digitalbeachbum This movie was awesome when it came out. I saw it and thought "wow what an awesome movie! I want to be an astronaut". However when I started to learn about the US Space Program and NASA I started to realize that the director and writers for this movie overstepped their rights for artistic license.So much of this movie is made up and bullshit that it is more fiction than it is truth. In fact, my research has led me to believe that 7/10 scenes in this movie are completely fabricated. Even character names, quotes and actions were changed for a variety of reasons, most common to make the movie fit a narrative of the director and writers.Listing all the problems with the movie would take too much time and effort for me. However I'll say that if you forget about all the real life facts and suspend your reality for a few hours, it isn't a bad movie.I did like this movie when it was released but over time it has lost the glimmer and shine. There are much better, more realistic, more historical movies out about the space race and NASA program.

powermandan The Right Stuff. The name alone will make anyone want to go see this. It uses enough generic pronouns and adjectives to sucker the viewer into watching this. I bet that many people had no idea it was about aviation and space travel. Is it bad to have an unclear title? Of course not. As long as it sounds good and fits in with the story. The Right Stuff fits so well with the story because that is what it is about and what it has.The Right Stuff is generally said to be the second best film of the 1980s only behind Raging Bull. I disagree, only because there were other movies that I thought were better. But I do think that The Right Stuff is one of the true great American films that achieves the status of excellence.The Right Stuff follows a group of pilots over a course of several years and their journeys as astronauts. Right off the bat, the filming of the flying is done to a high calibre. We get a first- person look during some of the missions that's intense and beautiful. This stuff happens in many different parts of the movie that can make any movie ignoramus like those particular scenes. Yes the flying sequences are first-rate, it is the character development that really makes this stand above other movies of its kind. We get to know and like some of the pilots. The first one we get to know is Chuck Yeager (Shepard) who lives a peaceful life and perseveres to break the sound barrier. He lacks a college degree, so he is not chosen to be an astronaut like some other pilots he knows. Seven pilots are chosen to compete with Russia's space program and they and their families are written very well. Alan Shepard and Gordon Cooper (Glenn, Quaid) are my favourite characters though. All their wives don't want them to go out on suicide-missions and become widows, but the men love what they do. The media attracts them, making them international superstars who believe they have " the right stuff". The men eat it up and think they are super-humans. As the movie goes on, their egos get to them and there are malfunctions with the rockets. These serve as symbols reflecting their personalities. Eventually, they get better and everything becomes a success. Hallelujah! The Right Stuff is an avant-garde, patriotic film. So cheesy how everything is overcome and they defend the honour of one's country. But I can't really say that's a bad thing. The only real flaw I can give this would be that at 193 minutes, it is dragged out, ever-so slightly.

gavin6942 By flying higher and faster than any other man had ever dared before, Chuck Yeager set the pace for a new breed of hero. Those that had just one thing in common...The biggest issue this film has is its length, coming in at over three hours. That may deter a lot of people from actually sitting down and watching it, which is unfortunate, because every minute is great. It could probably be cut down (and probably has been for television), but there is nothing that makes the run time seem too long.The plot, the emotion, the acting... all great. The story is more or less familiar to a lot of people, but it is an important story to tell, how Yeager breaking the sound barrier directly affected the space program. And such a great cast: Ed Harris, Lance Henriksen, Jeff Goldblum. Wow.

ma-cortes This story broadly painted deals with the beginnings of the US space career and the first seven Mercury astronauts , being based on Tom Wolf's nonfiction novel . The space began when Chuck Yeager (Sam Shepard who played legendary pilot , is actually afraid of flying) broke the sound barrier and scorching Mach 2 and following to other aviation pioneers , the Mercury mission with 7 astronauts , the suicide squadron who volunteer for astronaut training is formed by a motley cast (Fred Ward , Dennis Quaid , Lance Henriksen , Ed Harris , Scott Glenn and Scott Paulin) , showing that no one had a clue how to run a space program or how to select volunteers to be in it. It was after the Soviets successfully launched the Sputnik satellite in 1959, that the U.S. redoubled its efforts to surpass at their trail of glory in the sky . Electrifying film with credible interpretations but overlong and oddly uninvolving , based on Tom Wolfe's ambitious book about the history of the U.S. Space program , it reads like a novel . However , Tom Wolfe, was unhappy with the film because he felt it made too many changes to the book. William Goldman, the original screenwriter before he left the project also disliked it because he didn't like the way Philip Kaufman portrayed Chuck Yeager as the only hero in the film, while the rest of the astronauts only got lucky and didn't match up to him in any way. The film has that same fictional quality ; furthermore is thrilling , imaginative , rowdy and overlong -at more than three hours , including unnecessary material - all at once . The picture attempts hardly to tell the tale of human beings as well as the space conquest . The movie tries to narrate parallel stories , though it never quite successfully integrate them . It covers the breaking of the sound barrier by Chuck Yeager -Sam Shepard- as a test pilot of the old breed , giving a nice and charming performance . It provides an all-star-cast who bolster a fine movie with special mention to Ed Harris playing John Glen who subsequently was running for President . The main cast is perfectly completed by known secondaries as Barbara Hershey , Pamela Reed , Veronica Cartwright , Kathy Baker , David Clennon , Scott Wilson , Jeff Goldblum , Royal Dano , Donald Moffat among others . Special effects work and production design by Geoffrey Kirkland is spectacular and could hardly be bettered ; however , some moments relies heavily from stock-shots . Colorful and atmospheric cinematography by Caleb Deschanel , the role of Annie Glenn was the first film role for his wife , Mary Jo Deschanel . Imaginative and evocative musical score composed and conducted by Bill Conti . The film's music temp track consisted of music from Holst's The Planets, Henry Mancini's score for The White Dawn and various other classical pieces which were favorites of Director 'Philip Kaufman'. ¨Right stuff¨ results to be Philip Kaufman's one of the most successful films . He's a good filmmaker and little prolific who left some great moments in histories that not be forgotten , giving enough inspired images to make linger in the memory such as happens in ¨Right stuff¨ . Kaufman realized a Western ¨Great Northfield Minnessota Raid¨, a youthful tale as ¨The Wanderers¨, Sci-Fi ¨ as ¨Invasion body snatchers¨and two sexual stories ¨Unbearable lightness of being¨ and ¨Henry and June¨.