My D and I saw Hidden Figures on Friday at 3:00, and I was surprised the theater was full. We loved it - me an engineer and D a CS major. It’s been a while since I went to a movie where people clapped and cheered at the end. Not at all bothered by the anachronistic typewriter or smoking issues either. It did make me want to learn more about the story.
We enjoyed Rogue One as well. It left me with a renewed appreciation for those so committed to a cause they are willing to die for it.
I did! I did! The movie was Hunt for the Wilderpeople. It’s a New Zealand film, so foreign, no subtitles.
We also enjoyed Rogue One. It was mostly amazingly done, especially CGI recreating people who have died – including one guy who has been dead decades. ABC has an interesting 7 minute segment on it.
@TooRealistic We also enjoyed Hunt for the Wilderpeople. Funny, quirky, and poignant movie.
Just Patriot Day. Very good. I especially liked the end, where they interviewed real people. Although most of the actors are well known , they resembled the real life people.
20th Century Women
Different, in a good way.
Hidden Figures. Not the greatest movie in the history of the world, not likely to be a classic of the cinema, but it’s almost impossible to imagine someone going to this movie and disliking it, or not feeling uplifted. We saw it in a suburban theater with a very buttoned-down crowd, and not only did people clap and cheer at the end, they clapped and cheered several times in the middle, too. Everyone walking out was looking at a smartphone reading about the factual background. I thought the filmmakers did an excellent job boiling down 20 years of history into a couple of years, and turning some compelling ideas and anecdotes into a set of compelling, interwoven stories.
@JHS and I continue to lead parallel lives. We saw *Hidden Figures * today today. Same experience. Lots of cheering just a feel good movie. It really made us want to see The Right Stuff Again. Surely some liberties were taken with the facts though, John Glenn had any say in who did the number checking? I don’t think so!
Not a new film (2014), but an interesting one to check out on Netflix: The One I Love. It’s described as a science fiction thriller, but I’d say it’s more of a mind-bending dramedy along the lines of Being John Malkovich. It stars the luminous Elizabeth Moss (Peggy, on Mad Men.)
Went to see Hidden Figures with a friend. We both liked it.
Loved Hidden Figures. So did H. The theater was packed.
@ Mathmom - Hidden Figures does stray from real life some, but that part is actually correct when one looks at the Fact Checking website:
http://www.historyvshollywood.com/reelfaces/hidden-figures/
“Did John Glenn really ask that Katherine double-check the electronic computer’s calculations for his first Earth orbit?
Yes. Fact-checking the Hidden Figures movie confirmed that John Glenn personally requested that Katherine recheck the electronic computer’s calculations for his February 1962 flight aboard the Mercury-Atlas 6 capsule Friendship 7—the NASA mission that concluded with him becoming the first American to orbit the Earth. The scene in the movie unfolded in almost exactly the same way it does in real life, with Glenn’s request for Katherine taken nearly verbatim from the transcripts. He even refers to her as “the girl.” “Get the girl to check the numbers… If she says the numbers are good… I’m ready to go.” -NASA”
ps We loved Hidden Figures too… they had to make adjustments, but what they did seemed ok. The real Katherine Johnson loved it… (see website above).
@FallGirl, a friend also saw it in a packed theater. I think moviegoers are… making a statement.
Meanwhile, my sister, her son, and her son’s friend were the only moviegoers in the theater when they saw “Fences.” My daughter and I saw it in a full theater; my daughter was the youngest audience member by far (probably three decades separating her and the next youngest person).
Saw Hidden Figures today. Wow. What an uplifting movie.
My wife and I try to see all of the Best Picture nominees. Of course, we’d like to see them all at the cinema, but it’s hard to know which will be nominated. This year, among the films we think will be nominated, we’ve seen the following (I’m trying hard to keep out spoilers, but read cautiously if you have not seen one of these yet):
La La Land - I loved it except for the ending – found it wonderfully cool and entertaining and a (mostly) sweet love story. My wife, a cynic who calls herself a realist, disliked everything but the ending. I sighed/gasped (No!) along with most of the rest of the audience – it was audible – when the key r’ship disposition was made clear. My wife did not. lol
Manchester By the Sea - We both loved it. The “big reveal” was a real heartbreaker for us, as i’m sure it is for most. That poor man! What a gut-wrenching film and great performance by Affleck. Definitely Best Pic material.
Fences - We both liked it. It wasn’t quite as powerful throughout as MBTS, but the end brought the tears. And when I cry, I tend to remember the film fondly. The horn-blowing scene with you-know-who there at the end, and the sense of nostalgia and innocent love and loyalty accompanying it, really got to me. Denzel was awesome as usual.
Hidden Figures - We liked it, but didn’t find it as powerful or creative as MBTS or Fences. And it didn’t transport me to fantasyland the way LLL did. Yet, it’s a feel-good histopic that’s well worth your time. Just not quite Best Pic material, IMO.
We’ve heard very good things about Hell or High Water (DVD on that one…), Moonlight, and Lion. Those or any others that are nominated by AMPAS will be added to our list. We’ll probably catch Moonlight this week. Can’t wait!
@mathmom : Based on reading some articles about the factual background of Hidden Figures, that part of the John Glenn story was basically true, although nowhere near as dramatic as the movie made it seem. Apparently, he distrusted the IBM computer, and when the program shifted over to computer calculations he demanded that “the girl” (whom he had met) confirm them all. He also was unique among the Mercury astronauts in being generous and friendly with many of the workers in the program.
Some of the liberties the film took are obvious: Mission Control for the Mercury missions was in Cape Canaveral, not Langley, Virginia. Katherine Johnson may have been there, but probably not, and no one ran from Mission Control to the West Campus at Langley to retrieve her… The biggest liberties were taken with time. The Octavia Spencer character worked at Langley starting in the mid-30s, and she was promoted to supervisor in 1948. The character played by Janelle Mona’e got permission to take extension courses at a segregated high school in 1956, not 1962. Which makes a lot more sense: In 1956, there was still a great deal of confusion about how to implement the first Brown v. Board of Education ruling, and lots of state resistance, but it was essentially settled law that postgraduate education could not be segregated if there were not equal courses available for Blacks. (Katherine Johnson had been accepted as a graduate student in math at segregated West Virginia University in 1939, after graduating from a Negro college at 18.) By the time of the Mercury program, she was already an engineer.
Finally saw LaLaLand in a packed theater yesterday afternoon and really enjoyed it. I wasn’t sure i would like it, but thought it was great. I wasn’t put off by the less than perfect singing of the leads. As my friend said, it probably fit better in the story which had them as somewhat struggling in their fields than it would have if they were brilliant singers. And the roles required much more acting than singing.
Hidden Figures has been doing great in the box office. Look forward to seeing it.
I also recently saw the Hunt for the Wilderpeople and enjoyed. Well worth watching.
That’s cool about Glenn, I always knew he was a good guy. As for the smoking I noticed that Al Harrison (Kevin Costner) chewed gum constantly. I think that was intended to be a stand in for the cigarettes, more than a guy who just quit smoking (also a possibility.) The other thing I wondered about was the flag lapel pins on a lot of the engineers. I don’t remember seeing any during that era, but then I was living in Japan when John Glenn made his first orbit so I’d only have seen Americans at the Consulate. There’s a brief history of the pins here: http://content.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,1820023,00.html and another here. https://www.quora.com/What-is-the-history-of-US-politicians-wearing-flag-pins It sounds like it really took off in the late 60s in the Nixon White House.