Direction: Richard Linklater
Country: USA
This gorgeous rotoscope animated statement about a self-proclaimed fabulist is nothing more than a loosely based representation of director Richard Linklater’s childhood in Houston,Texas, during the summer of 69. The director of Boyhood puts himself in the skin of Stanley (Milo Coy), who dreams about a top secret NASA mission created to get him to the moon faster than the Russians.
This lunar conquest - simultaneously personal and real - is likely to seduce young and old folks alike as it straddles between a dreamlike scripted fiction and a rigorous slice of history. It’s a gentle chronicle of a journey to adulthood underpinned by both an evocative setting and a love of science. As an autobiographical coming-of-age effort, it looks back on the director’s most fantastic fantasies, plunging the audience into a narrative thoughtfulness that is already a staple in Linklater’s works.
This technically perfect, irresistibly nostalgic, and extremely informative cinematic experience offers us tremendously rich details about a specific time that are to be savored and absorbed without reservation. References to music and cinema, games and pranks, school activities and sports, as well as the family environment are pure enrapturement.
The picture spreads an infectious good mood with a vast number of aspects I could easily relate to. I miss those times with no cell phones nor the internet undermining a way of living that seemed more candid. Combining a legitimate dramatic structure with enchanting visual results, Apollo 10 1/2 is an immersive fantasy stripped of stiffness, where one finds comfort, loveliness, and sweet moments of grace.
