I can guarantee you that this movie is not nearly as colorful or exciting as this poster makes it out to be. Still better than Bohemian Rhapsody though, First Man is a fairly generic biopic about Neil Armstrong's life and his journey to being the first human to set foot on the moon. However, this film does serve its purpose in being an interesting exploration of man and space while providing beautiful production design and a good score. Even though Ryan Gosling is mediocre throughout this performance, I still appreciated this film for what it was.
The greatest parts of this film include its score, production design, cinematography, and most importantly, the emotions brought about in me. Justin Hurwitz's score was amazingly terrifying and brought so much emotion to each individual scene. Most notably in the scene when Neil was attempting to straighten out the shuttle so that it could land in the correct spot: the score during this was terrifying and reminded me a lot of the threatening music in 2001: A Space Odyssey. The production design in this movie was incredible too. From the NASA station to the actual surface of the untouched moon, every bit of the mise-en-scène was beautiful. This was aided by the camerawork done by Linus Sandgren, as the majority of the shots were very personal and not afraid to openly express their emotions. Ryan Gosling contributed to these emotional moments as well, proving that he is more than just a pretty face. His performance was absolutely top-notch in this film and personified Neil and his troubles excellently. From the expository death of his young daughter to his landing on the surface of the moon, he nailed his role as the legendary astronaut.
First Man does a solid job of fusing emotion into Neil's life and everything that he had to go through, which is the purpose of a biopic in the first place. My biggest takeaway from this film is my improved appreciation for their journey. I was not aware of every single event that led to Neil and his crew landing on the moon. Neil living with depression was the overarching trait that brought so much of his personality and motivation for fighting so hard with NASA. On top of his emotional state, having to also deal with the deaths of his three close friends in a wiring accident was quite rough for Neil, but created so much more motivation for him. Seeing everything this man had gone through along with the rickety and uncertain technology surrounding the Gemini project made me appreciate this part of American history much more thoroughly.
My biggest issues with this film are its directing, character development, and tone. Damien Chazelle, Oscar-winning writer and director of Whiplash and La La Land, should not have been in charge of handling this story. I personally adore his filmmaking, as Whiplash will forever be one of my favorite films, but his style did not mesh well with this story, given that he did not write the mediocre script. His brand of personal and jumpy cinematography is excellent, but felt a bit off, especially during the film's most crucial scenes. This is most likely due to the fact that Chazelle has not handled a biopic or true story before because the tone of the movie suffered. The plot was very monotone during the whole movie and did not build, climax, or fall in any kind of emotional way. I became quite bored during many of the extended launch and space sequences too, which created a runtime that was far too long.
All of these aspects make it clear that Chazelle directed but did not write the movie, because he would have been able to balance out these parts much better. This includes the character of Neil's wife Janet, played by Claire Foy. She was vastly underdeveloped and only served as a generic, 1960s housewife with no say in Neil's life. This was obviously not true, as the film concludes with a personal shot of the two of them reflecting on their individual journies, but Janet's was painfully undermined.
First Man is a fairly engaging biopic about the hardships and struggles that Neil Armstrong had to push through in order to make first human contact on the moon. Even though this was certainly not Damien Chazelle's finest project, I did enjoy learning more about Armstrong's life and how much he absolutely deserved what he accomplished.
My Rating: ★★★½
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