#689) Apollo 13 (1995)

The Plot: In April 1970, Apollo 13 becomes the latest NASA mission to the moon in the wake of 1969’s historic Apollo 11. After a few last-minute changes, the crew for the Apollo 13 mission are Commander Jim Lovell (Tom Hanks), Command Module Odyssey pilot Jack Swigert (Kevin Bacon), and Lunar Module Aquarius pilot Fred Haise (Bill Paxton). Lovell in particular is excited to finally fulfill his dream of walking on the moon, having orbited around it on Apollo 8. After a successful launch, a routine check of the oxygen tank stirring fans causes an electrical short, which depletes most of the ship’s oxygen and power. With the guidance of Mission Control in Houston led by Flight Director Gene Kranz (Ed Harris), the moon mission is aborted, and a race against time begins to get the astronauts back to Earth before they run out of oxygen. In other words: Now the story of several astronauts who lost power, and the Mission Control who had no choice but to bring them home. It’s “Apollo 13”.

Why It Matters: The NFR throws a ton of superlatives at everyone involved with “Apollo 13”, including Ron Howard’s direction (“equally meticulous and emotional”), the cast (“talented”), the script (“well-paced”), and the special effects (“crafty”).

But Does It Really?: I had never seen “Apollo 13” before this viewing, and I really enjoyed it. With “Apollo 13” Ron Howard takes an oft-overlooked bit of American history and turns it into an exciting, dramatic crowd pleaser. Key to this success is Howard’s balancing of technical and historical accuracy without compromising the human elements, keeping those of us with zero NASA knowledge engaged by these real people in real peril. “Apollo 13” also made me nostalgic for the kind of big-budget, well-crafted, non-IP studio movie that rarely gets made nowadays (outside of something like “Oppenheimer”). With its exceptional roster of talent both in front of and behind the camera, “Apollo 13” is a movie that works on every front and has stuck around long enough in pop culture that its NFR inclusion is more than justified.

Shout Outs: A quick reference to “2001” by Jim while inside the Odyssey, which makes sense.

Everybody Gets One: Ron Howard is already on the NFR as an actor, but this is his first Registry movie as director. Even in his child actor days Howard knew he wanted to direct, so in 1976 when Roger Corman approached the 22-year-old Howard about starring in the car movie “Eat My Dust!”, Howard agreed on the condition that Corman finance his directorial debut “Grand Theft Auto” (Corman also pops up in “Apollo 13” as a congressman touring NASA). After a run of TV movies, Howard returned to theatrical film in the 1980s with such hits as “Splash”, “Cocoon”, “Willow”, and “Parenthood”. Howard signed on to “Apollo 13” after his longtime business partner Brian Grazer secured the film rights to “Lost Moon”. Also making their NFR debuts are the movie’s screenwriters: William Broyles Jr. (former Marine Corps officer and creator of “China Beach”) and Al Reinert (director of the Apollo documentary “For All Mankind”).

Wow, That’s Dated: A credit that could only exist in the ’90s: “Vocal performance by Annie Lennox”.

Seriously, Oscars?: One of the biggest hits of the year, “Apollo 13” received nine Oscar nominations, one behind that year’s eventual Best Picture winner: “Braveheart”. “Apollo 13” lost in seven categories to seven different movies, but did win in two categories: Film Editing and Sound. The biggest outcry was reserved for Ron Howard, who did not receive a Best Director nomination.

• I won’t go into every difference between the actual Apollo 13 mission and the film version. Suffice it to say that like many a historical movie, the main details are accurate, with some events streamlined or dramatized for a clearer narrative. Among the bigger divergences is the portrayal of Jack Swigert, who in real life was nowhere near as green as Kevin Bacon’s portrayal. In fact, the real Swigert wrote the malfunction procedures for NASA’s command modules, including the Odyssey. Side note: Despite his popular distinction as “Center of the Movie Universe”, this is only Kevin Bacon’s second NFR appearance (the other is “Animal House“).
• Gary Sinise doesn’t get a heck of a lot to do as grounded pilot Ken Mattingly, but Sinise was offered any role he wanted and picked Mattingly, so I guess he knows what he’s doing. I’m just glad that Lieutenant Dan kept his word to Forrest Gump.
• It’s hard not to watch this movie without making the inevitable comparisons to “The Right Stuff“. It helps, however, that the two movies are more companion pieces than direct remakes, each covering neighboring but different eras in NASA history. As best I can tell, the only historical figure in both movies is Deke Slayton, one of the original Mercury Seven astronauts and later NASA’s Chief of the Astronaut Office. Slayton is played by Scott Paulin in “Right Stuff” and Chris Ellis in “Apollo”.
• Your movie isn’t set in the late 1960s until you play Jefferson Airplane’s “Somebody to Love”. It’s the law.
• The launch sequence gave me genuine chills. Much like the send-off scene in “Titanic“, Howard conveys the sense of awe and wonder of this historic launch, mixed with the tension and uncertainty of the crew’s later problems.

• This movie’s Mission Control is White Guy Character Actor Central. Led by the always great Ed Harris in a commanding yet understated performance, you also get the likes of Marc McClure, Joe Spano, Christian Clemenson, Loren Dean, Xander Berkeley, and Clint (brother of Ron) Howard. Special mention to Jim Meskimen, the real-life son of Ron Howard’s former TV mom Marion Ross. Does that make them stepbrothers?
• Clint’s not the only member of the Howard family in this movie. Ron’s mother Jean plays Jim’s mother, Ron’s father Rance is the minister watching the mission with the Lovells, and among the background extras the night before the launch are Ron’s wife Cheryl and their then-14 year old daughter Bryce Dallas Howard.
• Everything about this movie is A+, but the special effects are outstanding. Most early ’90s CG tends to stick out nowadays, but the effects of the modules in space still hold their own. This movie is also famous for partially filming in a reduced-gravity aircraft for several shots of the astronauts floating inside the modules. By the way, “Apollo 13” was Oscar-nominated for its Visual Effects, but you know what it lost to? “Babe”. That’s right, the talking pig movie. Seriously, Oscars?
• This movie’s most iconic line is a prime example of Screenplay Adaptation 101. In real life, Lovell repeated Swigert’s communication to Ground Control, “Houston, we’ve had a problem”. The screenplay punch-up is Jim alone telling them, “Houston, we have a problem”, a more dramatic version of the same thing.

• Shoutout to Kathleen Quinlan, who gets more to do as Marilyn Lovell than all the wives in “The Right Stuff” combined. Most of Quinlan’s performance is reacting to updates on her husband’s mission, but she nails it, giving the movie its beating heart. Quinlan’s first movie role was in “American Graffiti“, and I’m glad Ron remembered his old castmate.
• I don’t know why, but the fantasy sequence of Jim walking on the moon reminded me of that moon song Ernie used the sing on “Sesame Street”. Anyone else?
• The movie’s other iconic line, Kranz’s declaration that “Failure is not an option”, was created specifically for the film. The screenwriters interviewed flight controller Jerry Bostick (played in the movie by Ray McKinnon) about his experience during Apollo 13. Bostick informed them that during this entire mission, “we just calmly laid out all the options, and failure was not one of them.” The real Gene Kranz liked the line so much he used it as the title of his memoir.

• Serving as a wonderfully cinematic counterpart to the launch sequence, the re-entry of the Odyssey is wonderfully tense. Even with the knowledge of how it ended in real life, I caught myself holding my breath, with an immediate cathartic exhale once we finally hear from the astronauts. Also, keep an eye out for the real Jim Lovell as the captain of the USS Iwo Jima who shakes movie Jim Lovell’s hand.

• Nice workaround with the obligatory epilogue text; Tom Hanks narrates it in character as Jim, giving us a rundown of what happened to everyone, and wondering if we will ever get back to the moon. Who wants to break it to him that the only people going to the moon nowadays are self-indulgent tech billionaires having the most expensive mid-life crisis ever?
• I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: Where were the “Hidden Figures” ladies during all of this? I bet they would have solved this whole thing in about 20 minutes.

• Tom Hanks would go on to play another real-life pilot who helps land a vehicle in a life-or-death situation in 2016’s “Sully”.

• While NASA has never done another Apollo-level mission to the moon, we did get the Mission: Space ride at EPCOT, which features Gary Sinise in the pre-show, so that’s something.

• Clint Howard would spoof his own “Apollo” performance in all three “Austin Powers” movies. “In many ways, the Big Boy never left, sir. He’s always offered the same high-quality meals at competitive prices.”

• “Apollo 13” still gets mentioned quite a bit in pop culture, with one of the more recent homages coming from none other than Bryce Dallas Howard. A terrific director in her own right, Ms. Howard has helmed – among other things – an episode of “The Mandalorian” which has a re-entry scene that is almost shot for shot the “Apollo 13” re-entry scene.

• The film’s main legacy is, of course, the quote “Houston, we have a problem.” Anything even vaguely connected to astronauts and/or space travel has referenced that line. Heck, I’ve quoted it on this very blog!

• Perhaps the film’s biggest unintentional impact on our culture: In 1997, computer scientist Reed Hastings returned his Blockbuster-rented VHS of “Apollo 13” six weeks late, accruing a $40 late fee. Theorizing there must be a better way to rent movies, he and co-worker Marc Randolph created a video rental-by-mail system they dubbed “Netflix”. And now you know the rest of the story!

Further Viewing: “Marooned”, John Sturges’ drama also about three astronauts potentially stranded in space, released four months before the Apollo 13 mission (In fact, “Marooned’ won the Oscar for its Visual Effects four days before the Apollo 13 launch). It’s the movie that gave Marilyn Lovell nightmares about her husband’s mission, as depicted in “Apollo 13”.