Nobody is surprised now that some great director of our time collaborates with Netflix. Whether it’s because no one else wanted to finance a dream project of theirs, because no one paid more for the rights, or because it simply offered them their best conditions, the truth is that the streaming platform has titles by filmmakers such as Martin Scorsese, Alfonso Cuaron, David Fincher, Noah Baumbach or Jane Campion.
now added to that list Richard Linklaterresponsible for great works such as ‘Before sunrise’ -and its two magnificent sequels-, or ‘Boyhood’, with ‘Apollo 10½: A Space Childhood’. Linklater returns to animation 16 years later, although this time he does so to offer us another story with autobiographical touches, which is among the 5 best Netflix movies to date, and the best of all the ones it has released during what we have from 2022.
The real goal of the movie
Linklater has given a nostalgic and autobiographical touch to several of the films he has made since his debut in 1988 with the little-known ‘It’s Impossible to Learn to Plow by Reading Books’but in general he always associated it with late adolescence or early adulthood.
In the case of ‘Apollo 10½: A Space Childhood’ he travels a little further back, specifically to late 60’s with the landing of the man on the moon as a historical event to orbit, both through personal memories of what life was like in Texas back then and using a small dose of fantasy with which to justify its existence.
That leads to two different films cohabiting in ‘Apollo 10½: A Space Childhood’. On the one hand we have a review of the arrival of man on the moon linked to the crazy premise that the participation of a child in it is necessary. A curious common thread that Linklater uses more as an excuse than something he really wants to exploreso if that’s the only thing that attracts you to his latest work, don’t expect anything beyond a nice reinterpretation of what happened without the intention of going beyond that.
What really matters here is that trip to the 60s, but not to offer a completely accurate portrait of what happened or to subordinate everything to that inevitable nostalgia that we all feel at some point for past times. And it is that here everything is built around the memories of the protagonist, well supported by the wonderful work he does as a narrator. Jack Blackmanaging to give a touch of fable to the set that suits you wonderfully.
And the most curious of all is the spell that Linklater achieves with this resource, since the film starts by reminding us of its curious premise and then gives free rein to a collection of anecdotes in which there is no real spirit of celebrating and delighting in them, but of convey to the viewer the affection with which its director remembers all this, adding incidentally a wonderful portrait of childhood.
A freshness that catches
There is room both for small family stories about how his mother tightened her belt to support her family with limited financial means and to recreate moments of mythical titles that she enjoyed during her childhood. I have no doubt that all this is embellished to offer a somewhat more general vision of that time, but Linklater manages to convey that necessary naturalness so that at no time does it feel like a mere compilation of great vital events.
I imagine that the film will speak more strongly to those who were children at the time, but the truth is that we are facing a film with an undeniable freshness that achieves with amazing ease that one gets carried away and be part of a trip that perhaps promised more ambition for that starting point with which it is sold, but that at the moment of truth shines like few films digging into the trunk of memories.
I have not forgotten either the magnificent work of animation, for which a technique similar to that of rotoscoping that he already used in ‘Waking Life’ and ‘A Scanner Darkly’, but here he seeks more to enhance a look that matches his nature of memory corrected by the passage of time. With a unique personal touch that not only adds visual beauty, but also fulfills an essential function to transport us to that time, to the point that I am clear that the effect would have been much better if it had been limited to releasing it in real image.
In short
‘Apollo 10½: A Space Childhood’ is an excellent movie that reflects on the screen the sensation that invades you when you find a scrapbook or a collection of photographs from our childhood, which even leads us to remember things in which we surely do not participate directly, something that is reinforced through the type of animation chosen. All this with an extra point of imagination in relation to everything that surrounded the first trip of man to the moon.
‘Apollo 10½: A Space Childhood’ is available on Netflix from the April 1st.