Chazelle could be heading for his second Oscar

Rating: 9/10 (18 October 2018)

In the opening moments of Damien Chazelle's new movie "First Man" we encounter Neil Armstrong on the periphery of space in a rocket that isn't doing what it's supposed to be doing. It's a terrific scene, genuinelly frightening, (even if we know Mr Armstrong is going to come out of it in one piece), shot up close and personal and superbly edited and directed by young Chazelle, (he's the youngest person ever to win the Oscar for Best Director). That's just the beginning of this brilliant film about the Gemini and Appolo Missions that saw Neil Armstrong become the first man to walk on the moon and there are several other heart-stopping moments to follow. This is the most authentic looking of all the manned space mission movies to date and Chazelle films it as if it were a documentary, which isn't to say he ignores the human side.
Armstrong is played by that most taciturn of actors, Ryan Gosling, and here the silences, the 'meaningful' stares really work for him. A lot of the time Chazelle chooses to shoot him in close-up and in Gosling's face we can read everything the man is feeling. He is matched by the much more pragmatic performance of Claire Foy as his wife. There is also not a jot of sentimentality on display despite there being every opportunity to milk it, (early on Armstrong's young daughter dies, several of his colleagues are killed and then, of course, there is the triumphalism of the ending). Instead Chazelle gives us a level-headed view of those years, even going so far as to paint Buzz Aldrin as a somewhat vain individual and including, at one stage, the protest number 'Whitney on the Moon'. The quietude of the ending is also deeply affecting and if Chazelle were to win his second Oscar for this I certainly won't be complaining.