Apollo 13 (1995)
The story of the 1970 aborted Apollo 13 lunar mission – directed by Ron Howard, and starring Tom Hanks, Bill Paxton, Kevin Bacon, Gary Sinise and Ed Harris – is packed with true heroes. There are the astronauts launched into space (Jim Lovell, Jack Swigert and Fred Haise), the astronaut bumped off the flight due to potential illness (Ken Mattingley), and there are countless ground crew and personnel at Houston’s Mission Control Center, led by Flight Director Gene Kranz.
When the Apollo 13 lunar mission suffers catastrophic mechanical failure mid-flight, the lives of the three astronauts on board are placed in the hands of the engineers, astronauts and scientists of NASA, back on Earth. Faced with a situation never seen before, each individual must step up to the challenge of bringing the craft and its occupants back to Earth safely, and alive. As Lovell, Swigert and Haise are tested in unimaginable ways inside what is effectively a powerless tin can, floating in space, their NASA colleagues frantically search for new ways to generate the bare minimum of amps for a return journey from the moon.
We know the outcome, but the combination of heartbreak, fear and desperation conjured by Ron Howard and his filmmaking team make this an incredibly powerful piece of cinema. This is compounded by the other thing we know – that despite the talent and audacious ingenuity that brought these heroes back from the moon, no human has walked on it since Eugene Cernan in 1972.
