The Right Stuff

Rating:
Summary: The Right Stuff
Review: Excellent adaptation of Thomas Wolfe's striking novel. This is one of the fewer movies that has had a subject I am not usually interested in and then when I see the movie, I seem obsessed with it. Renting the DVD, you get the full surround sound deal and great picture. Wonderful movie! Inspirational!

Rating:
Summary: As much about the rise of modern media & celebrity as space
Review: The Right Stuff is not really about the early space program, I don't care what anyone else says. Philip Kauffman's epic deals with the rise of the modern media, and the technology that went with it--pictures--to show how from now on, how we looked doing something would matter more than what we did.

Yet there was a counterpoint to the modern media star: the lone hero, the renegade, untouched and unpolluted. For that story--which is almost a separate movie, so little does it touch the main story--Kauffman turned to the western to make his point. Sam Shepard plays Chuck Yeager as a modern day cowboy, the tall, quiet stranger who blows into town, does what he has to do, and leaves without saying a word or accepting thanks. It's an icon that has all but disappeared in this era of grandstanding for cameras. There's a saying that the only one who ever sees a cowboy cry is his horse, and Kauffman must have known that, because in the one scene where Yeager shows any emotion, his trusty steed is the only one to witness it.

The Right Stuff is about heroism and bravery, as everyone has pointed out, but more importantly, it's about the difference between public and private heroism and bravery. Even Yeager acknowledges an unspoken bravery on the part of the public astronauts--"It takes a lot of courage to volunteer for a suicide mission, especially when it's on live TV"--but the point, I think, that Kauffman wanted to make here was that as great as the Mercury 7 were, they were chosen not simply because of their greatness, but for other reasons, telegenic reasons, reasons of family stability, reasons relating to "God and country." If an astronaut was divorced, that had to be swept under the rug. Politicians were not above using the astronauts to advance their own careers....and astronauts were not above using their station to advance into politics. (Kauffman economically shows us one perfect shot of LBJ listening with rapt attention to John Glenn late in the film to drive that point home.)

The film has some structural problems. It's very hard to tell such a complex story even in 3 hours and 20 minutes, and there are some complexities that are glossed over. A scene where Alan Shepard, having just wet his space suit, urges the scientists to "fix their little problem and light this candle" is perplexing, as the scientists just seem to say "Okay, let's resume the countdown" without seeming to have fixed anything. And a moment where the astronauts go strutting down the hallway in slow motion in their space suits is visually exciting--it's been ripped off many times--but just silly. "Let's beat those Russians," says one, and the long-delayed American missions are put into high gear. Yeah, right. And seven astronauts is just too many for even as skilled a filmmaker as Kauffman to handle, and so several--Carpenter, Shirra, Slayton--just disappear into the background.

But what makes the film great, in my opinion, is the final sequence. Kauffman connects two scenes--a test flight with Yeager to break an altitude record, and the arrival of the astronauts to Houston amid fanfare, barbecue and Sally Rand--that do not touch and separately, say nothing. But the very act of juxtaposing them creates meaning far richer than any dialogue could. It's an extraordinary sequence, one of the best in modern films in my opinion, illustrating how the presence of the modern media has forever changed those American absolutes we hold so dear--bravery, heroism and patriotism. Kauffman's eye is jaded at times. Perhaps that's one reason why the film didn't do so well at the box office. (Confusion with John Glenn's presidential bid and the long running time might have been other factors.)

The 20th Anniversary DVD is a welcome addition to the catalog. Finally the whole movie is on one disc--or one side of one disc more accurately. The print is excellent. The second disc is reserved for the "goodies," and while there are many, I get the feeling there should be more. There's a 20 minute collection of scenes with commentaries--first from the actors and then from the crew, that is the best single bonus feature. Then there are two rather short and shallow documentaries about the making of the film, with lots of present-day interviews and surprisingly little behind-the-scenes footage from the production itself. A third short and shallow documentary interviews some of the real Mercury Seven today. Next are outtakes that are fascinating in that they reveal Kaufman working on getting his ideas across--the scenes aren't so much outtakes as they are discarded concepts. Bits of dialogue show up in similar scenes used in the picture. There's even a surreal sequence with Gordon Cooper's "ghost" prompting Gus Grissom during an interview. (A far less bizarre version of this scene ended up in the film.) Watching these bits, I felt like someone reading a writer's first experimental drafts.

The final element on the second disc is a 90-minute PBS documentary on John Glenn that's as boring as he is. Called "John Glenn, American Hero," the title is the most rousing thing about it.

But overall the set is well-worth the money. Finally this movie gets the deluxe treatment it desserves.

Rating:
Summary: Top notch, with a few flaws.
Review: First, the casting is confusing. One of the principle actors is Sam SHEPARD - so is he playing Alan SHEPARD? No, he plays Chuch Yeager. Another principleactor is SCOTT GLENN. Is he playing SCOTT Carpenter? No. Is he playing SCOTT crossfield? No. Is he playing John GLENN? No, HE plays Alan SHEPARD. At least they have SCOTT Wilson playing SCOTT Crossfield. But enough of that :-)

Actually, the cast is excellent. The story is based on history, but is somewhat fictionalized. The film is excellent, with a few drawbacks.

First, three of the seven astronauts have very small parts in the film. There is quite a bit of drama there that was left out - Carpenter overshooting the landing zone and being lost at sea for several hours, all of the technical breakdowns on Cooper's flight, and Slayton being grounded because of a heart murmur. But the movie is long as it is, and that would have made it even longer. Perhaps it would have been better to include more and make it a two part movie.

Secondly, I didn't like the pot shots it takes with the news media.

All in all, though, it is one of my favorite movies.

Rating:
Summary: 4 not for the movie, but for the subject...
Review: I always loved anything connected to science fact and science fiction and this movie is no exception.
I already owned the Laserdisc version of it, but this DVD is even better.
I gave it 4 stars, not because I don't like the movie, I actually love it, but I must consider the interest of the public and I honestly cannot say that this is a movie for the vast public.
The theme alone is a difficult one and deals with the history of the Space Age, as it began from an American perspective, and by telling the story of the astronauts involved in the Mercury project.
Being very long, it might not fit the modern view of a quick-fix movie.
This one has to be watched as if your were watching "JFK" or "Gettysburg", therefore with the outmost attention.
It has spectacular recreations of the atual launches, combined with more private moments, involving the astronauts, their loved ones and those who trained them.
This is not Science Fiction and it is not an Adventure movie, this is truly a history lesson about how the Space Race got started, how, with whom and why.
It is a very thoroughly researched movie, although it is not to be confused with a documentary.
It is an intelligent movie, with good dialogues, good character recreations, with humor and moments of sadness and tragedy.
The heroism of the first astronauts is not represented by their fabulous deeds, but rather by the sacrifices they had to make, in order to be successful.
If you can bare to sit in front of your TV for 3 hours and 15 minutes without unnecessary interruptions, then this documentation may make it clear why men and women risk so much in going "where no one has gone before".
But as I stated before, this is not an easy going movie and is reserved for all those who want to enjoy a good movie in peace.
I would recommend its showing in every school of the United States, and why not, also throughout the world.
Many children would then really appreciate what the conquest of space is all about.

Rating:
Summary: The TRUE Stuff
Review: Truth is not necessarily what really happened in an event or the exact image of some thing. When an artist paints a flower, we don't see what it looks like to be a flower, but rather what it feels like to be a flower. Philip Kaufman is an artist.

Rating:
Summary: GREAT MOVIE
Review: With the exception of some "colorful" language in a few spots.....this is the best movies about NASA and the start of the "Mercury" space program. Fantastic re-creations of actual events. Exciting, wonderful acting, factual, and the cinematography is exceptional. ...BR>We take space travel for granted these days......but what these 7 men volunteered for, back then, was heroic and well as historic. Simply a must see for every generation......

Rating:
Summary: Remember this?
Review: Great preview for "From the Earth to the Moon" from a content standpoint. Otherwise a really neat movie in the depicting of the progress of the original seven Mercury astronauts through the program. Fun characters, good story. Glad these events were recorded even though there must be a fair amount of poetic license here. The film is on the drama side of docudrama.

Rating:
Summary: Great Film, but DVD buyer beware!!
Review: By now, everyone knows this is a great film. First rate acting in all roles, great story and the effects are sensational. It is a terrific movie. However, in this day and age, Warner Bros should be taken to the woodshed over the fact that ( here in Canada anyway) the DVD has the move split. The brand new, sealed edition that I purchased stopped with about half an hour left, and the disc had to be removed and flipped over to watch the end of the movie. What a gross injustice to a landmark film. This seems like a modern version of an 8 track player. Warner Brothers: shame on you. You don't have "The Right Stuff!"

Rating:
Summary: Have you 3 hours of your life to waste...?
Review: The only thing that I was impressed by was the picture quality of a movie from '83. I thought they must have made a mistake and that it was from '93.
The movie itself is long, pointless, and gets nowhere fast. The characters are so shallow, it almost looks as though the movie makers had no more interest in making this film than I do in watching it!
Skip it!

Rating:
Summary: Yeager's star rises
Review: This is a good film, if a bit long. This is what really introduced Chuck Yeager to a new generation. It made him look good and the Mercury Seven like a bunch of frat boys. After this movie came out, you saw Chuck everywhere; driving the pace car at the Indy 500, putting out a best selling biography, selling parts for AC Delco. He makes a cameo in the film too. Toward the beginning of the film, when Jeff Goldblum and Harry Shearer visit Yeager's hangout, the bar, an old man offers one of them, I forget which, a drink. Anyway, the old man is the real Yeager.

I remember during a radio interview with an Apollo astronaut a few years back, I think it is was Jim Lovell, who wasn't even one of the Mercury seven, the interviewer asked what he thought of the Right Stuff. Lovell responded, and I quote, "I hated it." Of course they're gonna hate it. It made them look superficial, etc., etc.