In the Shadow of the Moon

Given that yesterday was the forty-fifth anniversary of the events described, it seems appropriate to post this review today:

They're old men now. Gray or balding, wrinkled, with liver spots. Their voices are still crisp and animated, with the calm of test pilots, which they all were, as they explain what it was like to be In the Shadow of the Moon. We have interviews with ten of their tiny fraternity --- it was a fraternity which only ever had twenty-four members, six of whom were dead and one of whom didn't give interviews at the time the film was made.  The interviews are intercut with archival footage from their adventures on and around a world a quarter of a million miles away. Buzz Aldrin and Michael Collins talk about the seat of the pants feelings as three hundred feet of rocket below them lights off and starts to propel them upwards. Charlie Duke explains that his father barely believed he traveled to the Moon, but his son thought it wasn't a big deal. Jim Lovell explains that the let down of not walking on the Moon didn't hit him until after he'd safely returned to earth after Apollo 13. Gene Cernan says baldly "I called the Moon my home for three days of my life... That's science fiction." It's material I know well, so there are no new facts here, but it is wonderful to hear the story of their adventure in their own words, to see the expressions on their faces as they pause to gather their thoughts and realize that, yes, they were at the Moon, to sample the awe they felt, to have them tell how they were transformed by the experience, how they now regard the Earth as a precious jewel. However, this has a very high wow! factor. Certainly, my sense of wonder was actively engaged through the whole three hours it took me to watch this hour-and-a-half long documentary: I kept backing up and watching passages a second time.

"When they opened up the fuel baffles we could hear the full rumble down these huge pipes. Then it dawned on me from an emotional point of view that we're gonna go to the Moon."

     --- Jim Lovell, In the Shadow of the Moon