A Richly Entertaining History Lesson

Rating: 9/10 (17 January 2017)

There's a scene in Hidden Figures in which Al Harrison, the harried NASA administrator tasked during the early 1960s with getting an American into space—quick—tells his staff of scientists, mathematicians, theorists, and engineers, "We all get there together or we don't get there at all." He's speaking not about ego or seniority or degrees of education, but about the integration of an enormously-gifted African-American woman into their ranks.
Although that line of dialogue, as spoken by actor Kevin Costner as Harrison, is inspiring enough to have been prominently featured in the television, radio, and computer advertising for the picture, there's really nothing particularly special about Costner's delivery of the line in the movie—the words are spoken with some authority, but also fairly quietly, almost conversationally, without any emphasis.
And that's one of the most likable aspects of Hidden Figures, the new 20th Century-Fox/Fox 2000 motion picture about the early days of the US space program and the importance of three very special people to the project's eventual success in landing a man on the moon. NASA was during that time very much a man's domain. The story of a handful of uniquely-gifted women who were able to gain entry to that exclusive territory is inspiring enough. That some of these women were African-American during a time of segregation and oppression makes a great story even better.
With the possible exception of the three women whose story it depicts, Hidden Figures is populated by characters who are sometimes flawed and eccentric or motivated by their own narrow personal agendas, but united in a mission to navigate the impossible, and in the process invent an entirely new branch of science.
In this way, Hidden Figures is refreshingly a movie about integration and civil rights in which integration and civil rights are almost—but not quite—secondary to a crackerjack story about exceptional people during exceptional times.
Katherine Goble, played by Taraji P. Henson, is an intellectual prodigy whom since childhood has grasped advanced theoretical mathematical concepts as if God Himself were her tutor. A shy, reserved, and bespectacled widow and mother of three, Henson plays the role as if segregation is an unfortunate and irritating inconvenience which only serves to distract her from her primary scientific passion.
Mary Jackson, played by model and recording artist Janelle Monae, is a research mathematician and physical scientist who yearns for an education in engineering. The mother of two and married to a civil rights activist, Mary is more career-oriented, determined and irreverently outspoken than her friend Katherine—the word sassy springs to mind. Unable to pursue her educational degree in a state where scholastic segregation is still legal, Mary ultimately takes her ambitions into a courtroom and challenges the law.
Dorothy Vaughn, portrayed by the wonderful Octavia Spencer, is the most philosophically-canny of the three friends, seemingly willing to compromise with segregation for as long as it doesn't interrupt her plans or career path. A mathematician assigned because of her gender and race to a secretarial pool, Dorothy finally employs subterfuge, and even a humorous little piece of larceny, as a means of gaining the information she needs to operate the new room-sized IBM computer NASA's experts don't even know how to turn on.
Registering the most impact among the supporting characters is Kevin Costner as Al Harrison. As played by Costner, Harrison is so consumed and obsessed with his mission of placing an American into space that he's virtually oblivious to the world and society which surrounds him. A consummate professional, the gruff, humorless Harrison needs the best scientists in the country to help him invent the new science required of his missionno matter their color. Harrison is a fictional character, an amalgamation of several different NASA administrators, and Costner plays him perfectly.
Also notable is actor Glen Powell as astronaut John Glenn. Although he does not bear even the slightest resemblance to the astronaut, Powell easily captures Glenn's million-megawatt charisma and charm. When the IBM computer's trajectory figures appear shaky, Glenn insists Goble personally—he calls her "the smart girl," the cardinal plaudit in Glenn's vocabulary—check the numbers before he climbs onto the rocket for his launch into history. It's a charming, little-known detail to an American legend, and it's absolutely true.
Theodore Melfi guides Hidden Figures with a loose and relaxed hand, wisely allowing the story to unfold naturally, in its own time. He essentially lets the story to speak for itself. While the viewer never gets the sense that actual historical events are unfolding on screen, it's a consummately agreeable history lesson. is so fascinating to others.
Hidden Figures takes more than a few liberties with the facts, but the filmmakers will be quick to point out that the picture is not a documentary—the words projected on screen at the beginning of the movie read, "Based on a True Story." As Americans, we sometimes seem to hobble ourselves, and move forward only with great reluctance and deliberation. And even accounting for the progress we achieve, often after a period of enlightenment we take a step or two backward and build walls of mistrust instead of bridges of understanding.
While Hidden Figures is being described accurately as a "feel-good picture," at the time of the historic space mission of John Glenn which concludes the picture, the fire hoses and police attack dogs shamefully used during the historic civil rights demonstrations of Selma and Birmingham were still a year or so in the future.
So as we're patting ourselves on the back and congratulating ourselves on how far we've traveled since that time in the early 1960s when Kevin Costner's character in Hidden Figures tells his newly integrated staff "We get there together or we don't get there at all," we might also want to be mindful of how far we still need to go.