What is Philip Kaufman's adaptation and directing technique of "The Right Stuff" based on historical facts?

Participation of Philip Kaufman

On the other hand, it was difficult to select a coach. The first candidate for director was Michael Ritchie, who had directed `` Ganbare! I get rejected.

And the person who arrived was Philip Kaufman. In 1976, he was selected to direct a Star Trek: The Motion Picture theatrical project called Star Trek: Planet of the Titans. Kaufman was very enthusiastic about working on Star Wars, but Paramount executives heard about Star Wars' bad reviews before it was released, decided that there was no future for science fiction films, and canceled the film in 1977. Put it away.

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Kaufman later directed the coming-of-age film `` The Wanderers '' (1979), set in the 1960s, and assisted George Lucas in writing the story for `` Raiders of the Lost Ark' ' (1981). was.

At this time, the project that was brought to him was to make a film version of ``The Right Stuff.'' He replied, "I'm OK with directing, but I don't like Goldman's script." The reasons for this were: ``I was tired of seeing so much nationalism on display,'' and ``the Jaeger episode had been completely deleted.'' Kaufman accepts the directorship on the condition that he be allowed to write the script from scratch.

Script writing

Kaufman returned to the original work and began analyzing its 448 hardcover pages. Although Woolf's writings were dramatized to some extent, they were essentially a list of facts. As a result, there is no main character throughout the story, and there are no overly dramatic developments.

Therefore, Kaufman places the Jaeger episode at the beginning and climax, exaggerates the historical facts to some extent in a cinematic way, creates ups and downs in the drama, and connects people who were active in different organizations and eras (as long as there are no big lies). I decided to have it.

"The Right Stuff" (c) 1983 The Ladd Company. All.rights reserved.

The theme of this film is the story of the men selected for Project Mercury (*5). However, if everyone is depicted individually, no matter how much screen time there is, it won't be enough. Therefore, Kaufman decided to focus on only four characters with relatively dramatic episodes: Shepard (Scott Glenn), Grissom (Fred Ward), Glenn (Ed Harris), and Cooper (Dennis Quaid). (*6)

Also, the process by which they are selected is depicted in a rather comical way. Lyndon Johnson (Donald Moffat) and other senators who are particularly upset about the Soviet Union's Sputnik 1 launch, the slapstick duo of Jeff Goldblum and Harry Shearer who play astronaut recruiters, and Fox-shaped glasses (so-called Jane Dornacker (*7), who plays the head nurse wearing Zamasu glasses, gives off a good look.

*5 The first astronauts recruited by NASA were limited to male military pilots. Therefore, a private project was launched to create female astronauts, and 13 talented female pilots were selected and named the Mercury 13. In fact, they received training similar to the Mercury Seven and recorded better results than men, but NASA and the US government refused to accept them due to reasons such as menstruation.Mercury 13: Women who supported space exploration(18)).

Meanwhile, the Soviet Union heard this information and on June 16, 1963, the first female cosmonaut, Valentina Tereshkova, boarded Vostok 6 (by the way, the call Signs she sent to the ground base in the event of an emergency was ``I am a seagull'' became a popular phrase at the time.Then, the special effects TV series ``Ultra Q(66), in episode 10, ``Underground Super Express to the West'', the artificial life M1 mutters this line while floating in space).

In response to Tereshkova's reaction, NASA reluctantly granted women the right to become cosmonauts in 1965. But it never happened, and the last American woman to actually go into space had to wait until Sally Ride aboard the Space Shuttle Challenger in 1983.

*6 Although it is not depicted in the movie, Slayton was replaced by Carpenter because he was suspected of having a heart condition, and from 1962 he remained at NASA as an employee. His first trip to space was during the Apollo-Soyuz test mission in 1975.

*7 Dornacker was also a rock musician and radio program reporter. He reported traffic information from a helicopter, but crashed twice. Although he survived the first accident, he died in the second accident on October 22, 1986.

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