This week’s movie of the week on The Criterion Channel is the 1989 documentary For All Mankind.
Directed by Al Reinert this doc looks at the Apollo progam and uses actually archival footage that NASA shot during the time and interviews with the astronauts and crew who participated in the program.
It took Reinert 18 months to copy the footage he wanted to use from NASA’s archives and he had to go through over six million feet of film.
The original cut of the film had no narration just Brian Eno’s music but it was poorly received. Reinert went back and recut the film adding the astronauts voiceovers.
This is an amazingly beautiful looking documentary. The footage is incredible. Reinert would co-write the screenplay for Ron Howard’s Apollo 13 and write several other scripts that never got produced. He made a few more films throughout the years but passed away from cancer last December.