| Apollo 11 | |
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.png) Theatrical release poster | |
| Directed by | Todd Douglas Miller |
| Produced by |
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| Starring | Edwin Aldrin Neil Armstrong Michael Collins Charles Duke Bruce McCandless |
| Edited by | Todd Douglas Miller |
| Music by | Matt Morton |
Production companies |
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| Distributed by |
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Release dates |
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Running time | 97 minutes[1] |
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Box office | $15.3 million[2][3] |
Apollo 11 is a 2019 Americandocumentary film edited, produced, and directed byTodd Douglas Miller.[1] It focuses on the 1969Apollo 11 mission, the first spaceflight to land humans on the Moon. The film consists solely of archival footage, including70 mm film previously unreleased to the public, and does not feature narration, interviews, or modern recreations.[4] TheSaturn V rocket, Apollo 11 crew (consisting ofBuzz Aldrin,Neil Armstrong, andMichael Collins), andApollo program Earth-based mission operations engineers are prominently featured in the film.[5]
The film premiered at theSundance Film Festival on January 24, 2019, and was released theatrically in the United States byNeon on March 1. It received acclaim from critics and grossed $15 million at the box office. At the4th Critics' Choice Documentary Awards, the film won a leading five awards (includingBest Documentary Feature), and, at the72nd Primetime Creative Arts Emmy Awards, it won three awards (for editing and sound) out of five nominations,one of which recognized Aldrin and Collins' work capturing the Apollo 11 mission on film.
In late 2016,Todd Douglas Miller had recently completed work onThe Last Steps, a documentary short aboutApollo 17,[6][7] when British archival producer and film editor Stephen Slater suggested making a similarly themed documentary for the upcoming50th anniversary ofApollo 11.[8]CNN Films subsequently became a partner in the project.[6]
Miller's conception of the film was centered on adirect cinema approach. The final film contains no voice-over narration or interviews beyond what was available in the contemporary source material. Portions of the mission are illustrated by animated graphics depicting the parts of the Apollo spacecraft as line drawings, the designs of which are based on the cel-animated graphics inTheo Kamecke's 1971 documentaryMoonwalk One. In addition, three wordless biographical sequences summarize the lives ofEdwin Aldrin,Neil Armstrong, andMichael Collins up to 1969 by means of family photographs and archive footage.
In May 2017, cooperation between Miller's production team,NASA, and theNational Archives and Records Administration resulted in the discovery of unreleased70 mm footage from the preparation, launch,mission control operations, recovery, and post flight activities of Apollo 11.[7][9] The large-format footage includes scenes fromLaunch Complex 39, spectators present for the launch, the launch of theSaturn V rocket, the recovery of the astronauts and the Apollo 11command moduleColumbia, and post-mission activities aboard theUSSHornet. The film incorporates this footage alongside 35 mm and 16 mm footage, still photography, and closed-circuit television footage.[7]Apollo 11: First Steps Edition, a 47-minute edit of the film for exhibition in museum IMAX theaters, includes extended large-format scenes that differ from the full-length documentary.[10]
The filmmakers used the facilities of Final Frame, a post-production firm in New York City, to make high-resolution digital scans of all reels depicting ground based activities that were available in the National Archives. Specialized climate-controlled vans were used to safely transport the archival material to and from College Park, Maryland.[7]
In addition to hundreds of hours of video, the production team sourced over 11,000 hours of audio recordings.[7] Among the audio recordings were 30-track tapes of voice recordings at every Mission Control station. Ben Feist, a Canadian software engineer, wrote software to improve the fidelity of the newly available audio. Slater, who had synchronized audio recordings with silent 16 mm Mission Control footage in earlier projects, performed the task of synchronizing the audio and film.[6] The production team was able to identify "Mother Country", a song byfolk musicianJohn Stewart, inLunar Module voice recordings, and the song was subsequently featured in the film.[6]
Neon acquired worldwide theatrical distribution rights to the film in July 2018.[11]
Composer Matt Morton only used electronic instruments that were available in 1969 for the film's score. The seventeen-track albumApollo 11 (Original Motion Picture Soundtrack) was released worldwide byMilan Records for digital download on March 8, 2019, on CD on June 28, and onvinyl on July 19.[12][13]
The film took a few liberties with the timeline of the mission. For example, an incident occurred during the return voyage—on day 8 of the mission atGround Elapsed Time (GET) 179:00:29—involving the disconnection of Michael Collins's biomedical sensor (his impedance pneumograph), which led him to wisecrack, "I promise to let you know if I stop breathing,"[14] but this event is depicted in the film as happening during the approach to the Moon before the separation of thecommand moduleColumbia andLunar ModuleEagle.
The world premiere ofApollo 11 took place inPark City, Utah, at theSundance Film Festival on January 24, 2019.[15][16] It was given alimited release in the United States inIMAX throughNeon on March 1, and was released in the United Kingdom on June 28, throughUniversal Pictures andDogwoof.[17][18]
Universal Pictures releasedApollo 11 in the U.S. fordigital download,DVD, andBlu-ray on May 14, 2019. The discs have two extra features: a 3-minutefeaturette titled "Apollo 11: Discovering the 65mm", and a theatrical trailer.[19] The film was released on DVD, digital, Blu-ray, and a4K Ultra HD two-disc set in the United Kingdom on November 4, 2019, byDogwoof.[20]
Its opening weekend in theaters,Apollo 11 grossed $1.6 million from 120 IMAX theaters (a per-venue gross of $13,392), finishing 15th at the box office.[21] The following weekend, the film gave up most of its IMAX venues to newcomerCaptain Marvel, but played in a total of 405 traditional theaters, and made $1.3 million, finishing 10th at the box office.[22] The film continued to hold well its third weekend of release, grossing $1.2 million from 588 theaters (a drop of just 2% from the weekend before).[23]
Upon its premiere at the2019 Sundance Film Festival, critics praised the film and the quality of the footage. On thereview aggregator websiteRotten Tomatoes, 99% of 192 critics' reviews of the film are positive, with an average rating of 8.9/10; the site's "critics consensus" reads: "Edifying and inspiring in equal measure,Apollo 11 uses artfully repurposed archival footage to send audiences soaring back to a pivotal time in American history."[24] OnMetacritic, the film has aweighted average score of 88 out of 100, based on reviews from 35 critics, indicating "universal acclaim".[25]
David Ehrlich ofIndieWire complimented Miller's ability to make theMoon landing sequence in the film feel unique and thrilling, and stated that the clarity of the footage "takes your breath away".[26]Owen Gleiberman ofVariety called the footage "quite spectacular", and, like a number of other critics, comparedApollo 11 toDamien Chazelle's 2018Neil Armstrong biopicFirst Man.[27]Glenn Kenny ofThe New York Times called the film "entirely awe-inspiring", and wrote, "Although we know how the mission turns out, the movie generates and maintains suspense. And it rekindles a crazy sense of wonder at, among other things, what one can do practically with trigonometry."[1][note 1]Matt Zoller Seitz ofRogerEbert.com gave the film four-out-of-four stars, calling it "an adrenaline shot of wonder and skill. [...] Films this completely imagined and ecstatically realized are so rare that when one comes along, it makes most other movies, even the good ones, seem underachieving. Any information that you happen to absorb while viewingApollo 11 is secondary to the visceral experience of looking at it and listening to it."[28]
