The Right Stuff (1983)
An incredible feat in history as well as in film. What surprised me positively was how it created the right balance of treating the historic source material with respect and reasonable accuracy, but not falling into the trap of taking itself too seriously or being overly hero worshiping. Like that montage with all the exploding rockets is equally tragic and hilarious. All the scenes where they have to manage the press and Life magazine, are on the surface lighthearted fun but also carries the burden of having to deal with all that. Especially when it comes to the appearing to be the “fearless wife of a test pilot”. Even though the movie generally takes its time with everything, I do wish a bit more time was spent of their wives. We get a few very good scenes with them and how they are dealing with all this, the press nonsense and the general fear of death and how they support each other in that role, but most scenes are merely tokens for that theme. But that is perhaps a job for another film entirely, since this has its main focus elsewhere. Which it is doing a fine job of.
Rating: 4