Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 7/10

Cast: Claire Foy, Ryan Gosling, Pablo Schreiber, Christopher Abbott, Ethan Embry, Ciaran Hinds, Jason Clarke, Kyle Chandler, Corey Stoll, Shea Whigham, Patrick Fugit, Lukas Haas, Corey Michael Smith, Brady Smith, Olivia Hamilton, John David Whalen, Leon Bridges.

If a film’s aim is to educate and inform, to make an audience appreciate the life and actions of the subject at hand, then Damien Chazelle’s in depth, almost microscopic, look at the life of Neil Armstrong, of the lead up to moment when he became the first human to take a tentative step on the surface of the Moon, the trials, the agony, the heartache that spurred him on, then First Man would be rightly considered to one of the most endearing and enduring of epics.

Unfortunately for Damien Chazelle and the magnificent cast that gave their all for this particular venture, a film of such possible magnitude must also at least leave the audience feeling exhilarated, feeling the pulse of the subject to the point where they are enthused enough to research more, to dream of achieving something extraordinary with their lives. It is in this that the microscopic view of the dream given the Presidential backing by John F. Kennedy and fulfilled, at great human cost, feels laboured, overly portrayed and whilst it is quite rightly one of humanity’s crowning achievements, in the end it doesn’t have the personality to make an audience love it for the true spectacle it is.

That said, First Man is beautifully imagined and captured on film, Ryan Gosling portrays Neil Armstrong with great sensitivity, an intensely private man, one not for the limelight but for just being the best person he can be, Mr. Gosling frames this deep but isolated, passion with extreme care. It is in this care that the film revolves, in which the true nature of heroism is perhaps examined and how it affects their life with deeper regret when they are thrust into the limelight.

Adventure can change a man, can bring a woman a different viewpoint, when that journey is undertaken, when the spirit of a nation, of family, of humanity, is wrapped up in the ideal of the mission, it can revolutionise the world, to not go into the nuts and bolts of what made the quest so important would have been a travesty of film making, but by doing so it made the experience seem underwhelming; the dichotomy of wanting to immortalise the motivation and obsession and sacrificing the zeal of the very human touch, the stimulation.

First Man is an exceptional exploration of the mind, as well as the endeavour of our species to see what lives beyond our short field of vision, our brief lives touch by the short-lived nature of our existence, but it lacks the promise of feeling touched in the heart in which to seek redemption in ourselves; a beautiful film but one that doesn’t quite take off.

Ian D. Hall