William Broyles Jr. & Al Reinert
(based on the novel "Lost Moon" by Jim Lovell)
Music:
James Horner
Cast:
Jim Lovell: Tom Hanks (Bachelor Party, Big, The Bonfire of the Vanities, The Burbs, Dragnet, Forrest Gump, Joe Vs. the Volcano, A League of Their Own, The Man With One Red Shoe, The Money Pit, Nothing in Common, Philadelphia,
Punchline, Sleepless In Seattle, Splash, That Thing You Do!, Toy Story, Turner and Hooch, Volunteers)
Jack Swigert: Kevin Bacon (Criminal Law, Diner, A Few Good Men, Flatliners, Footloose, JFK, Murder in the First, National Lampoon's Animal House, Picture Perfect, The River Wild, Sleepers, Tremors)
Fred Haise: Bill Paxton (The Abyss, Aliens, Boxing Helena, The Evening Star, The Last Supper, Monolith, NAVY Seals, Next of Kin, One False Move, Predator 2, Slipstream, Stripes, The Terminator, Titanic, Trespass,
True Lies, Twister, Weird Science)
Ken Mattingly: Gary Sinise (Albino Alligator, A Midnight Clear, Forrest Gump, Jack the Bear, Of Mice and Men, The Quick and the Dead, Ransom)
Gene Kranz: Ed Harris (Absolute Power, The Abyss, Eye for an Eye, The Firm, Glengarry Glen Ross, Jacknife, Just Cause, Milk Money, Needful Things, Nixon, Places in the Heart, The Right Stuff, The Rock, State of Grace)
Marilyn Lovell: Kathleen Quinlan (Airport 77, American Graffiti, Breakdown, Clara's Heart, The Doors, Trial By Jury, Twilight Zone: The Movie)
Mary Haise: Tracy Reiner (A League of Their Own)
Whiz Kid: Austin O'Brien (Last Action Hero, Lawnmower Man)
Congressman: Roger Corman
Apollo 13
tells a true story, less than a year after the first time man walked on the
moon. It was considered as simply another routine mission until Lovell (Tom Hanks)
spoke the famous words, "Houston, we have a problem".
Lovell, Haise (Bill Paxton) and Mattingly (Gary Sinise) are the
three astronauts chosen to go up in the ship until April 9th 1970, 2 days before
the launch, when Mattingly gets the measles and has to pull out, much to the
annoyance of the other two. As a member of the backup team, Swigert (Kevin
Bacon) takes his place.
On the 13th day, disaster strikes and oxygen begins pouring out of the
tanks. Desperate measures are taken in an attempt to solve things.
Top-notch acting comes from all the big names, although Kathleen Quinlan
doesn't seem to do much apart from look forlorn as she waits for the return
of her husband.
The picture quality looks mostly crisp and clear, allowing Ron Howard's vision
to fill the screen, particularly the special FX which are nothing short of
superb, but it is marred slightly by a small level of grain throughout the
film which is prevalent in lighter-coloured scenes. The film is presented in
its original widescreen ratio of 2.35:1 and the print is anamorphically-enhanced
for 16:9 widescreen televisions which provides 33% higher resolution. The
average bitrate is a very good 7.38Mb/s, occasionally going above 9Mb/s.
The surround sound - Dolby Digital 5.1 for the English soundtrack with surround-only
for the rest - excels in every department from James Horner's score, through to
general ambience, right down to the rocket launch powerful enough to knock you
off your seat. Songs from the 60's and 70's form the background music back home,
such as
The Rascals (Groovin),
Jimi Hendrix (Purple Haze) and
Norman Greenbaum (Spirit In The Sky).
Extras :
Chapters and Trailer :
There are 57 chapters for the 134 minutes of film, which is exactly what's
required and mirrors the amount on the previously-released PAL Laserdisc.
The original theatrical trailer is included.
Languages and Subtitles :
Dolby Digital 5.1 adorns the English soundtrack, but the French, Germans, Italian
and Spanish have to put up with surround sound only. Subtitles are available
in ELEVEN languages: English, French, Dutch, German, Portuguese, Danish,
Finnish, Swedish, Norwegian, Polish and Czech.
Filmographies, Biographies and Production Notes:
Biographies with accompanying filmographies are available for
Hanks, Bacon, Paxton, Sinise, Harris, Kathleen Quinlan and
director Ron Howard, although in all cases they only go as far as
1997 (!)
A few pages of production notes are included to give some background info to
the film, while the booklet expands on that.
Audio Commentaries:
Track 1: Director Ron Howard shares his thoughts in a
feature-length commentary about the making of the film.
Track 2: Jim and Marilyn Lovell give their views.
Menu :
Similar to the first batch of Universal releases, the menu is static and silent,
but it has a picture of Hanks in the same pose that featured on the NTSC
Laserdisc. On playing the disc you see the Universal logo and a copyright
message before the main menu appears.
Overall, this is an excellent film which has some worthy extras on this DVD,
but it still falls short of the Region 1's content in a number of respects :
Original documentary: The Lost Moon: The Triumph of Apollo 13Special effects: Extensive exploration of the special effects
explained by Robert Legato and Mark Forker.
Featurettes: Comparison of the movie's key sequences with NASA
footage; Bill Paxton's home movies of going to space school.
Behind-the-scenes footage.
DVDs reviewed by the editor are watched on a Panasonic TXW32R4 32" widescreen TV
connected to either a Creative Dxr2 DVD-ROM player or Microsoft Xbox and
played through a Sony STR-DB930 amplifier.
PC games reviewed by the editor are on:
Since Nov 2005: Intel Pentium D 830 3.0Ghz, 1Gb RAM, 128Mb nVidia GeForce 6700XL, Windows XP
Since Aug 2003: Intel Pentium 4 2.66Ghz, 512Mb RAM, 128Mb GeForce4 MX440 graphics, Windows XP
Since May 2003: Intel Pentium 4 2.6Ghz, 512Mb RAM, 128Mb ATI Radeon 9600TX graphics, Windows XP
Since Jun 2002: Intel Pentium III 600Mhz, 384Mb RAM, Windows 98 SE, 64Mb ATI Radeon 8500LE
Since May 2000: Intel Pentium III 600Mhz, 384Mb RAM, Windows 98 SE, Voodoo 3 3000 AGP
