Apollo 13

Apollo 13. Ron Howard, dir. USA: Imagine Entertainment (prod.) / Universal (dist.), 1995. Tom Hanks, Kevin Bacon, Bill Paxton, Gary Sinise, Ed Harris, Kathleen Quinlan, featured players. Based on the historical event.

Mainstream film stressing imagery of men inside a high-tech mechanism: Apollo 13. Note failure of mechanical (although not cybernetic) devices, failures overcome by diligent and inventive technicians on the ground (many of whom look engineering-geekish) and competent austronauts. There is a specific allusion to 2001: A Space Odyssey when the Bill Paxton character does not play a tape of Also Sprach Zarathustra but pop. music. Note also names of space vehicles: Odyssey and Aquarius. (RDE, 03/07/95)