One small step for man…

FIRST MAN ryan gosling blasts off in a neil armstrong biopic.

Following their all-singing, all-dancing collaboration on La La Land, director Damien Chazelle and star Ryan Gosling are reteaming to tell the story of Neil Armstrong. Although re-teaming might not be the right word, as they actually had a meeting about First Man before even discussing their Oscar-winning musical.

Rather than present a full cradle-to-grave biopic, First Man focuses on a very specific window of Armstrong’s life: the Apollo 11 mission that made his name one of the most well-known around the globe. “The film is about the mission to the Moon,” Gosling tells Teasers. “We try to juxtapose that mission with some of the emotional experiences that Neil’s family were experiencing at the time.”

Getting a sense of the man behind the most famous footsteps in history seems as important to Chazelle and Gosling as capturing the monumental significance (and difficulty) of the mission. As well as working with James R. Hansen, Armstrong’s biographer, the filmmaking team had access to some very close sources. “Obviously we had a lot of help from [Armstrong’s ex-wife] Janet and from the sons about what they think Neil’s emotional state was at that time,” explains Gosling. “It’s something that he was never really vocal about, and something that only he knew. So I was trying, through my research with his sister and friends and family, to interpret what I thought might have been going on with his emotional, internal landscape at the time.”

Claire Foy (The Crown) plays Janet, Neil’s wife who had to watch from the sidelines as he headed off on his landmark voyage, while Corey Stoll and Lukas Haas are Buzz Aldrin and Michael Collins, the other Apollo 11 crew members helping to make history. “It’s hard to communicate just how extreme and dangerous these missions were, and just how unique and specific the people were that flew,” adds Gosling.

With the film set to launch at the Venice Film Festival next month, expectations are through the exosphere. And while early IMAX clips of the take-off sequence have been intense and terrifying, Gosling’s clearly as fascinated with Armstrong’s inner-life as he is with outer space. “The film, to me, became also about somebody who had to go to the Moon in order to land on Earth,” he says. “There were two missions going on. Because he was experiencing so much personally… We were trying to convey both of those realities at the same time.”

ETA | 12 OCTOBER / FIRST MAN OPENS THIS AUTUMN.

‘it’s hard to communicate just how extreme and dangerous these missions were’ ryan gosling