There was a demon that lived in the air. They said whoever challenged him would die. Dopo l'ottimo
Dalla Terra alla Luna che copriva l'intero programma spaziale fino al progetto
Apollo e l'eccellente
Apollo 13 sulla sfortunata terza missione lunare, mi sono sentito in dovere di rivedere il superbo
The Right Stuff (pessimamente tradotto in
Uomini Veri: molto meglio vederselo in lingua originale, anche per il gergo aeronautico).
Finita la seconda guerra mondiale, gli
Stati Uniti scoprono che la
Russia non è più solo un alleato ma anche un pericoloso concorrente; le nuove frontiere sono il cielo e lo spazio: chi li controlla potrà assicurarsi la superiorità per i decenni a venire.
Da un lato la sfida è rappresentata dalla
barriera del suono:
mach 1 sembra essere una velocità insuperabile e già decine di piloti sono morti sperimentando nuovi velivoli sempre più veloci; un'impresa che rasenta la follia attrae un numero enorme di piloti collaudatori, veri e propri
cowboy dell'aria quasi folli, incontrollabili ed intrattabili: saranno loro a spingersi oltre il limite.
Sarà poi il lancio dello
sputnik a cambiare il mondo: la corsa allo spazio comincia, e gli Stati Uniti sono ancora fermi ai blocchi di partenza. Un imponente programma viene varato in tutta fretta mentre vengono selezionati i primi sette astronauti che viaggeranno sulle capsule
mercury. Un viaggio costellato di insuccessi, tenuto in piedi da fondi quasi illimitati, dalla paura di una inaccettabile sconfitta e soprattutto da persone straordinarie completamente focalizzate su ciò che era giusto fare.
Le due ore e mezza di film seguono principalmente tre filoni narrativi: prima la vita dei piloti collaudatori, celebrando l'impresa di
Chuck Yeager; in seguito verrà coperto l'intero programma mercury ed i primi sette astronauti americani; il tutto mantenendo sempre in primo piano i rapporti umani: la competitività tra gli uomini, i conflitti, il ruolo di mogli, tecnici, stampa e politici.
C'è il dramma, c'è la commedia e ci sono il meglio ed il peggio degli uomini;
Philip Kaufman fa qui un lavoro eccezionale nel rappresentare le persone ed il contesto in cui si muovevano, sottolineandone le profonde motivazioni ed i contrasti (aiutato anche dall'ottimo materiale di partenza, l'omonimo libro di
Tom Wolfe, e dall'avere lo stesso Chuck Yeager come consulente), mantenendo alto il ritmo e con una regia sempre impeccabile.
Ottime fotografia e musiche, perfetti gli effetti speciali.
Tutti gli attori sono a dir poco perfetti nei rispettivi ruoli; del resto basta guardare il cast:
Scott Glenn,
Sam Shepard (strane le coincidenze sui cognomi!),
Ed Harris,
Fred Ward,
Dennis Quaid e pure
Lance Henriksen e
Jeff Goldblum.
Uno dei film che più incarna lo
spirito americano nel miglior senso del termine: la frontiera, il coraggio, la sana competizione e la spinta a fare ciò che è giusto. Quattro meritati premi oscar, supera brillantemente la prova del tempo ed ancora oggi risulta un film che appassiona ed emoziona.
La qualità video del DVD è molto buona, così come l'audio; di buon livello anche i documentari e gli extra del secondo disco.
Non sarebbe male, per completare ed integrare la narrazione dell'epoca pionieristica dell'astronautica, una miniserie sul programma
gemini, una serie sul programma sovietico ed un colossal sull'
Apollo 11 (prima o poi...)
Voto: 9 (imperdibile, per gli appassionati di aviazione ed astronautica).
Tags: storico, drammatico, avventura, aviazione, astronautica, astronauti, corsa allo spazio, progetto geminy, programma spaziale, Stati Uniti, Unione Sovietica, sputnik, Juri Gagarin, piloti collaudatori, deserto, California, John F. Kennedy, Lyndon Johnson, Chuck Yeager, Alan Shepard, John Glenn, Gordon Cooper, Gus Grissom, documentario, aviatori, morte, funerale, scienziati, tecnici, rivalità, scimmia, anni '40, anni '50, anni '60, NASA, fallimenti, esplosione, razzo, Redstone, Atlas, navicella spaziale, aereo, barriera del suono, recordo, mach 1, Florida, bar, donne, primo americano nello spazio, Australia, aborigeni, scienziati tedeschi, eroi, guerra, U.S. Navy, marina militare, esercito, conferenza stampa, propaganda.
Shepard, Sam
Nome di battesimo: Rogers, Samuel Shepard
Data di nascita: 5 November 1943
Altezza: 6' 1½" (1.87 m)
Coniuge: O-Lan Jones::(9 November 1969 - 1984) (divorced) 1 child
Ultimi lavori: Trivia random: By the time he was 30, he had already written 30 produced plays in New York.
Citazione random: "Don't you find it kind of self-indulgent for actors to go around writing parts for themselves?"
Filmography links and data courtesy of IMDb.
Glenn, Scott
Nome di battesimo: Glenn, Theodore Scott
Data di nascita: 26 January 1941
Altezza: 6' (1.83 m)
Coniuge: Carol Schwartz::(1967 - present) 2 children
Ultimi lavori: Biografia:Scott Glenn was born January, 26, 1941, in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. As he grew up in Appalachia, his health was poor; he was bedridden for a year and doctors predicted he would limp for the rest of his life. During long periods of illness, Glenn was reading a lot and "dreaming of becoming Lord Byron." He challenged his illness by intense training programs and eventually got rid of his limp.Glenn entered William and Mary College where he majored in English. He spent three years in the Marines and then tried to combine his passion for storytelling with his passion for adventures by working for five months as a criminal reporter at the Kenosha Evening News. Glenn planned to become an author but found out he had "problems with dialogs," so he decided to overcome it by studying acting. In 1966, he headed to New York where he joined George Morrison acting class. He helped in directing student plays to pay for his studies and appeared onstage in La MaMa Experimental Theatre Club productions. Soon after arriving to New York, Glenn became a fan of martial arts. In 1968 he joined The Actors Studio and began working in professional theater and TV. In 1970 James Bridges offered him his first movie work in The Baby Maker (1970).Glenn left for L.A., where he spent seven of the "most miserable years of [his] life." He couldn't find interesting film roles and, doing brief TV stints, he felt "like a person who had to paint the Sistine Chapel with a house-painter's brush." On a brighter side, he worked episodically with Jonathan Demme (Angels Hard as They Come (1971), Fighting Mad (1976)), Robert Altman (Nashville (1975)) and Francis Ford Coppola (Apocalypse Now (1979)). In 1978 Glenn got tired of Hollywood and moved his family to Ketchum, Idaho, where he worked as a barman, huntsman and mountain ranger for two years (occasionally acting in Seattle stage productions). James Bridges once more changed the course of Glenn's life in 1980 when he offered him the role of John Travolta's rival in Urban Cowboy (1980) and made him a star. Glenn's acting abilities and physical presence helped him to excel both in action (Silverado (1985), The Challenge (1982)) and drama (The Right Stuff (1983), Countdown to Looking Glass (1984) (TV), The River (1984)) as he alternately played good guys and bad guys.In the beginning of the '90s his career was at its peak - he appeared in such indisputable masterpieces as The Silence of the Lambs (1991), The Hunt for Red October (1990) and The Player (1992). Later he gravitated toward more kinky stuff, such as the black Freudian farce _Reckless (1995/I)_ , the tragicomedy Edie & Pen (1996) and Ken Loach's socio-political declaration Carla's Song (1996). Today Glenn alternates mainstream (Courage Under Fire (1996), Absolute Power (1997)) with independent projects (Lesser Prophets (1997) and Larga distancia (1998), written by his daughter Dakota Glenn) and TV (Naked City: A Killer Christmas (1998) (TV)).
Trivia random: Did 2,000 push-ups (at one time) on the set of Urban Cowboy.
Citazione random: "There are many different reasons why people take parts. For me, there are basically two: one is economic -- you have to keep working, pay the rent; that's a given. The other one, for me, usually has nothing to do with the overall film - whether the script is good, whom I'm working with, whether it's going to get good reviews -- it's just the part, the character. Is this somebody whose shoes I want to live in for four months? If I don't instinctively answer 'yes' to that question, I shouldn't be doing the movie."
Filmography links and data courtesy of IMDb.
Right Stuff, The (1983)
Uomini veri
Regista: Philip Kaufman Scrittore: Tom Wolfe,
Philip Kaufman Genere: Adventure, Drama, History
Valutazione: 7.8/10 (17483 voti)
Durata: 193 min
Paese: USA
Lingua: English
Cast:Trama:Tom Wolfe's book on the history of the U.S. Space program reads like a novel, and the film has that same fictional quality. It covers the breaking of the sound barrier by Chuck Yeager to the Mercury 7 astronauts, showing that no one had a clue how to run a space program or how to select people to be in it. Thrilling, funny, charming and electrifying all at once.
Trivia random: During the newsreel segment when President Kennedy gives Alan Shepard (Scott Glenn) a medal for his flight, in the background we can see Charles Frank as Scott Carpenter. When the angle reverses to actual archival footage of President Kennedy dropping the medal, he bends to pick it up, and the real Scott Carpenter and Gus Grissom are in the background.
Citazione random: Trudy Cooper: [about being the wife of a test pilot] I went back east to a reunion and all my friends could talk about their husband's work. How "dog-eat-dog" and cutthroat it was on Madison Ave. Places like that.::[under her breath]::Trudy Cooper: Cutthroat.::[to everyone]::Trudy Cooper: I wondered how they would've felt if every time their husband went in to make a deal, there was a one in four chance he wouldn't come out of that meeting.::[begins sobbing]
Filmography links and data courtesy of IMDb.
Goldblum, Jeff
Nome di battesimo: Goldblum, Jeffrey Lynn
Data di nascita: 22 October 1952
Altezza: 6' 4½" (1.94 m)
Coniuge: Geena Davis::(1 November 1987 - 17 October 1990) (divorced), Patricia Gaul::(4 July 1980 - 1986) (divorced)
Ultimi lavori: Biografia:Born Jeffrey Lynn Goldblum on October 22, 1952 in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, actor Jeff Goldblum began his career on the New York stage after moving to the city at the age of seventeen.Possessing his own unique style of delivery, Goldblum made an impression on moviegoers with little more than a single line in Woody Allen's Annie Hall (1977), when he fretted about having forgotten his mantra. Goldblum went on to appear in the remake Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1978) before a high-profile turn in the classic ensemble film The Big Chill (1983).The quirky actor turned up in the suitably quirky film The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the 8th Dimension (1984), which became a 1980s cult classic, then went on to a breakthrough role in the David Cronenberg remake The Fly (1986), which also featured actress Geena Davis, Goldblum's wife from 1987-1990 and co-star in two additional films: Transylvania 6-5000 (1985) and Julien Temple's Earth Girls Are Easy (1988).Goldblum was the rather unlikely star of some of the biggest blockbusters of the 1990s: Steven Spielberg's dinosaur adventure Jurassic Park (1993) and its sequel, The Lost World: Jurassic Park (1997), as well as the alien invasion flick Independence Day (1996). These films saw Goldblum playing the type of intellectual characters he's become associated with.Recent roles have included critically acclaimed turns in Igby Goes Down (2002) and Wes Anderson's The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou (2004).
Trivia random: Was engaged to Catherine Wreford, a 23 year old dancer from Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada.
Citazione random: When I'm in a happy state of mind, I often am in Los Angeles, recently you know those Fantasy Tour vans that go around, I don't know what they're looking at, they're looking at studios and things like that, when I pass them in my car sometimes I roll down the window and point myself out to them, sometimes they don't notice me, and I'll go OK never mind, but sometimes they go Oh ladies and gentleman to the right we have Jeff Goldblum.
Filmography links and data courtesy of IMDb.
Ward, Fred (I)
Data di nascita: 30 December 1942
Altezza: 5' 9½" (1.77 m)
Coniuge: Marie-France Ward::(? - ?), Silvia Ward::(? - ?) (divorced) 1 child
Ultimi lavori: Biografia:A marvelous character actor with intense eyes, a sly grin and somewhat grizzled appearance, Fred Ward has nearly 70 appearances under his belt in many tremendous films. He first became interested in acting after serving three years in the US Air Force and studied at New York's Herbert Berghof Studio. Ward then went to Europe, where he dubbed many Italian movies, and first appeared on-screen in two films by Roberto Rossellini. He then returned to the United States, and got his first decent role alongside Clint Eastwood in the nail-biting prison film Escape from Alcatraz (1979). Ward's looks often saw him cast as law enforcement or military characters, and he put in noteworthy performances in Southern Comfort (1981), Uncommon Valor (1983), as astronaut Gus Grissom in The Right Stuff (1983) and scored the lead in the interesting spy / martial arts movie Remo Williams: The Adventure Begins (1985), which unfortunately was not as successful as had been the mega-selling series of Remo Williams books.However, during "Remo", Ward demonstrated a great knack for comedic timing and satirical performance, and used this ability was to great effect in several films, including playing Kevin Bacon's fellow giant-worm-fighting handyman in the light-hearted sci-fi hit Tremors (1990), as "Walter Stuckel" in Robert Altman's The Player (1992), as TV anchorman "Chip Daley" in Tim Robbins' razor-sharp political satire Bob Roberts (1992) and as a vicious, but incompetent, gangster menacing Leslie Nielsen in Naked Gun 33 1/3: The Final Insult (1994).Ward's abilities as both a strong supporting actor and a truly versatile character actor ensured that he would be in steady demand, and he has continued to turn up in a wide variety of roles utilizing his skills. Keep an eye out for Fred Ward in the action-filled The Chaos Factor (2000), as David Spade's dad in Joe Dirt (2001), in the tongue-in-cheek Corky Romano (2001) and in the Reese Witherspoon romantic tale Sweet Home Alabama (2002).
Trivia random: Good friends with Ed Harris.
Citazione random: "I think it's better for the picture to have as much of me as it can. But I also cherish getting down and doing some acting."
Salario massimo: $3,000,000, per Feast of Love (2007)
Filmography links and data courtesy of IMDb.
Kaufman, Philip (I)
Data di nascita: 23 October 1936
Coniuge: Rose Fisher::(? - ?), Rose Kaufman::(? - present)
Ultimi lavori: Biografia:Director and screenwriter Philip Kaufman was born in Chicago, Illinois. He attended the University of Chicago and later Harvard Law School. He won the Prix de la Nouvelle Critique at Cannes in 1965 for his film Goldstein (1965). He was the screenwriter for The Outlaw Josey Wales (1976) and was to direct it but was replaced as director by Clint Eastwood. Kaufman's first hit as director was Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1978), a remake of Don Siegel's 1956 sci-fi classic (in fact, Siegel has a cameo in it as a cab driver), and later, Kaufman was nominated for an Oscar for Best Screenplay on Material from Another Medium in 1988 for The Unbearable Lightness of Being (1988). Kaufman's steamy Henry & June (1990) was the first film released by a major studio to be rated NC-17, which created much controversy.
Trivia random: Met Anaïs Nin in 1962. Later, in 1990, he made a movie called Henry & June (1990) about her, her affairs with Henry Miller, and his wife June.
Citazione random: [About Fred Ward] "He's the first cult actor of 2000."
Filmography links and data courtesy of IMDb.
Harris, Ed (I)
Nome di battesimo: Harris, Edward Allen
Data di nascita: 28 November 1950
Altezza: 5' 9" (1.75 m)
Coniuge: Amy Madigan::(21 November 1983 - present) 1 child
Ultimi lavori: Biografia:By transforming into his characters and pulling the audience in, Ed Harris has earned the reputation as one of the most talented actors of our time. Born in Tenafly, New Jersey, Harris grew up as the middle child. After graduating high school, he attended New York's Columbia University, where he played football. After viewing local theater productions, Harris took a sudden interest in acting. He left Columbia, headed to Oklahoma, where his parents were living, and enrolled in the University of Oklahoma's theater department. After graduation, he moved to Los Angeles to find work. He started acting in theater and television guest spots. Harris landed his first leading role in a film in cult-favorite George A. Romero's Knightriders (1981). Two years later, he got his first taste of critical acclaim, playing astronaut John Glenn in The Right Stuff (1983). Also that year, he made his New York stage debut in Sam Shepard's "Fool for Love", a performance that earned him an Obie for Outstanding Actor. Harris' career gathered momentum after that. In 2000, he made his debut as a director in the Oscar-winning film Pollock (2000).
Trivia random: Due to injuries he sustained while filming The Abyss (1989), he was almost unable to accept the role of Frankie Flannery in _State of Grace (1990)_ .
Citazione random: "As soon as I went on stage, I wanted to do nothing else with my life but act. I always liked the attention that playing sports had brought, but acting fulfilled that need even better."
Filmography links and data courtesy of IMDb.
Henriksen, Lance
Data di nascita: 5 May 1940
Altezza: 5' 10¼" (1.78 m)
Coniuge: Jane Pollack::(22 April 1995 - present) 1 child, Mary Jane Evans::(10 February 1985 - 1988) (divorced) 1 child
Ultimi lavori: Biografia:An intense, versatile actor as adept at playing clean-cut FBI agents as he is playing psychotic motorcycle-gang leaders, who can go from portraying soulless, murderous vampires to burned-out, world-weary homicide detectives, Lance Henriksen has starred in a variety of films that have allowed him to stretch his talents just about as far as an actor could possibly hope. One of his latest projects was AVP: Alien vs. Predator (2004), directed by Paul W.S. Anderson. He also appeared in the TNT original movie Evel Knievel (2004) (TV), directed by John Badham and executive produced by Mel Gibson. Henriksen portrayed "Awful Knoffel" in this project based on the life of the famed daredevil, played by George Eads. Henriksen starred for three seasons (1996-1999) on "Millennium" (1996), Fox-TV's critically acclaimed series created by Chris Carter ("The X Files" (1993)). His performance as "Frank Black", a retired FBI agent who has the ability to get inside the minds of killers, landed him three consecutive Golden Globe nominations for "Best Performance by a Lead Actor in a Drama Series" and a People's Choice Award nomination for "Favorite New TV Male Star". FOX Home Entertainment has just released the first season of "Millennium" on DVD.Born in New York, Henriksen studied at the Actors Studio and began his career off-Broadway in Eugene O'Neill's "Three Plays of the Sea." One of his first film appearances was as an FBI agent in Sidney Lumet's Dog Day Afternoon (1975), followed by Lumet's Network (1976) and Prince of the City (1981). He then appeared in Steven Spielberg's Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1977) with Richard Dreyfuss and François Truffaut, Damien: Omen II (1978) and in Philip Kaufman's The Right Stuff (1983), in which he played Mercury astronaut Capt. Wally Schirra.James Cameron cast Henriksen in his first directorial effort, Piranha Part Two: The Spawning (1981), then used him in The Terminator (1984), and cast him as the android Bishop in the sci-fi classic Aliens (1986). Director Sam Raimi, who used Henriksen in his quirky western The Quick and the Dead (1995) opposite Russell Crowe, Sharon Stone and Gene Hackman, says, "Lance is a brilliant performer who goes way beyond acting. He becomes his character completely, leaving no trace of his former self and making something of every moment on screen."Henriksen's additional feature credits include what is one of his best-known roles, that of the head of a family of murderous redneck vampires in Kathryn Bigelow's cult vampire film Near Dark (1987). He's also appeared in Jagged Edge (1985), Pumpkinhead (1989), The Horror Show (1989), Survival Quest (1989), director Walter Hill's Johnny Handsome (1989), The Pit and the Pendulum (1991) (V), Bruce Robinson's Jennifer Eight (1992), Alien³ (1992), Richard Rush's Color of Night (1994), Powder (1995), Jim Jarmusch's Dead Man (1995), Disney's animated feature Tarzan (1999) and John Woo's first American film, Hard Target (1993), for which Henriksen received a Saturn Award as Best Supporting Actor.He was nominated for a Golden Satellite Award for his portrayal of Abraham Lincoln in the TNT original film The Day Lincoln Was Shot (1998) (TV) and had starring roles in PBS' Emmy-winning The Dark End of the Street (1981) and HBO's "Tales from the Crypt" (1989). Henriksen also played actor Charles Bronson in the television movie Reason for Living: The Jill Ireland Story (1991) (TV).In addition to his abilities as an actor, Henriksen is an accomplished painter and potter. His talent as a ceramist has enabled him to create some of the most unusual ceramic artworks available on the art market today. He resides in Southern California with his wife Jane and their five-year-old daughter Sage.
Trivia random: He was walking through a hotel lobby in Romania (where he was wrapping up another film) when he was offered One Point 0.
Citazione random: (On what he won't do as an actor) "I won't do slasher movies, and I won't play child molesters or men who beat women. I can't rationalize Nightmare on Elm Street and Friday 13th films because they're too one-note. And besides I've been killed in so many movies in so many ways over the years that to be dealing out that kind of death would be terrible. I'll play a bad guy, but he has to be a character with a purpose."
Filmography links and data courtesy of IMDb.
Quaid, Dennis
Nome di battesimo: Quaid, Dennis William
Data di nascita: 9 April 1954
Altezza: 6' (1.83 m)
Coniuge: Kimberly Buffington::(4 July 2004 - present), Meg Ryan::(14 February 1991 - 16 July 2001) (divorced) 1 child, P.J. Soles::(23 November 1978 - 23 January 1983) (divorced)
Ultimi lavori: Biografia:Dennis Quaid was born in Houston, Texas, the son of an electrician. He studied drama in high school and in college, but dropped out before completing his studies, moving to Los Angeles to pursue a career. His brother, Randy Quaid, had already began to build a successful career, but Dennis initially had trouble finding work. He began to gain notice when he appeared in Breaking Away (1979) and earned strong reviews for his role in The Right Stuff (1983). Aside from acting, Quaid is also a musician, and plays with his band, the Sharks.
Trivia random: Lived with and was engaged to Lea Thompson for three years. The couple met on the set of Jaws 3-D (1983).
Citazione random: "Well, a couple of times I had people come have a talk with me, but I was operating, for the most part, on two hours of sleep a night, and I realized, "I can't do this and last very long." So I cleaned up (in the early 90's) and THEN the jobs stopped coming. You clean up your life and think you're supposed to be rewarded for it, but things actually got worse. On the other hand, if I hadn't sobered up, I probably wouldn't be alive today." - On his recovery from cocaine addiction.
Salario massimo: $60,000, per Playing by Heart (1998)
Filmography links and data courtesy of IMDb.
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