L'étoffe des héros

How is it that writers & directors continue to try to pass off alternative/revisionist crap as historically accurate? While the events themselves may be accurate, the portrayals of the astronauts, NASA employees, their combined families, etc., is severely myopic and filtered through today's politically correct & fragile viewpoints. None of them were perfect, none of their families were...but they did what had to be done at a time when death could be all but guaranteed. I give it a D for this very narrow and shallow take on a classic novel & reality.

Tom Wolfe's focus in his book The Right Stuff (as it was in Phillip Kaufman's 1983 film) was on the status structure of the test pilot fraternity, with Chuck Yeager at the top, as well as the nature of celebrity in America. With more time available than in a film, it's surprising that this series cuts out that backstory of the 40s and 50s, which would have told us where these men came from - and what they put their wives through - before they became astronauts. While the rivalry between the prim-and-proper John Glenn and the fighter jock Alan Shepard is well known, a particular surprise is that we've so far only seen the 'Ice Commander' side of Shepard, and not his other 'Smilin' Al' side, both of which Scott Glenn portrayed so well in the film. Far from capturing the excitement that everyone must have felt at the time, it all seems pretty grim.

Anyone who has read the book or seen 1983 movie version will be disappointed in this version. I had the privilege of meeting John Glenn in 1997 and he is more like the "Ed Harris" version than the Disney version. The Disney version seems to put more emphasis on the personal lives and flaws of the Mercury 7 than the monumental accomplishments of these men. They were true American heroes...not the hero "wannabes" we see produced by Hollywood and the professional sports industry.

Yet another casualty of the tendency of modern writers being unable to identify with intelligent, educated, accomplished people with initiative. As a result, this iteration all but ignores their skills and accomplishments and instead focuses on portraying them as undisciplined jerks becasue the writers can't distinguish between traits like competitive versus combative, or driven versus reckless. Instead of celebrating the swell of patriotism and technological innovation that occurred during the formation and growth of the space program we instead get a boring melodrama about how white men are jerks, even when they are nice. Were these men perfect? No. People as driven and brazen as them are inherently flawed when it comes to social interaction, but that's not the same as being unruly. The misguided focus is so bad we see nothing depicting the reasons why the Mercury Seven were chosen. It's "look at what a bunch of jerks theses guys are" and suddenly BAM! "We've got our seven". Uh, what? Read the book and watch the film instead. Both captured that time much more faithfully while neither focusing on the astronaut's flaws nor sugar-coating them.

I've read Tom Wolf's facinating book. And I've watched Philip Kaufman's amazing movie. Both are fantastic. This however, is nothing but a tame school play. The actors all appear to be dead inside, the scenography is cheap and the SFX is all amateurish CGI, that looks outdated already. Do yourself a favour: Read the book, and watch i original movie instead.