These Women Definitely Had The Right Stuff

Rating: 8/10 (4 September 2017)

I couldn't help but think of this movie in relation to the 1983 movie "The Right Stuff." That film honoured the first seven American astronauts in the Mercury program. This movie honours the vital contributions to that program of African American women - largely behind the scenes and often not getting the credit they deserved. The movie focuses on three women in particular: Katherine Gobel/Johnson (Taraji P. Henson), Dorothy Vaughan (Octavia Spencer) and Mary Jackson (Janelle Monae). All three are brilliant in their respective fields: Katherine as a mathematician, Dorothy as a programmer and Mary as an engineer. All three work for NASA in the early days of the space program as the Mercury program is just beginning, and all three are involved in the vital calculations necessary to launch, orbit and re-enter capsules. In the midst of the work, the women are forced to deal with things such as riding at the back of the bus, segregated bathrooms and the prejudices of their co-workers. Henson and Spencer seemed somewhat more central to the story and offered good performances. Monae - better known as a singer than an actress - seems to fade away a bit compared to those two, but still does a fine job with the role.
Truthfully, race was really as central a theme to this movie as was the space race. While it was all set in the context of the space race between the USA and the USSR, it was also set in the early 1960's at the NASA facility that was located in Virginia - a state where segregation was still an accepted and every day fact of life. And, of course, the women are not just African Americans - they're women, and they have to deal with sexism as well - even from some African American males, who don't seem to know what to make of them working in such important jobs. The scenes depicting the reality of life in the south in the era are sobering, and once the Mercury astronauts are introduced there's a lot of tension involved - although much of that is mitigated by the fact that we've seen the astronauts' stories and the basic story of the space flights in "The Right Stuff." But it was inspiring to see the contributions of Katherine and Dorothy and Mary and others like them.
It's a well done movie. Some of the characters are composite characters. That isn't really a big deal and was probably necessary to give some focus to the movie. Actually, two of the most important NASA figures - Al Harrison (Kevin Costner) and Paul Stafford (Jim Parsons) were composites. There were some scenes that were very dramatic but that were created for the movie. Harrison (and since he didn't exist - no one else) never smashed down a "Coloured Women" restroom sign, for example. It was a powerful scene, but completely made up. I want to suggest that Parsons was a superb choice for the role of Stafford. His role as Sheldon on The Big Bang Theory makes it easy to relate to him as a jealous and arrogant scientist who seems to look down on everyone else's work - and he proved here that he can handle such a character in a dramatic role as well - although if I were Parsons, I might be concerned a bit with the possibility of type casting.
It's also a bit jarring in the year 2017 to see the state of technology in the era. I'm a child of the 1960's and grew up without computers, but even so I'm so steeped in today's culture that when I saw the sign "Coloured Computers" for the first time, I thought how ridiculous it was that even the computers that African Americans used were segregated. It took me a few minutes to realize that the African American women WERE the computers, doing the necessary calculations. NASA was just in the process of having a huge and primitive IBM computing machine built to take over the job of doing their calculations. Seeing people working frantically on all of the complex equations in the movie was a bit disorienting.
This is a very deliberately paced movie. It's interesting all the way through. I wouldn't say it's an intense movie very often, but it's a very watchable movie that pays deserved tribute to a largely forgotten but courageous and determined group of African American women who played a vital role in the beginning of America's space program. (8/10)