First Man with Ryan Gosling blasts off as one year’s best films

FIRST MAN with Ryan Gosling as pioneer astronaut Neil Armstrong approaches our fascination with space from an unexpected angle, and with breathtaking creative flair.

WHILE it remains a mystery as to why Hollywood took so long to tell the story of the first successful expedition to the moon, the wait proves to be well and truly worth it once you have witnessed the wonder of First Man.

Just as Dunkirk last year radically departed from accepted filmmaking norms to find a whole new perspective on the futility of war, First Man approaches our inherent fascination with space from both an unexpected angle, and with breathtaking creative flair.

Though its bravely unorthodox visual style and skeletal storytelling structure are sure to divide viewers in months to come, First Man is still undoubtedly one of the best and most significant movie releases of 2018.

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Ryan Gosling plays astronaut Neil Armstrong in ‘First Man’. Picture: Supplied

Oscar-winning director Damien Chazelle (working in a markedly different mode from his last work, La La Land) has definitely shaped a screen spectacle designed to completely enthrall audiences. However, he does so with an intimacy and intricacy that normally go undetected on this vast cinematic scale.

The astonishing sequence which opens First Man amounts to a virtual declaration of independence from any other space movie we have seen before.

The year is 1961, and the man destined to leave that fateful first footprint on the lunar surface, Neil Armstrong (played by Ryan Gosling), is piloting an X-15 rocket-powered aircraft.

‘First Man’ is still undoubtedly one of the best and most significant movie releases of 2018.

Far beneath him is the barren expanse of the Mojave Desert. Just outside his window is that unworldly area where the outer reaches of our atmosphere are about to end, and the vast emptiness of space will begin.

There is not a single second where Armstrong gets to enjoy the view. The machine with which he is perpetually locked in logistical and physical battle seems as if it will come apart at any moment.

Chazelle’s frenetically rattling camera keeps registering confusion, concentration and real terror in Armstrong’s eyes. Then there is the sound the craft makes: a chilling combination of a rolling thunderous rumble topped by a continuous metallic scream.

Jason Clarke (back centre), Ryan Gosling (centre) and Pablo Schreiber (back right) in a scene from ‘First Man’. Picture: Supplied

As Armstrong goes on to ascend from unassuming civilian pilot-engineer to unlikely NASA astronaut, the safety levels of the proto-spacecraft he is called upon to test, steer and land barely improve. However, the odds he might die steadily increase.

The movie charts Armstrong’s eight-year odyssey from the Mojave Desert to the moon with the same intense reserve as the man himself.

Again, this may make First Man a difficult prospect for some viewers to warm to. Gosling’s nuanced, almost hushed depiction of Armstrong as a man carefully orbiting around his true emotions is the only way he could be portrayed, and holds the only key to understanding this remote, yet focused character.

Ryan Gosling plays astronaut Neil Armstrong as inscrutable in ‘First Man’. Picture: Supplied

The final third of First Man is, of course, devoted to Armstrong’s crowning achievement as the pioneering leader of the Apollo 11 mission to the moon.

It is here the triumph of First Man is finally secured, balancing the momentous historical nature of the occasion (”one small step for man ...”) with a single touching moment where the inscrutable Armstrong finally lets his guard down.

FIRST MAN (M)

Rating: Four and a half stars (4.5 out of 5)

Director: Damien Chazelle (La La Land)

Starring: Ryan Gosling, Claire Foy, Jason Clarke, Kyle Chandler, Corey Stoll, Patrick Fugit.

A small step, a giant leap, and a mighty film

First Man opens on general release next Thursday, October 11.