Review of The Aeronauts (2019) by Kenr — 07 Jan 2020

Tom Harpers movie might have been a near modern historical classic if it had been treated to more truth than fiction. Instead, its Indiana Jones type foolishness eats away huge chunks of what could have been gut tearing historically factual suspense, and replaces it with old fashioned Saturday matinee nonsense - rendering the whole as simply unbelievable.

This is a shame as it’s based on some important historical facts that have been treated like mere fictional fodder. What’s left is just another example of Hollywoods PC gender pushing histrionics.

The real-life male hero of this actual ballooning duo has been replaced by a fictional, ultra-modern, female ‘role’ model. Laughably ‘modern’ Hollywood! Given all the real-life, deserving women the scientific world has had throughout history; why not make a movie about one of these - instead of adding a fictional one to our recorded history! Some nice mock (CGI) aerial photography attempts to camouflage the obvious manipulative agenda pushing, and if seen on a large screen it will supply enough adrenalin rushes for those with a predisposition toward fear of heights or vertigo.

The editing style is another drawback - just when things look like getting exiting in the balloon, we are forced back to ground to be shown how difficult it was, in the lead-up, for this duo to get airborne – these don’t work well because we already know they won their battles - so it just serves to slow the whole thing down.

Performances are uniformly good, and of its type, even with all the clichés, it’s a good movie but could have been so much better (and more honest).