MovieChat Forums > First Man (2018) Discussion > Whitey On The Moon...

Whitey On The Moon...


... was a sad, unnecessary addition which knocks this film slightly down from near masterpiece status.

This isn't really a film about the space race / landing on the moon. It was a film about being confronted with and living constantly with death close at hand. The fact that all the testing / moon scenes are very much shown in the "first man" perspective adds to this. There's no cheesy cut backs to mission control hollering and high fiving reaching other, nor any shots of his wife gasping with a hand over her mouth. It's all the better for that, making it incredibly claustrophobic even for the viewer and highlighting how alone and exposed these guys were.

However in the absence of these typical extraneous scenes the inclusion of "Whitey On The Moon" (dropping in as a bizarre juxtaposition when watching the film) just seems a rather sad inclusion, surely just placed for some SJW points, which will make for some odd viewing in future.

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Totally. It was out of place and completely unnecessary. Not to mention, it actually gave a bit of credence to the right-wing types who thought the "flag planting" omission was some kind of statement.

I don't think the flag planting was necessary at all, and it wasn't even a planting per se, but a long process of getting the thing to stand upright. However, the filmmakers explained its omission by saying this was a personal piece about Armstrong, not about the moon landing itself. Then they go and add this shit, which is totally inconsistent with that statement...

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Instead of being snarky they should have just went with a black astronaut alongside his hispanic Lunar Module Pilot with an asian piloting the command module. Honestly, I would respect them more for just laying everything out there.

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It's what happened. You want to whitewash history and pretend every American supported the trip to the moon?
NASA, at the time, didn't care about black people's voices. I'm glad the filmmakers did.

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First of all, what did you expect NASA to do? Oh, "most black people, specifically, don't like the moon landing (which is presumptuous as HELL on your part, btw), we better scrap the whole project. Fuck the moon race, fuck the Russian dominance in space and technology, fuck the Cold War, fuck Kennedy's wish... 'black people', 11% of the population, in particular, don't like it. SCRAP IT."

Secondly, and the main point here: the movie is a character piece about Armstrong, not the fucking politics of the moon landing. It doesn't affect the plot, the characters, it has NO relevance or impact on the story being presented. You SJWs have to make EVERYTHING about race/gender, don't you? You really do have some kind of mental disease/defect. An OCD-like tic that you have to scratch constantly, and hyperfocus in on... for anything and everything.

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"most black people, specifically, don't like the moon landing (which is presumptuous as HELL on your part, btw)... "

Typical republican to imagine an escenario to something no one has said. You should be a commentator on Fox & Friends.

Did you know that even NASA was segregated? You don't need to read a book to know that. They made a movie about it called Hidden Figures. But I guess you didn't watch it because it's a "SJW movie" about black women.

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What else were you implying then, exactly? That a minority of black people didn't support the moon landing? So a minority of a minority opposed the moon landing... which makes my post more valid and yours even more ridiculous.

I'm not even going to take your Hidden Figures bait and attempt to derail - you just conveniently ignored my entire post and its points, as expected.

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So the movie lied and made up the scene of people opposing *the spending of millions* on going to a moon because they thought there were bigger issues in the country, that privileged white people didn't have or cared about(back then and now), than a pissing contest with Russia.
Your point is valid and mine isn't. You can go to bed happy.

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I agree TheArgentinian.

I for one appreciated the 'whitey on the Moon' sequence. I thought it brought an interesting sociological and historical perspective to the whole space race (although I do see the point of those arguing that it was not entirely keeping with the 'first man' perspective - then again, it does add to Armstrong's sense of doubt and conflict leading up to the mission: is it all worth it?) I also don't see how anyone can be offended by the scene since the film is, overall, a testament and celebration of Armstrong and his fellow astronaut and NASA scientists' achievement. I just think a counter-perspective, letting viewers know that there were those who harboured, quite legitimate, doubts about the space race, adds a much deeper and more complex aspect to the film. A degree of ambivalence and some counterpoints, always does.

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I read the book about those women. They were mostly white. The movie is made-up bullshit.

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