The Challenger

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Movie
German title Challenger - A man fights for the truth
Original title The Challenger
Country of production UK , USA
original language English
Publishing year 2013
length 89 minutes
Age rating FSK 0
Rod
Director James Hawes
script Kate Gartside
production Laurie Borg
music Christopher Letcher
camera Lukas Strebel
cut Peter Christelis
occupation

The Challenger (US title: The Challenger Disaster ) is a television film from 2013 with William Hurt about Richard Feynman's investigation into the Challenger disaster of January 28, 1986. The film is a production of the BBC , Science Channel and Open University . It premiered on BBC2 on May 12, 2013 .

Alternatively, the film is also known under the title Challenger - A man fights for the truth .

action

Nobel laureate Richard Feynman is still a teacher in 1986 and is a living legend. He is adored by his students, but is a difficult character who is occasionally not good with other people. When the space shuttle Challenger breaks apart shortly after take-off in January 1986, he is invited to Washington DC to take part in the investigation into the accident.

The Commission also includes Sally Ride and Neil Armstrong on. Already in the first meeting the leader William P. Rogers tries to give a direction that is supposed to keep the image of NASA intact. Feynman is not enthusiastic about this. He tours the NASA site in Huntsville , Alabama , where technicians and engineers encounter him with hostility.

Some even actively try to prevent the examinations. Feynman tells them that there will be no more flights without test results.

In Cape Canaveral , all parts of the destroyed space shuttle are being collected. Here again attempts are made to cover up information from the public, and tensions between William Rogers and Feynman break out again. Feynman tells Rogers that he does not want to be tamed and that he has an obligation to the astronauts, who are believed to have plunged into the sea still alive and conscious. As an atheist, he does not believe in the " touched-the-face-of-God rhetoric " of President Reagan.

General Donald Kutyna, who has a different breed, brings Feynman back on board and he continues. At a hearing, Allan McDonald from the solid rocket project reported to Morton Thiokol as a whistleblower and stated that NASA put enormous pressure on Thiokol and that the launch was carried out despite warnings.

Feynman wants to ask questions, but he encounters a wall of silence as massive economic interests and national security are pushed forward.

Feynman's notes are not forwarded from his hotel to the commission and disappear. The almost 68-year-old Feynman is not only mentally but also physically hardly up to the task; he is disgusted by the political intrigues behind the commission and his heart is not working very well either. Nevertheless, he continues to work out of a sense of responsibility. His wife is appalled by this, but then accepts his decision. Feynman returns to Washington. Meanwhile, there is speculation in the press about a terrorist background. Feynman hands over his results to the commission and assumes that the results will be destroyed.

Finally, there will be the final hearing, which will be televised. Here the NASA representatives are unrealistic and in no way self-critical. Feynman accuses them of failure and uses a piece of rubber placed in ice water to demonstrate how the O-rings lose their elasticity in the cold and become unreliable. When the investigation report (to which Feynman's minority vote is attached) is handed over to the President, General Kutyna and Feynman speak again: Kutyna expresses his regret that the terminally ill Feynman's life was wasted on the work of the Commission; he replies that he does not consider it a waste.

The film ends with fade-ins: Sally Ride was (as Feynman already suspected) the astronaut who gave Kutyna the tip with the O-rings, Kutyna worked successfully on a military program. Allan McDonald kept working for NASA and improving the space shuttles. Feynman died of cancer two years later.

basis

The film is based on two books:

additional

  • Occasionally, live recordings of President Ronald Reagan's televisions and speeches are shown.
  • The film ran on US television on November 16, 2013 on the Discovery Channel and the Science Channel.

criticism

13 reviews were evaluated by Rottentomatoes . The film has a positive rating of 92% here.

Awards

  • Online Film & Television Association 2014
    • Nominated for the OFTA Television Award for best feature film
  • Prix ​​Europa 2014
    • Second place in the election for the Special Commendation TV Fiction
  • Royal Television Society 2014
    • RTS Television Award for best drama

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Release certificate for The Challenger . Voluntary self-regulation of the film industry , November 2015 (PDF; test number: 155 930 V).
  2. ↑ Rob Bricken: Here's William Hurt as the legendary physicist Richard Feynman! . io9. Retrieved March 20, 2013.
  3. ↑ a b End credits
  4. ↑ The Challenger at Rotten Tomatoes (English)Template: Rotten Tomatoes / Maintenance / "imported from" is missing