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Apollo 13: Under Pressure · Have You Seen?! The Movie Podcast

0:00
Joe: We interrupt this regularly scheduled podcast to bring you this special report.
0:04
Dylan: Following a successful return from the Artemis II's mission, the world is once again gazing towards the stars.
0:11
Joe: As space travel continues to advance, we find ourselves reflecting on one of the most remarkable missions in history.
0:19
Dylan: A mission that was never intended to be remembered this way.
0:22
Dylan: Yet it has become one of NASA's greatest survival stories.
0:52
Joe: This week we're headed into space with Apollo 13.
0:55
Joe: And with Artemis 2 just returning, it felt like the perfect time to revisit one of the most intense missions ever put on film.
1:04
Dylan: If you enjoyed the show, make sure to follow it on your favorite podcast app and leave us a five-star rating.
1:09
Dylan: It really helps the show grow.
1:11
Joe: And we want to hear from you.
1:13
Joe: Text us your name and a movie suggestion using the link in the description.
1:17
Dylan: This week's movie, Apollo 13, is rated PG for brief, strong language, and intense situations.
1:23
Dylan: If that's not suitable for little ears, we hope you'll tune in next week.
1:27
Dylan: But first, a word from our completely real sponsors.
1:32
Joe: Hello, my baby.
1:33
Joe: Hello, my hug.
1:41
Anna: In space, there's one thing you can't afford.
1:45
Anna: A little problem.
1:46
Anna: Hull breach.
1:49
Anna: Loose panel.
1:51
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1:54
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1:56
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1:59
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2:24
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2:34
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2:37
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2:39
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2:41
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3:18
Joe: Is it?
3:18
Joe: Yes.
3:19
Dylan: The name sounds familiar.
3:22
Joe: Well, um Ron Howard uh was originally Opie in uh Andy Griffith's show.
3:32
Joe: And then he was Richie Cunningham in uh um Happy Days.
3:40
Joe: And he was also in between those two, he was in George Lucas's uh first movie, American Graffiti.
3:48
Joe: Which had a cameo by Harrison Ford.
3:57
Dylan: We must have talked about him in Bassing or something.
4:00
Joe: Yeah, I think we have.
4:02
Joe: He's produced movies, um and he's he went from being being a pretty good successful actor to directing.
4:13
Joe: He's done some Beatles uh documentaries recently, uh movies like Rush, Frost Nixon, Da Vinci Code, Cinderella Man.
4:27
Joe: Oh, How the Grinch Stole Christmas.
4:31
Joe: Yeah.
4:33
Dylan: Um The Story of My Life.
4:37
Joe: Which one are you?
4:40
Dylan: I think it's obvious.
4:41
Dylan: Yeah.
4:42
Dylan: Cindy Lou, no.
4:44
Dylan: The Who?
4:46
Dylan: Yes.
4:47
Dylan: All right.
4:50
Dylan: So for a quick plot setup, if you haven't seen this movie in a while, here's the quick setup.
4:57
Dylan: NASA's Apollo 13 mission to the moon is cut short after an onboard explosion, forcing astronauts and ground control to work together to bring the crew home safely.
5:07
Dylan: I have to say, I was not expecting for how tense they made this movie.
5:17
Joe: Yeah.
5:19
Dylan: I mean, especially like, you know, knowing the history and knowing the outcome, like, they definitely still did a good job.
5:30
Joe: It's one of those that you know the ending, but you still like holding your breath.
5:36
Dylan: I know, like when they were at the very end of it, when they were do entering the blackout and was waiting to hear back, I was like, oh, like my chest hurts.
5:48
Dylan: I feel the like just the tension of it.
5:51
Dylan: Yeah.
5:52
Joe: Yeah.
5:53
Dylan: It makes you wonder how much of that, you know, was from like Hollywood versus the real situation or, you know, the real moment.
6:06
Joe: Yeah.
6:07
Joe: So it was started from a book that Jim Lovell had had written.
6:11
Joe: Yeah.
6:12
Joe: And so they took a lot of, especially the dialogue from uh, you know, between the Palo 13 crew and uh uh the uh command center, um, they had transcripts for.
6:29
Dylan: Yeah.
6:29
Joe: And so they just kind of went verbatim at certain points.
6:33
Joe: Um and they did get complaints from people because they thought um things were a little too Hollywood when in reality a lot of it happened.
6:48
Dylan: Wow.
6:48
Joe: And it was just a crazy coincidence of events.
6:54
Dylan: So I mean, because like it's one of those things that you see, you know, based off of a true story.
7:02
Joe: Right.
7:02
Dylan: And you're like, okay, like yeah, walking by somebody on this on you know on the stairs, and you hear two seconds of their story.
7:10
Dylan: Oh, based on the true story, I can make a whole movie from this thing.
7:13
Joe: Oh, you know, yeah, there's a whole horror genre based on you know.
7:18
Joe: That's exactly what I was thinking.
7:20
Dylan: Yeah, a creepy doll that we're not gonna bring up.
7:23
Dylan: Yeah, yeah.
7:25
Joe: Yeah.
7:26
Joe: Yeah.
7:27
Joe: There are things like that.
7:29
Joe: And there's biopics and and other things that you know they they twist some things, and and there are I think when you look at the scope of it, there are minor things that are you know played for drama or whatever.
7:44
Joe: Yeah, like apparently, um, like Jim Lovell never cussed, he never cursed at all.
7:50
Joe: Oh, yeah.
7:50
Joe: So even saying GD or whatever, like he would not ever say that.
7:55
Joe: Um, but those were the things that were like kind of little changes that were made.
8:01
Dylan: Right.
8:02
Dylan: So let's talk about the characters.
8:05
Dylan: Okay.
8:05
Dylan: So Jim Lovell played by Tom Hanks.
8:10
Dylan: Yeah.
8:11
Dylan: Um, even I recognize him.
8:14
Joe: Yeah.
8:14
Joe: And it's kind of funny with Tom Hanks because you would have thought that when Toy Story came up, he would have been Buzz Lightyear.
8:25
Joe: Yeah.
8:27
Joe: Like with was that too on the nose?
8:32
Joe: A little on the nose there.
8:33
Joe: Yeah.
8:34
Joe: We like him for this cowboy.
8:40
Joe: Right.
8:44
Dylan: Well, and like Tom Hanks is one of those like voices that is just like instantly recognizable.
8:54
Joe: Oh, yeah.
8:55
Dylan: Um, but he does such a good job, like in any role he has.
9:01
Joe: Yeah.
9:01
Joe: Yeah, the tone of his voice and all these, you know.
9:04
Joe: Apparently, when they started casting, it was before Forrest Gump had even come out and Philadelphia.
9:10
Joe: Yeah.
9:11
Joe: And so a lot of people, people even contacted uh Ron Howard, who knew him, and said, Are you gonna do like a comedic take on this?
9:20
Joe: Because you know, he was in Big and some other uh, you know, one of his first his first TV show was called Bosom Buddies, where him and another guy had have to dress up as as ladies to to get a um room in a dorm.
9:36
Joe: Oh and this is like two seasons of that.
9:39
Joe: So yeah, so at the time it's like you know, you have not you don't have as dramatic references, right?
9:48
Dylan: I mean, what is essentially people look at as a like a comedy actor?
9:54
Joe: It's like okay, you can you cast this comedian, you know, like what is this movie gonna be?
9:59
Joe: Yeah.
10:00
Joe: Um, and so so yeah, they were they're very very hesitant, but when Brian Grazer, the producer, and um Ron Howard got together, they asked, Who does the world want to save the most?
10:16
Joe: Like wow.
10:19
Joe: So of all the actors, who would the world want to save the most?
10:22
Joe: Tom Hanks was the was the shoe-in for that.
10:26
Joe: So there you go.
10:32
Dylan: Yeah, for being his first like serious role though, like he pulled out all the stops for that.
10:41
Joe: Yeah, I mean, you know, yeah, there's just points of you know where he goes on to, you know, do private Ryan and everything, and he and he's he's just he just plays a leader really well.
10:54
Dylan: Yeah.
10:55
Joe: And you know, takes over in in some of those situations, and just he's he just has a great dynamic range.
11:05
Dylan: For sure.
11:05
Dylan: So next you have Fred Hayes.
11:11
Joe: Played by Bill Paxton.
11:14
Dylan: I recognized him.
11:15
Joe: Yeah.
11:16
Joe: Yeah, he's been in everything from aliens to twister, um Terminator, the first Terminator.
11:27
Joe: Uh I mean, he's just had so many parts.
11:29
Joe: So one of my favorite movies that he's in that hopefully will cover some point is Tombstone.
11:36
Joe: So Love of Mine.
11:41
Joe: But yeah, he he just great sporting actor in this one.
11:47
Dylan: Yeah.
11:48
Dylan: Yeah, I I couldn't think of his name.
11:50
Dylan: I'm terrible with names, but I was like, ooh, I know him.
11:53
Dylan: Yeah, I recognize him.
11:55
Joe: Yeah, yeah.
11:56
Joe: Jack Swig Swaggart uh is played by Kevin Bacon, which most people know him from uh Footloose.
12:05
Joe: Yeah.
12:06
Joe: It's one of his biggest.
12:10
Joe: I mean, he's he's done so many as well, but Footloose is probably what most people know him for.
12:18
Dylan: Yeah.
12:18
Dylan: Um yeah, for for Jack to like pass away from cancer after all of that.
12:29
Dylan: I know that's wild.
12:33
Joe: Yeah, just to go through all that and just yeah.
12:39
Dylan: So when they switched him out, um how many days did he have?
12:51
Joe: I thought he only had a few, or like a week or something like that.
12:55
Dylan: I was thinking like not long at all.
12:58
Dylan: Yeah.
12:59
Dylan: And like, even though he's a part of like, you know, the the B crew or whatever.
13:05
Dylan: Right, yeah.
13:06
Joe: He was an understudy, essentially.
13:09
Joe: Right.
13:09
Joe: So then you have mission control leader Gene Kranz, played by Ed Harris.
13:17
Joe: Ed Harris has been in tons of movies.
13:23
Joe: Um Truman Sho.
13:26
Joe: He was good great in that.
13:29
Joe: Just there's all these you know, actors that there's so many things that you just know them, you recognize them.
13:39
Dylan: Yeah, but Ed Harris, though, is another one of those that he he has a recognizable face.
13:46
Dylan: Yeah.
13:47
Dylan: And so when they first showed him on screen, I was like, oh, I recognize that one too.
13:54
Dylan: Yeah.
13:54
Dylan: Could not tell you what from, but you know, yeah.
13:57
Joe: And and in the command center, there are a lot of actors back there that, you know, are soon to come on their own or have been in multiple films and just, you know, character actors or you know.
14:10
Dylan: Um so um who who played um I was gonna say Tom Hanks.
14:19
Dylan: Um well who who played um Jim Lovell's wife?
14:26
Joe: Uh Kathleen Quinlan.
14:28
Dylan: Uh Marilyn.
14:30
Dylan: That's her name.
14:30
Joe: Yeah, Marilyn.
14:31
Joe: Marilyn Lovell.
14:33
Dylan: They did not spend as much time with her character as I thought they were going to.
14:37
Joe: Oh, really?
14:38
Joe: You didn't think so, huh?
14:41
Dylan: I I I guess I was just expecting more.
14:44
Dylan: I mean, like the the screen time they had for her was definitely like quality.
14:53
Dylan: Yeah.
14:53
Dylan: She did a great job acting.
14:56
Joe: Yeah.
14:57
Joe: I think this was her only Oscar nominated role.
15:03
Dylan: Really?
15:04
Joe: Yeah.
15:04
Joe: Wow.
15:06
Joe: Which is surprising because um she was in the movie The Doors, and that was Oliver Stone and Val Kilmer, and that was just an amazing movie that was nominated and stuff.
15:19
Joe: So I'm surprised that she wasn't nominated for that either.
15:23
Dylan: So wow.
15:24
Dylan: Yeah.
15:25
Dylan: All right, let's talk about the sound here.
15:27
Dylan: Okay.
15:28
Dylan: The the soundtrack was definitely is definitely good.
15:33
Dylan: Who was the composer?
15:37
Joe: Uh James Horner.
15:40
Dylan: Oh, that's not recognizable.
15:43
Joe: I know.
15:45
Dylan: Um yeah.
15:48
Joe: I think the thing about it too was that the because of it being in the 60s, uh, there was use of a lot of older songs from the 60s.
16:01
Dylan: Yeah.
16:01
Joe: You know, which is pretty cool because I mean it it kind of defines where you're at at the time and stuff.
16:07
Joe: And uh anywhere from, you know, when they're in space and they're playing, they're supposed to play 2001 Space Odyssey, and he plays Spirit in the Sky.
16:18
Joe: Oh, you know.
16:19
Joe: Um, yeah, it's uh it's kind of like that guitar riff that uh dun dun dun and uh so gotcha.
16:30
Joe: And then there's another scene where um they're they're playing uh the daughter's playing like Purple Haze from uh Jimi Hendrix.
16:41
Joe: Yeah, you know, just all these Grooven uh from the Rascals, somebody to love Jefferson Airplane, crashing out over the Beatles break up yeah, yeah, exactly.
16:53
Joe: I so the funny thing about that is they couldn't get the rights to the Beatles music because the Beatles at the time didn't uh kind of lend out their music for uh you know movies and stuff, and so they couldn't get the rights, so they ended up playing Jimi Hendrix instead.
17:12
Joe: Funny.
17:13
Joe: Yeah, yeah.
17:14
Joe: Well, yeah.
17:19
Joe: Um the other thing that was interesting about this is at when the radio or the cassette player is is like brrrrrrrrrr, you know, it's like the last song is playing, and it's Blue Moon.
17:34
Joe: That was actually a more modern band called the Mavericks.
17:38
Joe: Um and they had them record that.
17:40
Joe: Uh I'm not sure if it was Wrights or or what, but for some reason they had them record that, which kind of made them kind of catapulted that band into, you know, kind of more fame.
17:53
Dylan: Took them to the moon.
17:54
Joe: Yeah, took them to the moon, really.
17:58
Dylan: Um something that I really felt with the like the music in this is just like the the emotion of the music.
18:11
Dylan: Um he did a very good job of like, you know, like with like the you know, the rocket ship blasting off and just creating kind of the awe and wonder feeling in them.
18:27
Dylan: Yeah.
18:30
Dylan: And then like, you know, at the end waiting for them to splash down and just like the the tension that was created.
18:41
Joe: Yeah, which man, it just there was tension all around once they got up.
18:47
Dylan: Yeah, yeah, and then the the overall sound design that they did was really good too.
18:53
Dylan: Like, I don't know how realistic it is, but like it just hit the exact beats that I would expect it to, you know.
19:03
Joe: Yeah, yeah, and the yeah, the sound effects and things like that where they really took the time to find the mechanical even when the um what is it that they're joining ships, you know, and there's this little like you know, it's like they got as much detail about all the sounds that they could find and and put it together, and yeah, just that just really goes to show like how the movie is put together, just the overall like commitment to realism.
19:38
Dylan: Right.
19:39
Dylan: I mean, that's what sets it, you know, above and beyond.
19:44
Joe: Yeah, it it was definitely um interviewing everybody from anybody who's part of the space command to the astronauts that were alive at the time, yeah.
19:58
Joe: Uh reading Jim Lovell's book, um having every detail that they could and just creating that realism of of um weightlessness and things like that.
20:12
Dylan: It just so how did they do that?
20:14
Dylan: Because I was like, you know, watching and I was trying to like see if I could figure it out.
20:23
Joe: Acting.
20:24
Joe: Magic.
20:28
Damion: Well, that's the show.
20:30
Joe: Yeah.
20:30
Joe: There's uh there's a plane called the KC-135, and um NASA actually used it to recreate uh uh you know weightlessness in space.
20:47
Joe: And so what they do is you basically go on this plane, it does a nosedive for 23 seconds, and then you become weightless as yeah, it's like riding the inside of a roller coaster.
21:01
Joe: That's yeah.
21:02
Joe: So what they did was they created a a little set of the ship, and they had the actors in there, and then they would do so.
21:11
Joe: Whenever like they're showing weight, so when he threw up, he threw up for real.
21:15
Joe: Yes, yes, yes, it was canned soup or something that he left in his mouth.
21:21
Joe: Really?
21:21
Dylan: Yeah, oh my gosh, that's wild.
21:24
Joe: Yeah, so a lot of those shots were were done through there.
21:30
Joe: Um and so they he was able to uh uh Ron Howard was able to get permission from NASA to do that because you know it was it it's a tribute to NASA anyway, you know.
21:42
Joe: So it's like um it was it was coined the vomit comet.
21:49
Dylan: I've heard that name.
21:50
Dylan: Yeah.
21:52
Joe: Yeah.
21:53
Joe: So filming inside the plane, they could only do 25 seconds.
21:59
Joe: Bursts.
22:00
Joe: So the plane performs 612 dives, giving filmmakers 54 minutes of footage in weightless environments.
22:10
Dylan: Wow.
22:11
Dylan: I mean, because like not only do you have like your your actors, yeah, but all of like the like supporting cast that goes along with that, like also has to be there.
22:26
Joe: Yeah.
22:26
Joe: Yeah.
22:27
Joe: Yeah.
22:27
Joe: Yeah.
22:28
Joe: The cameramen and all that kind of stuff hanging out in the back.
22:34
Joe: Being thrown around.
22:35
Joe: Yeah, being thrown around.
22:36
Joe: Get ready.
22:37
Joe: You know.
22:38
Joe: But again, going back to the acting part of it, some of the weightlessness was done on a sound stage.
22:46
Joe: And they would position themselves, you know, in a certain way and to just be just uncomfortable.
22:55
Joe: And then they would then they would turn the camera.
22:58
Joe: And so then that would give you the or you know feeling of orientation being off.
23:02
Joe: Right.
23:03
Dylan: Um, and yeah, there were a few times where I've noticed, I noticed where like somebody like turned, and I'm like, oh, you're definitely just like sitting down, like you know, rotating in your seat.
23:14
Joe: But there's a there is a shot where um Bill Paxton is playing with the radio, and he's actually it's it's they're not in the weightless uh really oh wow, so they became good at making it look like things were floating or whatever, you know, when they weren't.
23:32
Joe: And um I guess some of the positions were like sustaining a sit-up in place for minutes at a time.
23:41
Joe: Oh man.
23:43
Joe: Yeah.
23:44
Joe: So it wasn't completely easy the whole time either.
23:48
Dylan: Right.
23:48
Joe: One of the biggest things was when the script was originally written, um the space command didn't really have our command center didn't really have like characters to them.
24:02
Joe: And as they refined the story in the script, they found that they had three key pieces of the story, which was um the people on Earth and the families, and then you had the mission controllers, and then you had you know the the guys in space trying to get back home.
24:25
Joe: And so they they tried to tie those um together.
24:31
Joe: Um and so it's kind of like where um Marilyn's mission was to hold her family together, yeah.
24:42
Joe: You know, and it was like you kind of see that where they go and visit his mom, and yeah, you know, she's taking care of all the stuff that's going on on earth, and you know, she's having to deal with media and and all those things.
24:56
Joe: And so, like when he interviewed the and started to get to know all the people who were in the command center, um they described it like it would be like a surgery crew trying to save your best friend on the operating table.
25:17
Joe: It's like that's how close they were, like um they were like family or like a brotherhood, and so the minute anything happened, everybody got together, everybody felt it, yeah, yeah.
25:34
Dylan: Alright, so we've got to talk about favorite scenes because there were some good ones.
25:39
Dylan: Um one of my favorites was just the launch sequence.
25:46
Dylan: Yeah.
25:48
Dylan: Like they just went into such detail with everything and did so it just did so good.
25:54
Joe: Yeah, yeah.
25:55
Joe: I mean, considering like the majority of that stuff was, you know, there were models used, but the majority of the the launch was CG.
26:04
Joe: Yeah, for the for the time, it's amazing how I don't know if it was budget or time or what it was, but you know, you look at some movies in '95 and it's like, ugh, you know, yeah.
26:16
Joe: And this was like, whoa.
26:17
Joe: Right.
26:17
Joe: You know, like any little thing from uh, you know, when when uh Jim Lovell's having that dream sequence where he's walking on the moon, yeah.
26:30
Joe: When he lifts that first piece of glass up, that was that was there, but the second piece that's kind of covering his face, where kind of the clear part wasn't there, you know.
26:42
Dylan: Oh, so okay, so the tinted visor was real that he put up.
26:47
Joe: Uh-huh.
26:47
Joe: But then the clear yeah.
26:51
Joe: Wow.
26:52
Joe: Yeah, I know.
26:53
Joe: Things like that that are just so tiny or so, but you know, it it just the people behind it were were just artists.
27:03
Joe: Yeah.
27:05
Dylan: Yeah, like another one for me is the like explosion moment and Houston we have a problem.
27:13
Joe: Yeah.
27:14
Dylan: Um just the the weight of that moment.
27:21
Dylan: You just felt it.
27:23
Dylan: Yeah.
27:23
Dylan: And you know, people not knowing what's going on, and it's like trying to scramble to figure it out, and just it it showcased the the tension of that moment.
27:40
Joe: Yeah, and and I think one of the biggest things was how cool and calm and collected they were, even though things were like in a panic, yeah, they could still have this grace under pressure, right, and and just talk through it.
27:58
Joe: And you know, they know time is a factor, but if your emotions get the best of you, that could be your life.
28:06
Joe: Right.
28:07
Joe: You know, for sure.
28:09
Joe: Just kind of on a effects scale, too, is just like how he has those dream sequences, um, yeah, you know, and he's just it's like subconsciously like oh you know, yeah.
28:23
Joe: Yeah.
28:24
Joe: Um could you not?
28:26
Joe: Right.
28:26
Joe: Yeah, it's you're already in dire straits, and it's just it's hard to stay calm and cool.
28:33
Joe: And um I I definitely like the um the Gary Sinise character that um you know he's been grounded and um it's uh Ken Ken Madden Ken Mattingley, um you know, who was supposed to originally go and they said he, you know and so it's measles, measles.
29:02
Joe: Yeah.
29:03
Joe: So he what what I like about that whole thing was that he managed to get outside of himself to serve other people and to go and do his job.
29:14
Joe: And he was like, Well, I can't I can't be up there, but I can be down here, you know, helping them out and and stuff.
29:22
Joe: And so that was really cool to to show that part of it.
29:26
Dylan: Yeah.
29:26
Dylan: Or when they offered him, you know, to take a break.
29:30
Dylan: He's like, Well, you know, they can't take a break up there, so I'm not sure.
29:35
Dylan: You know, they don't have the time up there, so I don't have time down here.
29:38
Joe: Yeah, yeah.
29:40
Joe: Yeah.
29:41
Joe: Um, one of my I think maybe not a favorite scene, but anecdotal scenes uh that is funny.
29:51
Joe: Um is that oh yeah, after after Swagger admits having forgotten to file his taxes, Clinton Howard um is Ron Howard's brother.
30:05
Joe: Yeah.
30:06
Joe: Um he he goes, that's no joke.
30:09
Joe: They'll jump on him, you know.
30:11
Joe: And so apparently he had had tax problems in real life, and so he improvised the line and they kept it in.
30:19
Joe: That's a good one, yeah.
30:25
Joe: So it's just like those those kind of things that fall into place, you know.
30:32
Dylan: Yeah.
30:32
Dylan: Or the uh the the the pardon, if you will, of being out of the country.
30:40
Joe: Yeah, yeah.
30:44
Dylan: I'm out of off the planet for a little bit.
30:46
Joe: Yeah, I'm gonna be off the planet for a little bit.
30:48
Joe: More than out of the country.
30:52
Dylan: All right, Joe.
30:53
Dylan: So what do you have for behind the scenes nuggets?
30:56
Joe: Well, one of the things uh I was kind of alluding to was when um so after the premiere of the film, um, Ron Howard asked audience members to write a review of the film.
31:12
Joe: While most of the reviews were positive, one review stated that there was no way the crew would have survived the mission.
31:21
Joe: So apparently the person didn't understand that this was the true story.
31:26
Joe: Yeah.
31:32
Joe: And there was a lot of skepticism from people that felt like they were writing Hollywood stuff in because when um Marilyn is taking a shower and she drops her ring and loses it, people were like, Oh, that's oh, you're just going too far.
31:50
Dylan: You're just trying to go for symbolism.
31:52
Joe: Yeah, and and that actually happened.
31:54
Joe: Yeah.
31:55
Joe: And then the whole 13 thing was was like a real you know, yeah.
32:00
Joe: Yeah.
32:01
Joe: And she was very superstitious and did ask questions about it and was like, Are you sure you want to do this?
32:07
Joe: And yeah, this is kind of, you know.
32:10
Joe: So when uh another side note is that they were nominated for you know multiple Oscars, they got nine Oscar nominations.
32:21
Dylan: Okay.
32:22
Joe: When they got to the last one, um Brian Grazer was sitting at the Oscars waiting to hear the nominees being announced, and he was sitting next to Jim Lovell.
32:35
Dylan: Yeah.
32:36
Joe: He thought he heard his name because he heard B, and they ended up saying Braveheart.
32:42
Joe: So he's he stood up and then he sat down because he thought he, you know, he thought he was gonna go up and get the award, and then he heard it was Braveheart that won.
32:52
Dylan: Yeah.
32:53
Joe: And he thought it was gonna say Brian Grazer for Apollo 13.
32:57
Joe: You know, so he sits down and Jim Lovell put his hand on him and said, Don't worry, I never made it to the moon either.
33:05
Joe: Oh man.
33:12
Dylan: We get it, okay.
33:13
Dylan: Yeah, it's like man.
33:18
Joe: Originally, John Travolta was offered the role and of what?
33:22
Joe: Of Jim Lovell.
33:24
Dylan: Really?
33:25
Joe: Yeah, yeah.
33:26
Joe: Yeah.
33:27
Joe: Going to pilot their teeth.
33:30
Joe: Um, and he turned it down, which would be the second role that he he had turned down that Tom Hanks ended up getting, and the first one was Forrest Gump.
33:40
Joe: So so he was on kind of uh like, you're not picking the good movies here.
33:47
Joe: Like right.
33:48
Joe: I mean, if if I had a choice, because uh you know, Forrest Gump was being directed by uh Robert Zumakis, that would have been for me.
33:59
Joe: Okay, I'm I'm doing this, you know.
34:01
Joe: Uh Ron Howard, I'm doing this.
34:04
Joe: I don't care if I have to be the water boy and you know play the coffee pot or something, but I'm gonna be in a Ron Howard film.
34:15
Dylan: The two powerful coffee pot.
34:17
Dylan: Exactly.
34:18
Dylan: All right.
34:19
Dylan: So, Joe, what kind of impact would you say that this movie had on like film culture and stuff?
34:28
Joe: Well, I think I think it was part of pushing the boundaries of not not only technology, but telling telling a true story.
34:37
Joe: Yeah.
34:37
Joe: You know, and it because the accuracy that they went through, and uh, I guess it was Jim Lovell who when he saw the launch had asked Ron Howard where he and covered like these archives of footage because it looks so real, and some of the shots you know look like things that he's seen, and he was he was just blown away by that.
35:06
Joe: And so that that kind of realism that they put into it and in and things that I think influence movies after that, you know, just to get those details down because it's those subtle things the details matter, yeah, matter.
35:23
Dylan: So yeah, and it's such like a a celebration of like the teamwork and uh the all the problem solving that goes into that.
35:33
Joe: Yeah, like who like in an adventure slash suspense movie would think that a whole bunch of people would be doing long division for everybody to save their lives, you know?
35:49
Dylan: Yeah.
35:50
Dylan: Man, and I always thought long division was pointless.
35:54
Joe: Right, right, exactly.
35:55
Joe: You could just hear the moms of the world going, Say I told you, you gotta study your math.
36:02
Joe: Yeah, my uh two of my nephews or two of my nephews and uh my niece, they're all the same brothers and sisters, they're math leads, and so I turned over to to uh my wife and I said, This is why they need him.
36:21
Joe: They need him to work for NASA.
36:24
Joe: Yeah.
36:30
Dylan: Well, and it makes you wonder too, like how much it like revitalized kind of the the space culture, if you will.
36:41
Joe: Yeah.
36:42
Joe: Yeah, it definitely does.
36:44
Joe: I think people look at it as a good reference for even the situation of what not to do or how to take care of those situations and how to you know solve those problems in space.
36:58
Joe: And I think one of the cool things is that like Walter Cronkite actually came back.
37:04
Joe: Uh he was one of the top reporters for years and was just known to be the guy to give stories, and so he actually came back to do overdubs for for the movie.
37:18
Joe: Huh.
37:20
Dylan: So was he the guy on the TV?
37:22
Joe: Yeah, he was the main guy with a mustache, not the other guy with like the uh like there was two main uh uh reporters on there, and Walter Crockite was the one with the mustache, and he was like interviewing people, yeah.
37:37
Joe: So but he was just yeah, back then he was one of the leading top reporters.
37:44
Dylan: Yeah.
37:44
Dylan: Something that I like was surprised about, didn't think about was all of the um the reporters on her lawn in her yard.
37:58
Joe: Yeah.
37:58
Joe: Yeah, just the fact that like they would they would uh yeah, just bounce on just yeah, like hang out just waiting to get a reaction.
38:14
Joe: Yeah, mm-hmm.
38:16
Joe: Yeah.
38:16
Joe: I th I thought it was cool too where they they showed how the the wives already had like preset things to say, and so yeah.
38:27
Dylan: Yeah.
38:28
Joe: Yeah.
38:29
Joe: It's like they they really prepped everybody to be, you know.
38:34
Dylan: Right.
38:34
Dylan: Well, I mean you get paid to think think everything through.
38:38
Joe: Yeah.
38:39
Joe: Yeah, it's definitely yeah.
38:43
Joe: I think the last thing is that Apollo 13 held the record for the deepest humans have the deepest humans have been in space in 1970 until the Artemis II broke that record by by a longer moon moon orbit in 2026.
39:05
Dylan: Yeah, because Artemis II went like 250 something thousand, you know, and it's just unfathomable.
39:16
Joe: Yeah, yeah.
39:17
Joe: I thought they were gonna walk on the moon.
39:20
Dylan: Did you really?
39:21
Joe: Yeah.
39:24
Dylan: Cause that like something that like was kind of links these two together a lot is that they follow like a lot of the same trajectory, yeah, because they were trying to stress test the Orion capsule.
39:41
Joe: Oh, okay.
39:42
Joe: Huh.
39:43
Joe: Wow.
39:45
Dylan: So yeah.
39:46
Dylan: Um, because I guess the Artemis one had a lot of issues with the heat shield.
39:52
Joe: Oh.
39:52
Dylan: And so but so Artemis II like covered the like half the circumference of the earth in like 14 minutes or something like that?
40:03
Dylan: Wow.
40:04
Dylan: Yeah.
40:05
Dylan: Crazy.
40:08
Joe: Yeah.
40:08
Joe: So even knowing how the movie ends, um did this movie still feel intense?
40:17
Joe: Yes, for sure.
40:20
Joe: Were there any were there any uh you know kind of things that you thought might be in it that weren't, or uh you know, what what kind of changed as you watched it?
40:38
Dylan: Um I was very impressed by how true to life it stayed.
40:45
Dylan: And um something that we were talking about beforehand is that like one of the things that got changed was like the argument between people and like for the sole reason to increase the dramatic factor of it and um just kind of comes back to like your grace under pressure comment.
41:15
Joe: Yeah.
41:16
Joe: Yeah.
41:18
Joe: Yeah, they definitely respected each other and had certain places where, you know, in the in the command center itself, they weren't allowed to argue, but when they went to those other rooms, they were allowed to argue as much as they wanted to.
41:34
Joe: Yeah, because it was it was about it was sort of like debating where your best idea, you get the best idea out to save somebody's life, or to, you know, so it's like they wanted that there, but they wanted this, you know, like the command center was like the sanctuary, yeah.
41:54
Dylan: So yeah, I would I would have to say like on uh like a rewatchability scale, like man, I'd have I'd probably I'd probably have to give it like an eight or a nine.
42:10
Joe: Yeah.
42:10
Joe: Like yeah, yeah.
42:13
Dylan: Um just with it just comes back to all of the the care and detail that was put into it.
42:24
Joe: Yeah.
42:24
Joe: Yeah.
42:25
Joe: It just the nostalgia of it, the detail to even the clothing, the styles, the haircuts, the mannerisms, um, just everything that that goes into it just to tell the story of what happened.
42:42
Joe: And um there were so many things that were that seemed Hollywood or that seemed uh crazy that some things were were were even removed because they were just like no, this might be too much for people, yeah.
43:00
Joe: So and I'm sure it could have been a longer movie.
43:04
Joe: There were so many things that were happening up there, and right, you know, so what would you rate this movie?
43:12
Joe: I think I'd go with an eight.
43:16
Joe: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
43:17
Joe: I mean, it definitely uh from Tom Hanks, uh Kevin Bacon, Bill Paxton, and Gary Sinise.
43:29
Joe: I mean, those guys are just amazing on their own.
43:33
Joe: Yeah, and then you just have this uh just ensemble of of actors, Kathleen Quinlan, and uh you know, every once in a while Clint Howard will show up in one of Ron Howard's movies, so it's kind of an Easter egg kind of thing.
43:49
Joe: He he was uh he was in a TV show called Gentle Ben, and we used to watch that, so I remember him from that.
43:57
Joe: Yeah, but yeah.
43:59
Joe: Yeah, it's just the whole ensemble, the whole uh uh script, the from you know and even having like again Ron Howard and Brian Grazer, like they're just you know, the the the guys who make great movies.
44:17
Joe: So yeah.
44:19
Dylan: Thanks for listening to Have You Seen the Movie Podcast.
44:23
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44:27
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44:32
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44:33
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44:37
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44:41
Joe: Everything you need is right there.
44:43
Dylan: We'll be back next week with another movie premiere.
44:46
Dylan: Dylan, I think we have a problem.
44:51
Dylan: Odyssey, Houston, welcome home.