Never of the audience was closer to: “Apollo 11”, the 50. Anniversary of the moon landing, coming to a cinema, offers an overwhelming experience. The Film by Todd Miller relies on an unconventional cinematic approach.
Where ever you have the opportunity: Watch this movie in an IMAX theatre. Or, at least, on a large cinema screen. Because “Apollo 11” relies entirely on the power of the images and the sounds. Director Todd Douglas Miller and his Team have decided in your documentary for an unusual concept: you waive any and all commentary, to over voice, on Interviews, on filing sequences.
“Apollo 11” uses only Original footage, chronologically assembled, provided with the corresponding audio accompaniment: the original of the historic space mission of the Apollo capsule and NASA sounds-Central.
Director Miller: experience of space and time
“Apollo 11” is something like the “official” Film for the anniversary. The American news channel CNN asked Director Miller three years ago, the Film for 50. To set the anniversary of the first landing on the moon in the scene. Miller was in the Post-production of his short film “Apollo 17” the last moon landing of the NASA. Earlier, the Director had completed his spectacular dinosaur documentary “Dinosaur 13”. He seemed the right man for big tasks.
Neil Armstrong: the first man on the moon
If you look at the finished Film now on the big screen, it’s a little as if time had stood still. Of course very few people have noticed the preparations and the work behind the Scenes so close to the action, as it presents the Film now. Most likely at that time, on 20. In July 1969, only the slightly blurry Black-and-White have seen the recording of that legendary first step of Neil Armstrong on the moon.
In “Apollo 11” one is as a spectator close to the action
The Film shows the day immediately prior to the Start of the carrier rocket with the Apollo 11 capsule. He shows the work of hundreds of engineers in the NASA control centres, the preparations, which eventually led to the Start. The audience experienced the last hours of the three astronauts Neil Armstrong, Edwin “Buzz” Aldrin and Michael Collins up close. He is there when the three space suits and helmets, create, last, under instructions of the technical staff on the way to get. As you ride the Elevator to the capsule, there in their narrow seats to squeeze.
Last handles just before the Start: technicians help Neil Armstrong in his space suit
Although there has been some documentaries about the Apollo 11 Mission, game movies have in the land of the successful and the failed Moon missions dramaturgically compacted (the last one was impressive “First Man”/2018). The cinema history has been made at the very beginning with the French pioneer Georges Méliès a spectacular trip to the moon (“A trip to the moon”/1902). And the cinema has also filmed the myth of the moon landing, which supposedly was never, and was only staged, (“Capricorn one”/1978).
The Film “Apollo 11”: With 70mm on the moon
“Apollo 11” by Todd Douglas Miller adds to the historic Events now something New. Possible the digital age has made it. Miller and his helpers have been buried in the archives, and promoted all day-to-day, what slumbered there, and so far hardly or never to a larger audience was shown. The greatest treasure: previously unpublished 70mm Material. This was polished with the help of the newest digital methods of processing to a high gloss. Added to this were some 11,000 hours of audio material.
The carrier rocket with the Apollo 11 capsule lifts
“Here, you will experience the moon landing, as you yourself were.” With this Slogan, the rental for “Apollo 11 advertises” and a little bit actually. The first scene of the film is impressive: Huge wheels, on which the launcher is mounted, will move infinitely slowly to the start terminal on Cape Canaveral. This is in its size, its slowness, its grandeur, is overwhelming.
The first moon landing was a worldwide media event
A few kilometres further on, thousands of people have assembled in the car, with their cars and caravans. It has a mood like a large Open-Air rock concert there. Families, men, women, children, space-Fans – they all want to witness the Start of the Apollo Mission live. The Film captures the impressive footage from the helicopter perspective.
Spectators watch the action from afar
And so it goes. Until the Start of the rocket. Finally, up to the moon. Since the original recordings are naturally sparse – the flight, for example, is shown with a short animated scenes, the only concession to the film makers of the classic documentary. Filled this movie be empty with sequences from the control center. There, hundreds of specialists in front of their computers, values from sitting, calculate flight paths, and re-plan the next steps and Smoking. This small, minor Detail reminds the viewer, perhaps, the most to the fact that it is an event from the year 1969. At the time all smoked – but by all of them.
“Apollo 11” shines with brilliant colours
The amazing cast, but the brilliant colors of the film. The moon landing in Black-and-White in memory – and, of course, the sequences of the first steps, and the stay of the astronauts on the moon are to be seen as the only way to. Everything else shines, however, in color, incredibly sharp, contrast-rich, color-intensive. The digital processing makes it possible.
In the movie “Apollo 11” one is as a spectator, always very close to the protagonists
“The Mission of Apollo 11 is one of the greatest achievements of human history – hundreds of thousands of people, tens of thousands of companies and businesses, all of them were focused on one goal, to bring people into a different world,” says Director Miller about the pioneering spirit of the time. In his Film, he has captured him. Have helped him, especially the achievements of the digital age, of the then, in 1969, hardly anyone knew something was up.
After the premiere at the Sundance film festival, the Film comes from the 27.06.2019 worldwide in the cinemas. The Germany-Start is for the 7. July provided. “Apollo 11” is also isolated in IMAX film theatres shown (part of it in a shorter Version).