DVD Reviews

Apollo 13 (15th Anniversary Edition) – Blu-ray Review

By Frankie Dees Apr 15, 2010, 11:48 GMT

Nominated for nine Academy Awards®, including Best Picture, Apollo 13 blasts off onto Blu-ray? Hi-Def for the first time ever with Blu-ray? exclusive bonus features. Produced by Academy Award® winner Brian Grazer and directed by Oscar® winner Ron Howard, Apollo 13 stars two-time Academy Award® winner Tom Hanks, Kevin Bacon, Bill Paxton, Gary Sinise and Ed Harris in the inspiring and riveting story of the real-life space flight that gripped ...more

A top of the their game cast including Tom Hanks and Ed Harris headlines the true story of the peril’s of ‘Apollo 13’, a mission to the moon gone awry. Ron Howard’s usual no-frills filmmaking is a good fit for the suspenseful as-is material which led to his first of many blockbusters.

In 1984, Ron Howard directed Tom Hanks in his very first starring role in the whimsical ‘Splash’ with Howard himself only having one notable film under his belt, ‘Night Shift’. The stars aligned (no pun intended) almost a decade later for ‘Apollo 13’ which ended up being the third-highest grossing pic of 1995 beaten only by ‘Batman Forever’ and Hanks’ own ‘Toy Story’.

And to continue their film collaborations that read like the equivalent of ‘When Harry Met Sally’, they got together after another decade to settle into what seems like a ho-hum retirement with the altogether lackluster Dan Brown adaptation borefests ‘The Da Vinci Code’ and ‘Angels & Demons’, a decided waste of both their talents. Although at least Howard gave us the terrific ‘Frost/Nixon’ – Hanks, meanwhile, is apparently sitting around counting his Langdon dough.

Which leads me to a tangent as ‘Apollo 13’ reminded me just how damn charismatic Hanks once was and has it really been eight years since he has done anything remotely notable (box office success be damned)? If you’re keeping track, ‘Catch Me If You Can’ and ‘Road to Perdition’ being his 2002 one-two punch. Since then? Feel free to disagree on ‘The Lady Killers’, ‘The Terminal’, or, ugh, ‘The Polar Express’.

Anyway, back to the pic at hand at a time when Hanks could do no wrong. The script by William Broyles Jr. and Al Reinert based on the book ‘Lost Moon’ by Jim Lovell (portrayed by Hanks) and Jeffrey Kluger is a mostly to-the-point linear affair where their journalist backgrounds clearly come into play in offering a lot of well-researched sequences that keep the film tense and suitably dramatic if not ever really offering the depth of, say, ‘The Right Stuff’.

Yet, the film really flies on the strength of a great ensemble cast with Hanks, Ed Harris, Bill Paxton, Kevin Bacon and Gary Sinise all getting chances to shine. Opening scenes settle in on the homestead of astronaut Jim Lovell (Tom Hanks) as he gathers with his dutiful wife (Kathleen Quinlan) and friends to watch the historic moment Neil Armstrong becomes the first man to walk on the moon on July 20, 1969.

A vet of a few space missions where he was mere miles from the moon but had yet to step foot on it, Jim’s chance comes with ‘Apollo 13’, a unlucky number whose meaning is not lost on his wife.

A first setback comes when pro com module pilot Ken Mattingly (Gary Sinise) gets a bogus diagnosis that he might get the measles in space and devastatingly has to relinquish his spot on the spacecraft to a less experienced pilot, the womanizing cocky Jack Swigert (Kevin Bacon).

So Jim, Jack and family man Fred Haise (Bill Paxton) shoot off successfully on April 11, 1970 and all goes well enough for a couple days but disaster strikes when Jack performs a routine ‘oxygen stirring’ and a tank explodes resulting in a myriad of problems including a lack of oxygen, a rise in carbon dioxide and a continuing loss of power available to the shuttle. Not only does this ruin their chances for a moon landing but it also means that there’s a considerable chance they won’t be able to return home.

So the last hour and a half of the film is all about the survival of these men who, if they died, would be the first Americans to not make it home from outer space. Cutting back and forth from mission control headed up by Gene Kranz (Ed Harris) who puts his team to work on rescue procedures including bringing in a depressed, drunken Ken Mattingly who hits the simulators to recreate the Apollo’s situation and come up with power-saving solutions to the dire situation amongst the three on Apollo 13, the film ends up at the inevitable but is consistently fascinating getting there.

The film is also effective with time and place and pulls viewers into an era where space exploration was genuinely exciting even if the film makes a point that America was bored with it by the third trip to the moon. The film is fifteen years old but effects hold up well including the ILM handling of the initial rocket launch and the real zero gravity moments of the actors.

The 1080p AVC 2.35:1 encode is a solid transfer for it’s age with nice detail but the film always had an intentionally soft image which doesn’t’ sparkle in high-def. Ironically, the Earth-bound scenes fare the best such as the scenes at Lovell’s home where colors are more vibrant and the late 60’s era sets and costumes get to come to life. The DTS-HD Master Aud track fares better with the rocket launch being the spotlight.

Most of the features from the Anniversary DVD release have been carried over which start off with two audio commentaries. The first with just Ron Howard and the second with the real Jim Lovell and his wife Marilyn and both end up being great listens. The track with the Lovell’s is particularly fascinating for history buffs and fans of the film alike.

Next is the hour-long ‘Lost Moon: The Triumph of Apollo 13’, a fine doc from the original ‘Collector’s Edition’ DVD. As typical of Universal’s early CE DVDs, the doc is pretty comprehensive and gives us an in-depth look at the making-of the film including interviews with cast and crew.

The newer ‘Conquering Space: The Moon and Beyond’ runs 50 minutes and is a history-channel like doc on the world’s space race. ‘Lucky 13: The Astronaut’s story’ is a quick featurette that takes a look at a lot of the real-life peeps in the film including Lovell, Haise and Kranz.

New for the Blu-ray is Universal’s ‘U-Control’, a interactive Picture in Picture feature that contains pop-up info tidbits on the ‘Apollo Era’ and ‘Tech-Splanations’ which examines the science behind the mission.

I always like ‘U-Control’ as it allows you to watch these featurettes individually that way you don’t have to fast forward through the film if all you want to do is watch this content. Standards BD-Live, pocketBlu and social Blu are also featured which allows social network access and iPod, iPhone and Blackberry content access.

A well-made, well-acted story of real-life survival, ‘Apollo 13’ is one of Ron Howard’s strongest films. One might argue that Howard’s usual restrained filmmaking style is more than evident here but I found the story a good match for his sensibilities – too much flash might have overpowered what is at its heart, a simple but powerful story of three men that want to live. The Blu-ray specs are solid and special features good with Universal even throwing in some new stuff – a welcome and recommended catalog release.