Journey to the Moon: The 40th Anniversary of Apollo 11

My first thought on initial viewing was:"What a rip-off, I've been mislead and want my money back!" I decided to cool down and just watch the entire thing and THEN decide. Firstly, the whole thing is done on the cheap, so no new interviews and recently stated proclamations by Armstrong, Collins or Aldrin, which was really what I came for. I can live with that,though. The voice-over is colorless and uninspired, it sounds like something on a one-reeler the A/V boys wheeled into science class a minute ago and the narrator even calls it a "Saturn Vee", not once but TWICE! The soundtrack was a solo acoustic guitar strumming melodiously but really, what more do you need? They were capable and it was pleasant to listen to. The "extras" were old NASA public relations films concerning Apollo 11 (in a general sense) which was narrated by Burgess Meredith, Apollo 12 & 13 (as post-mission reports) Apollo 17 ( no matter how they tried to 'spin' it, I'm STILL mad congress cut NASA's funding for more moonshots!), a pretty dull film on the slide-rule jockeys that actually got 'us' to the moon and JFK's Rice University speech ("We choose to go to the moon..."). Additionally, there is an Apollo 11 'slide show' and the visual gem of the whole disc, a 'slide show' of images of the universe courtesy of the Hubble telescope which is truly WONDERFUL! This is not to say the vintage Apollo shorts are not. They are. I know for sure I saw some of these in the day at IPMS meetings, there was always a member who worked for North American Rockwell or TRW that had access to these films and brought them to meetings, I would've watched until the last dog was hung! For me, the best part is on Apollo 12 when Alan Bean is feeding numbers to Pete Conrad during the latter's 'pinpoint' landing at "Snowman" crater. Bean-o is so cool and reassuring and even enthusiastic as Pete is getting it done, about 180 degrees opposite that of the same procedure on Apollo 11 (Mike Collins referred to the trio as 'amiable strangers') Conrad, Bean and Gordon made their encore mission seem like three frat rats on a road trip by comparison. So, yeah, I ended up being pleasantly surprised and a satisfied customer over/after all. It's not as well produced as "In The Shadow of the Moon" or "For All Mankind" but those two films had a one day lunch budget that far exceeded what "Mill Creek Entertainment" probably has for their yearly operations! Thanks Amazon, keep the suggestions coming!

A good companion to "In the Shadow of the Moon".
I would buy both. This DVD reminds me of "For All Mankind" because it is made from the classic 16mm film footage. The soundtrack is also very nice.

This documentary is made from rare NASA film footage and radio transmissions.
It tells the story from launch to landing and includes over 3 hours of additional footage from the NASA archives. My favorite bit is when Buzz says (while climbing out of the capsule for the first time) "I'll be sure not to lock the door behind me." priceless!

"In this one moment, the world came together in peace for all mankind"
- Buzz Aldrin

I agree completely with Mr. Dacey's description of this video as being done on the cheap from stock NASA footage. In fact, it wouldn't even play on one of my DVD players, and the other had a little trouble reading it. The soundtrack was disappointing, and there were several minor factual errors in the narration. So although I agree with his description, I feel compelled to give it a lower rating.

But I have to admit that I had not seen some of the launch footage, so it was worth something. I much prefer David Sington's "In the Shadow of the Moon."