Pretty good. Regardless of the execution, it tries to know and humanize a private man.

Rating: 7/10 (14 January 2019)

Some of the family scenes felt a little too much like a Terrence Malick movie. Arguably the family stuff and the wife (the proverbial woman behind the man) are given too much screen time in general for a movie about space travel. These were professionals that compartmentalize in order to focus. I can sort of see the filmmakers' viewpoint that the family knew some aspects of him more than maybe his colleagues, particularly for someone this private, and since he's the protagonist here that should be a primary source, but it feels forced and weird.
I liked how they did more POVs & close-ups in the craft and from within the craft and fewer gods-eye-views. That's a big pet peeve of mine of lamely providing prospectives no one had and they did it well here; also makes it more suitably claustrophobic and violent.
I didn't like how brooding they made Armstrong and how Aldrin almost seemed to have a social disorder. The former was more smiley and affable in footage I've seen though he was clearly shy and not the most comfortable in the spotlight, and Aldrin's personality seems exaggerated here to act as an obvious character contrast.
Liked the dangerous, uncertain, mysterious, spooky tone it had compared to the boys choir romanticized shlock of Apollo 13. Might improve rewatchability if you can get past the morose Armstrong and excessive focus on family. The film's overall somberness does sort of lend itself I guess to the being-close-to-certain-death aspect that permeates it, like hanging out in an ER for a night.
Launch times still too short and still not fully showing trajectory, but are more accurate in this than prior movies like showing vibrating eyeballs. The Gemini 8 scene has a little homage early to the film Contact, which also brought to mind some similarities elsewhere in First Man to Interstellar. The Gemini 8 boarding and launch scene alone will probably get this nominated for Best Sound this year.
I would have liked to see some of the living, shaving, pooping, whatever everyday annoying stuff of life in a tin can for a couple days on transit to the moon... constant mind-numbing checklists, cleaning sweat off stuff, complaining about the smell, etc. They're just, boom, all the way to the moon and getting ready for landing. Could have also been an opportunity for the Armstrong and Aldrin thing to have more of an arc beyond just the awe-inspiring and hairy landing.