shorter than Wolfe, Kaufman’s choice of ending with the final Mercury mission works – the last solo space flight by an American, it ended the days of the lone astronaut. Kaufman works deftly with details – Werner Von Braun is never mentioned by name, but he speaks with a stereotypically german mixture of self-tyranny and ego cluing the more knowing into his identity; Chuck Yeager is utterly fearless, except for a terror of losing his wife; Gus Grissom struts with a wounded dignity after a mysterious accident ruins an otherwise uneventful flight, marking him for failure and hinting at the tragedy of Appollo One; Ed Harris breathes sincerity into John Glenn'’ sense of patriotism and heroism, qualities nobody were supposed to believe in when the book came out – and it all works. Kaufman firmly mythologizes some details – notably the Soviets’ mysterious “Chief Designer”. In the film, and still unnamed, he looks like a cross between Marty Feldman and Max Schrek, and gazes into the wake of a rising missile with a mad scientist’s grin. (After the film, and longer after his death, the “Chief” was revealed to be Sergei Korolev; an official picture gives the scientist a visage looking far too benign in comparison to the fear and loathing he inspired here). Being light on history didn’t keep Kaufman from going into areas that a purely historical film would have avoided – like having Glenn’s wife keep LBJ at bay, mirroring the discontent of the older test pilots who remain footnotes in history next to the astronauts despite their contributions and risks, or depicting the astronaut’s debates over the squeeky clean and unbelievable images they must uphold as public figures or the embarrassing and painful tests they were forced to undergo to become astronauts. Much of the Soviet’s menace as a space power proved vastly overstated, but the movie gets it right by showing the perspective of the Americans at the dawn of a new age. An excellent film.

Rating:
Summary: Superficial Propaganda
Review: Space development is one of my favorite themes. And I knew this movie had high reputations. So I expected much when I bought a copy.
But I was really disappointed.
Are Americans the only people who have "the right stuff"? Ofcourse NOT. Russians would have had the same human dramas in space development. And people in other countries have. Why can't hollywood show any respect to other countries? It's really disgusting.

Anyway, this film is a product of the Cold War.

Rating:
Summary: The Right Stuff Indeed
Review: I've grown up in the times of Ron Howard and Steven Speilberg.

Imagine my surprise when I realised how much more I enjoy Philip Kaufman's directorial style. Both Ron and Steven tend to make even the roughest of men sappy, the strongest of women wimpy, and the hardest story a love story. And that's all find and dandy, but a bio-epic should be at least parcially realistic.
Jim Lovell (APOLLO 13/Hanks) was made out to be a JOHN GLENN wanna-be, a boy scout who dreamed of the stars. I guess it's some what ironic that the man who played Glenn in Kaufman's more honest portrayl of our heros, ED HARRIS, was Mission Control Commander in APOLLO 13.

So, if you like Ron's sappy love story of APOLLO 13, then THE RIGHT STUFF is the back story you need to see. A bonus will be that it's better directed, acted, and far more real.