A Fascinating and Compelling Re-Creation

Rating: 10/10 (29 February 2016)

Every year on Oscar night, rather than get bored to tears watching Hollywood's annual display of self-indulgence and this year, self-loathing...I put on a truly great movie that has withstood the test of time and last night I throughly enjoyed another viewing of "Apollo 13." How this didn't win a a best movie or best director for Ron Howard and only pulls a 7.6 on IMDb is beyond me, but once again I sat absolutely mesmerized for 2:20 to watch this tale of the near disaster and rescue of this manned space mission to the moon. Howard captures the drama and tension of the event and the teamwork and dedication of all involved with the space program.
Excellent performances by Hanks, Paxton and Bacon as the crew of A13, Gary Sinise as Ken Mattingly, who was scrubbed from mission at the last minute but selflessly did so much to help the crew make it back. Ed Harris was stellar as Gene Kranz, the Mission Control flight director as was Kathleen Quinlan, playing Marilyn Lovell, wife of A13 commander Jim Lovell.
And after viewing this again I realized that we have had a couple generations of Americans (those under 50)grow without having experienced and seen the excitement and pride virtually all of us shared in the manned space programs, that climaxed with the moon landings in 69 and the early 70's. It is truly sad to think of what our space program could have accomplished in space exploration after all we did during the incredible decade of the 60's.