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Apollo 13 (1995)

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NOTE: These commentaries are on the original Dolby Digital single-disc release, as well as the March 2005 10th Anniversary 2-disc edition. The original DTS single-disc release does not have any commentary tracks.

Commentaries on this disc:

Commentary 1: Director Ron Howard Rating:6.5/10 (15 votes) [graph]Login to vote or review
Reviewed by space guy on July 23rd, 2004:Find all reviews by space guy
Ron Haward is articulate and offers alot of information about this movie. He talks about both How the movie was made and why he Chose this project. All in all avery good commentary.
Reviewed by Elijah Sullivan on April 21st, 2005:Find all reviews by Elijah Sullivan
Ron Howard isn't too impressive. He really sounds like a film-school student explaining his student project to the teacher. His jokes about running over Arnold Schwarzenneger's humvee with the crawler are just lame, lame, lame.
Reviewed by Agressor on March 15th, 2008:Find all reviews by Agressor
I found the commentary really interesting, he covers many aspects regarding the production of the film. I especially liked the sections that dealt with the real astronauts and mission control-room operatives who all were consulted during the filming, that's something not many commentaries can provide (for obvious reasons).

Makes me look forward to listening to the other commentary by Jim Lovell, he must have some pretty fascinating recollections from the trip.
Reviewed by The Cubist on March 17th, 2008:Find all reviews by The Cubist
I agree with the other reviews and would add that Howard mentions how he didn’t want to make a movie about the space program but instead focus on a specific mission and the danger inherent in launching a rocket into space. It is an engaging track as the filmmaker talks about the historical accuracy of certain scenes and ones that were invented for dramatic purposes.
Reviewed by Uniblab on January 12th, 2009:Find all reviews by Uniblab
This is the first Ron Howard commentary to which I listened and I didn't get a good impression of him. He talks in a nice way,but tells randomly mostly production anecdotes and trivia; all in a very bland way, that comes across as neither interesting nor insightful.
Reviewed by reidca on February 9th, 2012:Find all reviews by reidca
This is unfortunately a fairly dull commentary. I tend to listen to commentaries while doing something else and the good one's pull me away from what I'm doing. This one disappeared into the background like wallpaper. I appreciated his comments about Roger Corman and all of his famous students putting him in their movies, as I did his remarks about his daughter, Bryce and her cameo and input into the movie. While he doesn't fall into the trap of many of his peers and simply narrate, there is a heck of a lot of self congratulation and pointing out of relatives (which is par the course for Howard).
Reviewed by drukepple on November 1st, 2016:Find all reviews by drukepple
It's a decent commentary; I don't mind the other reviewer's complaints about "lameness" but it would be better if Howard commented more. There are plenty of dead spaces, sometimes I had to check and make sure I still had the commentary track engaged. I also tend to find solo commentaries less interesting; a conversation usually holds my interest more than a monologue. Still, it's a decent commentary, and sheds a lot of light on what details are true-to-life and which one had some liberties taken.
Commentary 2: Astronaut Jim Lowell and his wife Marilyn Lowell Rating:7.9/10 (11 votes) [graph]Login to vote or review
Reviewed by space guy on July 23rd, 2004:Find all reviews by space guy
Jim Lovell was of course the comamnder of Apollo 13. It's interesting to hear commentary from someone who has a movie based on them. Jim Lovell is insightful and has alot to say about the movie and it's accuracy.
Reviewed by Agressor on March 16th, 2008:Find all reviews by Agressor
This is a nice companion piece to Ron Howards commentary. Lovell elaborates on certain events that are depicted in the film and reveals where the filmmakers have cheated or changed the facts. It's also nice to hear from his wife how affected she still gets by the events just by watching them on the dvd.
Reviewed by Uniblab on January 15th, 2009:Find all reviews by Uniblab
Although much livelier and more interesting and sympathetic than the Ron Howard commentary, and despite the fact that it is essentially a commentary on the movie's subject and not on the movie itself, this one also left me disappointed. Jim and Marilyn (mostly Jim) don't offer insights about anything beyond what's on the screen and basically stick with technical information.
Reviewed by drukepple on November 2nd, 2016:Find all reviews by drukepple
This commentary is valuable if you care about how the film compares to the true life story (spoiler: it's very close). The Lovells (mostly Jim) pretty much spend their entire commentary mentioning how a bit in the film was either exactly like that in real life, augmented/adapted to heighten an emotion, or completely fabricated. They don't talk much about the film production (but why should they, that's Ron Howard's area) and they lapse into silence fairly often, but when Jim Lovell talks, it's captivating. This commentary made me appreciate just how incredible the true story of Apollo 13 was, and how the film changed rather little about it, and reinforced why it's one of my favorite films.